Administrators at the Chapel School in Bronxville, New York, are investigating some pretty horrifying allegations about a “history lesson” on slavery. A teacher at the school, Rebecca Antinozzi, allegedly held a mock slave auction with her fifth-graders as a class activity. The lesson included white students bidding on black students who were pretending to be slaves.
The New York Daily News reports that Antinozzi is, of course, white.
Vernex Harding, an educational administrator at another school, told the newspaper that her son was one of the black students singled out by the teacher. “I’m shocked and infuriated that this happened to my son,” said Harding, who understandably reached out to school leadership. “I’m very shaken.”
According to Harding, her son reported that Antinozzi selected three black students from her classroom and brought them into the hallway. There, she pretended to put them in imaginary shackles.
Then she reportedly brought them back into the classroom, where she proceeded to do the mock slave auction. This involved the white students pretending to be rich slave owners. And the teacher? She pretended to be the auctioneer. She reportedly repeated the activity in a second fifth-grade class, even after kids of all races were reportedly uncomfortable.
There’s a lot that’s disgusting about this lesson. It’s dehumanizing. It’s also traumatizing. Asking black students to role-play institutional abuse is not a teaching tool. Marginalized students aren’t props to make a point in a lesson. Black students continue to face systemic racism today; they’re more likely to be punished in school, and punished more severely at that, and have less access to advanced courses in math and science. They’re also more likely to be tried as adults … and that isn’t even taking into consideration the epidemic of police brutality.
While it’s unclear whether or not the students were asked if they wanted to participate, they’re kids. There’s a power dynamic between adult and child, teacher and student, that suggests that the students in this case would be likely to go along with the activity, regardless of how comfortable they actually were with it.
Attorney Joshua Kimerling is representing Antinozzi. He says the allegations are incorrect, and told the Daily News, “The portrayal of the history lesson that has been reported is inaccurate, out of context, contains false facts and ignores the overwhelming support of Ms. Antinozzi from dozens of parents at the school. To the extent anyone took offense to a small portion of the overall lesson that day, it certainly was never intended.”
Ah. The old “took offense” line.
In addition to an investigation by school officials, state Attorney General Letitia James is also looking into the events. “
The reports of racist ‘lessons’ by a teacher at The Chapel School are deeply troubling,” James said in a statement sent to New York station WPIX. “My office is monitoring this matter closely.” NBC reports that the teacher has been placed on indefinite leave during the investigation.
This incident is reminiscent of a recent case in which fifth-graders at a different school were assigned to pick cotton and sing slave songs as part of yet another history lesson.