San Diego County middle school yearbooks are recalled after a racial slur is noticed on the cover

A racial slur inadvertently printed on the cover of the Black Mountain Middle School yearbook sent campus employees scrambling this week to recall the students’ copies and scratch off the offensive word.

The slur was spotted by some eighth-graders who received the yearbooks Monday. Almost all of the 1,000 copies were collected Tuesday by school workers, who spent a few hours scratching off the word, said Christine Paik, director of communications for the Poway Unified School District.

The cover features the words “Looking for Adventure” emblazoned over a 19th century map of northern San Diego County. The design was intended to reflect the yearbook’s theme of travel and adventure.

What the yearbook staff didn’t notice when selecting the map, however, was that a long-since changed road name included a racial epithet for blacks.

“This is something that we definitely need to look at in terms of how the yearbook gets edited and proofread,” Paik said. “Even if it was unintentional, it was still hurtful to people.”

Darlene Willis, executive director of the Concerned Parents Alliance, which runs programs to help college-bound students, said she was disappointed to learn of the issue, but pleased with the district’s quick response.

“The majority of our families are black students,” said Willis, who was a little torn herself about what to do with the books. While part of her wanted them reprinted, she said, she understood the move would have been costly to the district and caused a delay for students.

Reprinting the books was considered, but nixed because it would have cost $36,000, Paik said.

The offensive word was on a road named after Nate Harrison, a legendary pioneer and freed slave who lived on Palomar Mountain from about 1850 until his death in 1920.

Harrison was known as the first African American homesteader in the county, and a Pauma Valley road still bears his name. San Diego State University archaeology students have been excavating the site of his cabin to learn more about life on the mountain.

According to an article by the Save Our Heritage Organization, the road with the offensive name was changed in 1955 after a successful petition drive from the NAACP. Paik said the yearbook staff found the old U.S. Geological Survey map when looking for an example of what the Black Mountain area used to look like.

To read the article in Spanish, click here

gary.warth@sduniontribune.com

Warth writes for the San Diego Union-Tribune.

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