A California school district has apologized after it offered white students a support group following Derek Chauvin‘s guilty verdict.
The havoc wreaked upon the Black community by people who align with white supremacist ideologies is taxing mentally, physically, and emotionally. This is especially the case after the Black community comes to terms with the countless lives of Black people being taken by the police. But a school district in Piedmont, California, feels its white students need support. It created a “support circle for white students.”
“A poor choice of words” is what the school district is calling the decision to implement a support group for white students. Assistant Superintendent Cheryl Wozniak, who is white, said she created the group to invite white students to “discuss how the trial, verdict, and experiences related to the George Floyd murder are impacting you. In addition, the students were to be given two counselors so they can process [and] share…to one another.”
It took less than a day for Wozniak to walk back her mission, saying her idea resulted in “our students of color…feeling hurt and disrespected by district administration.” One of the students said Wozniak’s idea was strange regardless if it was done with “good intentions.”
The school district released a statement on its website, addressing the issue, “A poor choice of words in the subject line of the invitation to white students led to the perception that white students needed the same kind of ‘support’ as our BIPOC students,” the statement reads. “Students of all racial backgrounds rightfully pushed back on that idea. We agree, and we want to affirm in the strongest terms that our commitment is to give all students a place to express their feelings and to learn how to engage in important issues.”
