St. Paul Teacher Accused Of Discriminating Against Black Students

[Penny Lane 8,159]

Heights Community School parents have filed a lawsuit that is now moving to federal courts against the St. Paul Public School District in Minnesota, amid an investigation into allegations that teacher Timothy Olmsted discriminated against black students.

Olmsted resigned after the district placed him on paid leave in the spring after parents complained that he called black students "fat, black and stupid" and told them, "you will never amount to anything" and "you only have one parent," WCCO reported.

The teacher also allegedly forced black students to sit in the back of the classroom, or sit with their desks facing the wall.

"He told the whole entire class that it is easier for him to teach rich white folks than poor black people," Tolbert told WCCO.

Olmsted resigned in March, but is still being paid through the first week of October, and parents are dissatisfied. He is also not facing disciplinary action due to the resignation.

In the suit, parents claim that the district failed to protect their children from Olmsted, the Star Tribune reports. Latasha Tolbert, mother of 12-year-old Jamia Ware, said she made nearly 100 calls to school officials in the fall regarding Olmsted's classroom behavior, but the no one acted until January.

District representatives, however, tell the Star Tribune that an investigation was launched promptly and all complaints against the teacher were addressed immediately. Olmsted's attorney notes that the teacher "denies any improper conduct and believes that the claims against him are baseless."

But the educator has a record of controversy. The St. Paul School District reported in 2002 that Olmsted gave a sixth grade girl a birthday card with sexual innuendos, and requested that she read it to the class. He was also accused of giving a graphic description of castrating horses and throwing testicles into a field to feed cats.

For the various incidents over the years, disciplinary actions against him have ranged from written reprimands to days of suspension without pay. Students also find his more recent, racial comments strange.

"He would say random things like when I get out of the shower my dog dries me off," student Aylecia Ingram-Jones told WCCO in a separate report.

Her father, Miguel Jones, has moved the teen to another school district, and asserts that there should be no question about whether Olmsted should be allowed to keep teaching.

"I wouldn't stand for it," Jones said. "Right is right. Wrong is wrong."

Minnesota does not have statewide regulations regarding disciplinary action for teachers, so process is followed based on district decisions and as outlined in teachers' union contracts.

The allegations in St. Paul are similar to complaints against Kathleen Pyles, a math teacher at North End Middle School in Waterbury, Conn., who was placed on paid leave in June while officials investigate claims that she addressed a black student with a racist remark.

Parents have accused Pyles of inappropriately calling a student "black boy" when she couldn't remember his name. When she first called the boy by the wrong name, he pointed out her mistake. So she responded, "How about black boy? Go sit down, black boy."

Parents are calling for her dismissal.

In another incident in March, a Virginia high school English teacher allegedly asked the only black student in the class to read a poem in a "blacker" manner.

Jordan Shumate, a ninth-grader at George C. Marshall High School in Falls Church, Va., says he was reading aloud Langston Hughes' "Ballad of the Landlord" when teacher Marilyn Bart interrupted him.

"She told me, 'Blacker, Jordan -- c'mon, blacker. I thought you were black,'" Shumate told The Washington Post.

Source

[rocks 494]

It's surprising that this still goes on, isn't it? Anyone would think it was still 1960...

Brandy Springer pulled her two children from the school after her 12-year-old daughter, who is half native-American and in the 6th grade, was told she didn't meet the qualifications to run for the office of reporter on grounds that she was not black, the AP reports.

According to the website MixedandHappy, Springer's daughter was told "she should run for class president, that was open to only white students." When the Nettleton mother initially took the matter up with the school board to inquire about which racial category her daughter fell under given her mixed-race, she was told, "Go by the mother's race b/c with minorities the father isn't generally in the home," and that "a city court order is the reason why it is this way."

Link Nettleton Middle School Segregates Students: Only Whites Can Run For President

The middle school election rules,were brought to the public's attention when the mother of a mixed race sixth grader went online to complain that her daughter could not run for reporter because she wasn't black.

Brandy Springer's daughter, a sixth grader of mixed white and Native American heritage said the 12-year-old girl came home distraught that she would not be allowed to run for reporter-–a position slated only for black students.

Springer, who recently moved to Mississippi from Florida, has another son of mixed white and Native American heritage and two younger children, who are mixed white and African American, and said she was shocked by the policy.

"The principal told me this was court-ordered in 1969. I just kept saying, 'I don't think you're executing the order the way it was intended.' To me this is the definition of segregation. If you're black you can never be class president," she said.

Miss. Middle School Bars Black Students From Running For Class President

[X Factor 1,112]

I don't see the race of the perp being mentioned. But he is a racist and a pervert.

[Penny Lane 8,159]

I don't see the race of the perp being mentioned. But he is a racist and a pervert.

There's a picture of him at the source.

[rocks 494]

I don't see the race of the perp being mentioned. But he is a racist and a pervert.

[Teddy B 17,252]

Is orange a race?

[Penny Lane 8,159]

Is orange a race?

Hahahaha.

[rocks 494]

Is orange a race?

[Danno 1,228]

Just one more reason why students captive in a government school is a bad idea.

[rocks 494]

Just one more reason why students captive in a government school is a bad idea.

Yes, this is the governments fault. Let's live in total anarchy...

Perhaps you would prefer this?

The American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana threatened Tuesday to sue a northeastern Louisiana charter school if it doesn’t change rules that keep pregnant students out of the classroom and require girls under suspicion of being pregnant to be tested.

The four-paragraph “Student Pregnancy Policy” in Delhi Charter School’s policy manual says that if a suspected girl refuses to take a pregnancy test, she can be removed from class or the school.

That violates the U.S. Constitution and federal laws against sexual discrimination, state ACLU executive director Marjorie R. Esman said.

Edited August 8, 2012 by rocks

[Danno 1,228]

Yes, this is the governments fault. Let's live in total anarchy...

In your mind, those are the only two choices.

[rocks 494]

In your mind, those are the only two choices.

Read my edit.

[Danno 1,228]

Read my edit.

Edit Smedit, in your view we will have governemnt run schools are anarchy.

But maybe we can find agreement..... lets get rid of teachers unions so the School district can act decisively and sh_t can such teachers.

[X Factor 1,112]

There's a picture of him at the source.

Now you see why I post pictures

[rocks 494]

Edit Smedit, in your view we will have governemnt run schools are anarchy.

But maybe we can find agreement..... lets get rid of teachers unions so the School district can act decisively and sh_t can such teachers.

I don't understand the first line. Perhaps you should have used the "edit" function.

I don't think getting rid of unions will solve this problem. How will it make any difference to the charter school in Louisiana?