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BY MICHAELA SAUNDERS |
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| WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER |
A small group of Westside High School students plastered the school Monday with posters advocating that a white student from South Africa receive the "Distinguished African American Student Award" next year.
The students' actions on Martin Luther King Jr. Day upset several students and have led administrators to discipline four students.
The posters, placed on about 150 doors and lockers, included a picture of the junior student smiling and giving a thumbs up. The posters encouraged votes for him.
The posters were removed by administrators because they were "inappropriate and insensitive," Westside spokeswoman Peggy Rupprecht said Tuesday.
Rupprecht said the award always has been given to black students.
Westside Assistant Principal Pat Hutchings said the award has been given for eight years on Martin Luther King Jr. Day to a senior selected by teachers.
Rupprecht said disciplinary action was taken against the students involved but, citing student privacy policies, she declined to specify the penalties or what about the students' action led to them.
Karen Richards said her son, Trevor, who was pictured on the posters, was suspended for two days for hanging the posters. Two of his friends also were disciplined for hanging the posters. A fourth student, she said, was punished for circulating a petition Tuesday morning in support of the boys. The petition criticized the practice of recognizing only black student achievement with the award.
One of the school's students, Tylena Martin, said she was hurt by the posters and the backlash she said it caused.
Martin, a junior, said she is the only black student in her homeroom class, and the poster was on the door to her classroom when she arrived Monday morning.
Westside has fewer than 70 blacks out of 1,843 students this year.
Hutchings said she heard from several students about the posters Monday.
"Many students were offended," she said.
Karen Richards said her son and his friends were not trying to hurt anyone.
"My son is not a racist," she said. "He has black friends, friends from Bangladesh and Egypt. Color has never been an issue in our home."
"It was a very innocent thing," she said.
Richards said her family moved to Omaha from Johannesburg six years ago. Trevor, she said, "is as African as anyone."
