Caesar Rodney School District investigating Black History Month lesson

By Brooke Schultz
Posted 2/26/21

CAMDEN — Officials in the Caesar Rodney School District are investigating an “unacceptable” Black History Month lesson taught at an early childhood center circulating online.

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Caesar Rodney School District investigating Black History Month lesson

Posted

CAMDEN — Officials in the Caesar Rodney School District are investigating an “unacceptable” Black History Month lesson taught at an early childhood center circulating online.

In a statement, Mike Williams, a district spokesman, said that the district considered the lesson “unacceptable and not consistent with Caesar Rodney School District values.

“The situation is currently being investigated,” he said.

Footage of the lesson from a McIlvaine Early Childhood Center class posted by local television station WMDT touches on the transatlantic slave trade, stating that African people “came to America on boats to become slaves” and that “the Africans were treated very poorly even though they farmed the land and plowed the fields to make America beautiful and help grow our food.”

The lesson was paired with yoga poses, such as the plow pose and boat pose.

The incident follows the district grappling with how it handles racism, first brought to the forefront by students over the summer after Black Lives Matter protests took place throughout the state and country.

After a petition garnered thousands of signatures calling on the district to adopt “specific, antiracist educational policies,” the district outlined several initiatives in response.

Goals included creating a coordinator of equity and diversity — that position was hired over the summer — re-evaluating the humanities curriculum, commitment to promoting the hiring of people of color, diversity training and meeting regularly with the Black Student Union.

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