A cotton field planted at a Hollywood school to teach the horrors of slavery has traumatized an African-American student, according to lawsuits filed in California.
Rashunda Pitts, who claims the episode caused her daughter emotional distress, is seeking $250,000 in damages.
“He has uncontrollable anxiety attacks and … experiences depressive episodes when thinking about the cotton harvest project,” according to the complaint filed this week against the school district.
The cotton fields, where slaves were forced to work in appalling conditions, remain a defining symbol of this period in American history.
“Identify with the reality of African-American slaves”
The student, identified only by the initials SW, began studying at the Laurel Span School in Hollywood in late 2017. From an enthusiastic start, SW, now 17, had grown more sullen and tired, the document said.
Shortly afterward, as Rashunda Pitts was dropping her daughter off at school, she noticed cotton fields on campus.
“Baffled that a cotton field is growing in Hollywood, let alone public school grounds,” she had asked to speak to management, according to the complaint.
She was told that the children in her daughter’s class read the autobiography of Frederick Douglass, a famous black abolitionist, and that “picking cotton was one of the experiences he talked about.”
The school official he spoke to reportedly explained that the field had been planted to give younger children an idea of what slaves were required to do.
“Very outraged by the idea that the school asked her daughter and other children to pick cotton as part of a school exercise to identify with the reality of African-American slaves, Mrs. Pitts had expressed her disappointment and her pain” in he faced an “insensitive” project, we can read in the complaint.
Removed “educational activity”
According to the document, the school did not ask for the parents’ permission and did not inform them about this project in advance.
Also according to the same source, the Los Angeles Unified School District, which oversees the school, said in a statement that it regretted that an “educational activity” was considered insensitive.
“When school officials learned of a parent’s concern about the cotton field, they responded immediately by removing it,” the school district said.
In a statement to AFP, a spokesman said the school district “generally does not comment on pending or anticipated litigation.”
Source: BFM TV
