Principal Responds To ACLU’s Investigation Into Whether His School Singled Out Latinos For Talk On Sex, Gangs And Low Test Scores
27 September 2009, 10:30 AM. By Alex Alvarez
Principal Gene Suttle of Gainesville High School issued a response on behalf of his administration after it was revealed that the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas would be looking into whether they discriminated against Latino students. A concerned parent had called the ACLU to inform them that Latino students had been called over the high school’s intercom and ushered into an assembly where they were essentially blamed for the school’s low TAKS scores before being lectured about sex and gangs.
Said Suttle:
At no time were these kiddos accused of being responsible for the rating of this school. We have a lot of very successful Hispanic kids. It was an informational meeting to make sure they know what support is available.
He added that, despite the complaint presented to the ACLU and despite another’s student’s comment about having been made “uncomfortable” when the discussion suddenly turned from test scores to the topic of promiscuous sex, many parents were happy about the meeting. Suttle also mentioned that other groups of (presumably non-Latino) students were lectured to in other, separate meetings.
So, Suttle didn’t deny that only Latinos were called into this assembly - he simply stated that his school thinks it is appropriate to divide students by ethnicity in order to educate them.
And this helps his case… how?
Principal says Hispanics weren’t blamed for school’s low state rating [Star-Telegram]
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The ACLU Wants To Know Whether Latino Students Were Singled Out For Poor Test Scores At Texas High School
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Ay dios mio, que estupido. Gainsville High School’s actions exceed NYC public school nonsense by a lot. It’s incredible how in this day and age you’d have such blatant and unapologetic prejudice, and towards kids, no less! Reminds me of the time our 8th grade bilingual class was involved in some sort of ill-conceived pen pal program with an Iowa middle school. Our teacher read the letters aloud without screening them first, and the first potential pen pal asked if we were in a gang and what our “tag name” was. The best part was when the kid wrote something about his parents not allowing him to have sex and wanting us to write back what it was like because we were surely more experienced in the carnal arts. LOL. You’d think their teacher back in Iowa would have read the letters before sending them, this seemed so inappropriate.
If I had a child at that school, I would be more concerned about the fact that my child lost classroom instructional time while attending that lecture. It’s no secret that hundreds of schools in Texas refused to show President Obama’s speech to the students because they claimed it was “taking away from instructional time and not part of the written curriculum.” I don’t see how a lecture regarding sex and gangs is part of the written curriculum and yet the students were pulled out of their classrooms to listen to it.