Led by Rev. Amos Brown, pastor emeritus of San Francisco’s Third Baptist Church and longtime NAACP leader, community leaders called on San Francisco Superintendent of Schools Maria Su and the Board of Education to take swift, concerted action to combat students’ use of the n-word in public schools.
“There has been an outbreak of hate speech against Black students and the district must put an end to discriminatory language and the use of the n-word against Black students,” said Rev. Brown at a recent press conference at school district headquarters. The community demand follows incidents at Lincoln High School where an African-American baseball player was racially mocked at a junior varsity championship game in May, and a fight was allegedly sparked by a student’s use of the n-word this fall. Some portions of the cross-racial fight that took place Sept. 4 were videoed and the subject of a Chinese language TV news report. While the fight’s origin, perpetrators and victims are the subject of discussion and debate, parents and community members from all backgrounds are on record agreeing on at least one aspect — common dissatisfaction with school administrators on addressing their concerns.
In 2014, the NAACP updated and strengthened its own earlier ban on the use of the n-word and described it as “derogatory, degrading, dehumanizing and … one of the most offensive words in history.” At the same time, the 117-year old civil rights organization acknowledged that the n-word was “too often freely and casually used by some individuals in popular media, literature, and general society with usage broadened across racial and generational backgrounds.” The resolution called upon all local NAACP adult branches and youth units to make eradication of the n-word a top civil rights priority, implement educational efforts about its offensiveness, and establish a reporting process.
Recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions give school district personnel the authority to combat racial epithets or offensive speech on campus and on social media, but they also allow individuals to profit from using racial epithets by striking down the prohibition on disparaging names in patent and trademark law. Here are ways school district administrators can step up and take action.
Racial epithets are a cancer in any institution, particularly schools. When faced with treating a cancer, a medical professional must locate the disease and find out to what extent it has spread. Step one for the school district should be to survey adults and students about how often and where they hear racial epithets at school. Cafeteria workers, hall monitors, paraeducators, and coaches will have particularly important intelligence about use of the n-word because they hear and interact with students in more unstructured, informal settings than classroom teachers.
Racial epithets are a cancer in any institution, particularly schools.
Not only is it important for school administrators, when establishing policies and procedures to address use of the n-word, to know its frequency, but it is also important to learn more about who says it and who it targets. Are there differences in its use among student demographic groups? If its use becomes more prevalent in middle school and high school, are there different ways to approach younger students to reverse that pattern? Are there any meaningful differences between when it is typically said as a means of bullying or in anger and when it is used within a community with a different intention or meaning? Answers to these and other questions will produce better results than relying on anecdotes and assumptions about what is happening in district schools.
In 2022, local press reported that the school district removed an elementary school principal for using the n-word in a talk to new immigrant students to educate them on its hateful history in the United States and why it should not be used. The principal’s use of the n-word may have fit within the very narrow category of acceptable purposes listed in the NAACP resolution that are exempt from its ban — when it “alludes to the historical context of the word or … highlights [its] prejudicial nature.” If it didn’t, perhaps the NAACP’s twelve years of experience implementing its educational program nationwide could offer better ways to educate young people. The Anti-Defamation League has its own high school lesson plan on the n-word’s history, use, and impact. With clarity and partnership, the school district can make meaningful progress toward not just reducing the use of the n-word but increasing understanding of its abhorrent place in American history and society. A strategy focused solely on punishing its use risks increasing its use by young people seeking attention or challenging authority.
Any plan to end use of the n-word in San Francisco public schools should be accompanied by parallel efforts against racial epithets directed against other communities as well. If successful, the school district can truly unify its stakeholders, make school a more appealing place for students and families, reduce one of the factors contributing to chronic absenteeism, and improve student outcomes. As President Johnson stated when calling upon Congress to pass the Fair Housing Act days after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., “The time to act is now.”
