Some families in Loudoun County, Virginia, are outraged after a high school history class in which the teacher told the students to pass around cotton.
The lesson last Thursday at Riverside High School involved a discussion surrounding cotton, the invention of the cotton gin and enslavement. As part of the discussion, the teacher passed around a piece of raw cotton," a spokesperson for Loudoun County Public Schools said in a statement to News4.
Loudoun County NAACP President Pastor Michelle Thomas said she received a complaint from a Black student in the class after the lesson at the Leesburg school last Thursday.
"Black students were extremely embarrassed and humiliated. In some sections of the class, we had students that were actually laughing and making jokes," she said.
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"The lesson was upsetting to some students. This is contrary to what we believe the teacher - and LCPS - strive to accomplish in our classrooms," LCPS said in its statement. "It is the division’s intention to achieve a safe and inclusive learning environment for all students. That is not what happened here and we must and will do better."
Thomas said she hopes teachers understand the hurtful connotations of cotton to students of color.
"The fact that teachers have cotton on hand to be used as demonstration, that is problematic, especially when they’re teaching advanced classes," she said.
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Riverside High School Principal Doug Anderson said in a letter sent to parents of students in the class that the lesson "invoked uncomfortable feelings in some students."
Anderson said administrators, teachers and counselors would work to support students who were involved.
“We take matters that involve our students’ safety, both physically and emotionally, seriously," the letter said in part.
In 2019, students at Madison’s Trust Elementary School in Brambleton were forced to act as runaway slaves for a gym lesson during Black History Month.
That same year, Loudoun County Public Schools and the outside firm Equity Collaborative issued a report, finding many students of color had experienced racial slurs. One student reported their teacher said in class that “all Arabs are terrorists.”
LCPS created an equity plan in response to that report, with goals such as diverse hiring and culturally responsive instruction.
"I just don’t understand why there’s this cultural competence gap with our teachers still at Loudoun County, especially when we’ve done so much equity work. It’s hurtful," she said.
LCPS said its diversity department would work with teaching and learning to "develop further guidance for instructional staff when lessons could potentially be associated with trauma."
Parents are supposed to be given advance notice about learning content involving sensitive topics, but that didn't happen in this case, the spokesperson for LCPS said. The school system promised to review those policies with staff.
