'We messed up': ELPS criticized for racially insensitive homework assignment

A homework assignment on slavery drew sharp criticism after its graphic imagery distressed at least one Black family in East Lansing Public Schools. 

Chelsea Wade said her daughter, an eighth grader at MacDonald Middle School, completed an assignment during Black History Month that presented violent images and descriptions of slaves, slave quarters and rebellions, then asked students to imagine themselves as enslaved people.

The assignment traumatized her daughter and the entire family, Wade said.

One exercise on the three-page worksheet showed students a photo of a slave rebellion in which a Black man is strangling a white man. It then asked: "Imagine you were one of these enslaved persons. Describe what would bring you to the point of fighting back."

Another question showed students an image of enslaved people in cotton fields. "Imagine you are one of the enslaved people in this scene," it read. "Describe how you would feel at the end of the day."

East Lansing Public Schools sent home an apology letter to all eighth grade families on March 12, which Wade said was unsatisfactory. The letter was signed by Superintendent Dori Leyko, Director of Curriculum Glenn Mitcham, MacDonald Principal Amy Martin and eighth-grade history teachers Matthew Christians and Katelyn Newcombe.

"These are educators and they should know better," said Wade, who declined to name her daughter. "How does it go through the superintendent, principal, curriculum director and two social studies teachers to pass this assignment on to my daughter? No one stepped in to say, ‘hey, this is a problem.'"

Wade filed a complaint with the Lansing branch of the NAACP. The chapter's Vice President Randy Watkins said it was forwarded to the organization's legal redress team for review. 

"We messed up and we fully admit that," Leyko told the Lansing State Journal. "We aren’t trying to defend the assignment or excuse what we’ve done. It’s been a part of our board-adopted social studies curriculum. It’s outdated."

Mitcham said the curriculum in question, developed and released by Teachers' Curriculum Institute (TCI), is in thousands of schools across the country. His office is reprioritizing replacing the social studies curriculum, he said, but has no timeframe for how long it will take.

The district had been waiting to purchase a new curriculum until the state Department of Education approved new standards, Mitcham said, which took five years. 

Still, he conceded, the assignment was likely approved by TCI with white students in mind.

"Even in the constructing of curriculum, it was done, I believe, in that white supremacist world of, ‘What can we do for the white kids?’ with probably some good intentions, but missing out on the perspective of Black and brown people," he said. 

Wade spoke during the public comment portion of ELPS' board meeting Monday, eliciting strong reactions from the board and Leyko. 

"Teach about the building of pyramids, kings and queens, the rich history of scientists, mathematicians and inventors," Wade said at the meeting. "Instead, this assignment asked my daughter to get in the mindset of her ancestors as a slave. How dare the school inflict pain and trauma on my daughter, my family and all of the other families that are hurt by this school’s failure?"

Board members Terah Chambers and Kath Edsall "broke public comment protocol" to immediately apologize and condemn the assignment. 

"I have spent my years on the board working to correct these issues," Edsall said. "Each of us are trying to rectify a white supremacist district in a white supremacist city, state and country."

Wade's daughter got an "A" on the assignment, to her mother's frustration. In one of her answers, Wade's daughter wrote that she would not fight back against a slave master out of fear for making matters worse or being killed. 

"She said she figured that’s what they – her white teachers – wanted to hear," Wade recalled her daughter saying. "Clearly she was correct. Had my daughter answered the opposite and said ‘I’d fight back at every chance I got to gain my freedom and kill every white slave owner in my path,’ would that answer be correct (and) also receive an ‘A?’"

That took the district by surprise, Mitcham later said. All eighth grade students had the assignment removed from their graded record, but Wade was able to locate it through her daughter's Google Classroom account. 

"One thing that I did discover in the follow-up is that everyone got an 'A' on it," Mitcham said. "It was an attempt to try and give all benefit and no harm, but it would have been better to get rid of it completely."

Leyko refrained from holding one staffer solely responsible for the assignment. The district bares a collective responsibility and needs to be held accountable, she said — part of a broader effort to elevate diversity in ELPS and provide an inclusive and equitable education. 

Board member Debbie Walton suggested that parents, rather than staff, be allowed to lead the district's Marble equity teams. Those groups, named after Marble Elementary, advocate for equitable and inclusive education in ELPS elementary schools. 

Wade also asked that those teams do more to review inclusivity in ELPS curriculum and that they be placed in middle and high schools.

Leyko said the teams are helmed by ELPS employees and board members, but she was open to the idea of adding community members, parents and students. Members are currently undergoing training to ensure they have an appropriate grasp on concepts surrounding social justice, equity and inclusion. 

Leyko said TCI's history assignment was a step back for the district, but that they plan to recover and rectify it. She was embarrassed to learn about the assignment, she said, but sees it as an opportunity to "repair the harm and help us learn to do better."

How, according to ELPS, should students learn about slavery and slave rebellions? 

"It’s (about) teaching it from the perspective of what the institution of slavery rendered for white people and the power it rendered," Mitcham said. "That’s where we should have come from on this assignment. Allow students to analyze and think through and talk about the institution of slavery instead of trying to bring it down to this personal level of ‘what would it feel like if you were a slave?'"

Contact reporter Krystal Nurse at (517) 267-1344or knurse@lsj.com. Follow her on Twitter @KrystalRNurse.