‘A mockery out of slavery’: US school teacher under fire for botched-up lesson, faces investigation

A White school teacher in the US is facing investigation after immense criticism for allegedly asking seventh-grade social studies class students, mostly Black, to pick seeds out of cotton and wear handcuffs when lessons on slavery were taught, media reports said.

The incident happened in a school in Rochester, New York. The unidentified teacher has been put on leave.

Adam Urbanski, president, teacher's union, told WXXI-AM, “if someone departs from what they should be doing, they should suffer the consequences, but due process has to be allowed first.”

“It made me feel bad to be a Black person,” Jahmiere O’Neal, a ‘School of the Arts’ student, told reporters.

The matter came to fore when a parent, in a Facebook post, said that her daughter was confronted with the cotton-picking lesson on Tuesday.

“He made a mockery out of slavery. I don’t have a problem with you teaching our kids about slavery and what our ancestors went through and how they had to pick cotton. Our teachers back in the day told us that, but they don’t bring in cotton and make you pick cotton seeds out of cotton,” the mother, Precious Tross, told news outlets.

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The parents are asking the authorities to sack the teacher and revoke his licence.

In a letter, Kelly Nicastro, school’s principal, told parents, school leaders “take these allegations very seriously”, as per reports.

“In a district of Black and brown students, it is important to be sensitive of the historical framework by which our students are engaging and learning,” board president Cynthia Elliott told the outlets.

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(With inputs from agencies)