CENTINELA VALLEY PROTEST: A SEARCH FOR COMMON GROUND : All Sides Speak Out on Centinela Schools’ Racial Tension

Micheal Gloud, Hawthorne Senior

Micheal Gloud, Hawthorne High School Associated Student Body president, is a 17-year-old senior. He is a varsity baseball player who attended Jane Addams Elementary School and Yukon Intermediate School.

Q: What do you think has been the cause of the racial tensions and student unrest in the district?

A: The board members didn’t respond to allegations (that the board wanted to fire all minority faculty members), so the students felt that what was being alleged was true. If the allegations were . . . that they were getting rid of Mr. (Ken) Crowe because he is black and the board members don’t say otherwise, then what are the students led to believe, except that what has been alleged is true?. . .

I’d say about 95% of the students who marched from Leuzinger High School had absolutely no idea what was going on, and they did it primarily to get out of class. . . .

I believe that a lot of students on this campus, and I can’t speak for Leuzinger, feel that this came almost directly, but definitely indirectly, from Mr. Crowe. A lot of this unrest and the walkout was because Mr. Crowe gave a public resignation and gave a little inference (that he was forced to resign because of his race). Then the whole student body was saying, “Oh my God. They’re firing him because he’s black, and that’s not fair. We’ve got to go to his side.”

Q: Do you feel having the mannequin on campus was racially insensitive?

A: To the best of my knowledge that was completely pulled out of the closet. Mr. Gold had that mannequin in his room for years. . . . They wanted it painted . . . so one of the students was taking it across the school to the print shop to get it painted and, you know, he was kind of walking in circles and walking around making sure everybody saw it. And Mr. Crowe and Mr. (Jerome) Brown (Hawthorne’s head of security) both saw it and they both confronted Mr. (Michael) Gold about it. . . . It wasn’t meant to be any kind of racial slur or anything.

Q: How do you feel about the anonymous notes and cartoons that were sent to black teachers and administrators?

A: I’m not sure how many students know about the notes and everything. You know, a lot of notes can be written by students because there is a lot of student unrest. . . . But, as far as I know, they are all just allegations and have not been put to the test yet.

Q: Is there racism in the schools?

A: One thing that I know that I can say for the students is we just want to get back to the learning process. The teachers, the administrators, the school board members and the parents, all they’re thinking about is themselves. I stand right here at lunchtime and these are all blacks right here. There’s no tension. I stand there with Mexicans, and there are white people and Samoans over here and there’s no tensions. It’s between themselves. And they don’t seem to realize that what they are hurting is our learning process.

Q: How effectively have the school board, administrators and teachers responded to the situation?

A: I think that if (the school board members) would have gotten their allegations addressed quickly, right after the allegations were presented to them, then there wouldn’t be all this.

Q: Three of the school board members were elected in November. Some people say they have not been given enough time to address the problems. Do you agree?

A: OK, they come in and (the allegations) are new to them. But is it still going to take three or four months before they can answer to the public why there is student unrest, why all the parents and all the teachers think there is racism in the school?

Q: What about teachers?

A: There are a handful of teachers here that are using up their class time (to talk about the racism allegations) and are going about this process wrong. But as for the other teachers, they just want to get on with the teaching process. . . . Mr. (Charles) Prater, (a black teacher who has been the victim of racially offensive notes and cartoons) I feel, blows things way out of proportion, and he wants to go on with increasing the magnitude of the problem.

Q: How have administrators handled the situation?

A: I think that especially (Supt.) McKinley Nash should have seen this coming. . . . I feel that he allowed this to happen. He knew something was going to happen, and he didn’t take enough assertive action to see that it didn’t. That goes for Mr. Crowe too.

Q: What should they have done?

A: They should have tried their best to keep it out of school by maybe making it clear to the school board that these kinds of things need to be discussed behind closed doors.

Q: What should be done to address the problems?

A: The student unrest is over, for the most part. We are uniting more. This is more of a school like it used to be. . . . (Administrators, teachers and board members) need to solve these problems behind closed doors, because as soon as it affects us it affects everyone.

Q: Some people have said that the district needs to offer white teachers programs to help them better relate to minorities. Do you agree?

A: No. I think we all need to be more open. I think minority teachers should be more accepting of what is going on. They need to accept that there is racism everywhere but that it can be minimal. But when they take something like (the mannequin incident) and blow that up, that’s just wrong. They’re making something out of nothing. They, minority teachers, need to be more accepting so we can all work together in the same environment and help the children learn to the best of their ability and reach their goals. That’s what they are here for.

Q: Has any good come from all of this?

A: No, not a damn bit of good, unless we find through investigations that the allegations were correct and people are prosecuted.