Friday, June 27, 2008

Black Students Given "Ghetto" Names In HS Yearbook

I can see how some might find this funny, but I can also see how people could be extremely offended by it.

Phony "ghetto" names were printed under a yearbook photo of Black Student Union members at a suburban Los Angeles high school, leaving some angry students and parents calling for an apology and a reprint.

"Tay Tay Shaniqua," "Crisphy Nanos" and "Laquan White" were among the nine names placed next to the club's photo in Charter Oak High School's yearbook, Charter Oak Unified School District Superintendent Clint Harwick said.

Yearbooks are not the place to make fun of people. I stated that before, here.

3 comments:

KauaiMark said...

Noone proofread the master copy before going to press?

Ellen K said...

This is why the yearbook teacher is supposed to read the galley before approving publication. When you allow kids to do this kind of thing without oversight, you will end up with petty fights being fought on the pages. Locally we had a similar issue.

Lord Floppington said...

At a school with 2,000 students, there's a decent chance that any teacher might know less than 500 kids by sight, and even less than that by name.

Just because a student is in the BSU does not mean that the student is guaranteed to be known by all teachers.

While it may certainly be the case, I didn't notice any indication that the yearbook teacher knew any of the kids in the photo.

Take all of that, toss in the urge to create "unique" names for children among some parents, and I have no difficulty imagining a yearbook teacher seeing those names and honestly believing that they are not bogus or goof names put in by someone pulling a prank.