Yearbooks recalled after racial slur noticed on cover

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

The slur was spotted by some 8th grade students who received the books Monday. Almost all of the 1,000 books were collected Tuesday by school workers, who spent a few hours scratching off the word, said Christine Paik, director of communications with the Poway Unified School District.

The cover featured the words “Looking for Adventure” emblazoned over a 19th Century map of North County. The design was intended to reflect the yearbook 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.

“This is something that we definitely need to look at in terms of how the yearbook gets edited and proof-read,” Paik said. “Even if it was unintentional, it was still hurtful to people, and we don’t want to do it again.”

Darlene Willis, co-founder and executive director of Concern Parents Alliance, once had two children at Black Mountain Middle School and said she was disappointed to learn of the issue, but pleased with the district’s quick response.

“The school district called us and wanted to give us a heads up,” said Willis, adding that the alliance runs programs to help college-bound students. “The majority of our families are black students, and they wanted us to look at the yearbook and see what we thought.”

Willis said she was a little torn about what to do with the books. While part of her wanted the books reprinted, she said she also understood the move would have been costly to the district and caused a delay for students, who typically like to have friends sign the pages inside.

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

All but three of the books distributed to eighth graders were returned Tuesday. The school has contacted the students who didn’t turn theirs in and will collect the outstanding copies, Paik said.

Sixth and seventh graders have not received their yearbooks yet.

Willis said the employees took care in altering the books, and the scratches don’t look bad. She said that although the slur was unintentional, there is a lesson to be learned.

“It’s a historical document, but it belongs in history books, not an eighth grade yearbook,” she said. “In all fairness, it’s small, but we just have to be very careful.”

She said schools should be especially careful when reprinting things from the past, when such slurs were more common.

“We need to review it and review it again,” Willis said. “ We can’t afford to have setbacks like this.”

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 archeology students have been excavating the site of his old cabin to learn more about life on the mountain the late 1800s and early 20th Century.

According to an article by 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 United States Geological Survey map when looking for an example of what the Black Mountain area used to look like.

Black Mountain Middle School Principal Charan Kirpalani issued a statement to students and families following the discovery of the slur.

“In using a historical map from the 1800’s of northern San Diego County, our staff and yearbook editors inadvertently used a background image for the cover of this year’s yearbook containing a highly offensive racial term,” he wrote. “This was a reference to an area of San Diego County on Palomar Mountain which was once known as the home of a freed slave, and referred to with a very derogatory label.

“We deeply regret this error and have recalled all yearbooks distributed to grade 8 students and will delay distributing the books to our grade 6 and 7 students,” he continued. “We understand how important the yearbooks are to our students and are working on getting their memories to them. We are making the correction and will redistribute the yearbooks as soon as possible. Please contact us with any concern.”

gary.warth@sduniontribune.com

Twitter: @GaryWarthUT

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