D16 is taking a Food Science class this year because she is considering majoring in food sci. She has taken all Honors/AP throughout her HS career. This is a regular level class and the majority of students in her class have not taken any AP courses. This is one of the first experiences she has had with classmates who have not primarily taken honors courses. There are quite a few athletes in this class because it fulfills a 4th science credit needed to graduate on a distinguished scholar plan and is not an advanced academic class. Not that athletes don't take honors/AP classes, I point out the athletes because these incidents involve some varsity athletes.
Today the teacher handed back an assignment that according to my D16, the majority of the class failed. D16 has maintained around a 96 in the class and she received a 100 on this particular assignment, which was entirely fill in the blank from the required reading and write out some definitions. It was not a subjectively graded assignment. One of her classmates, an African American young man, sitting next to her noted her grade and called out "Of course she got a 100, she is white". In the past he has also said "Put me in the lab group with the white girl, that will guarantee me a good grade".
Earlier in the course D16 turned in her portion of a draft of a group project on time, one of few who turned in on time, (late portions received a 5 point deduction) and another basketball player commented that they all had basketball practice and all the white girl had to do was study and watch netflix The teacher, who happens to be a football defensive line coach, quickly shut him down by saying D16 plays lacrosse and a weekend LAX tournament hadn't effected her ability to get the draft work done, "Do the work and stop making excuses".
She was really bothered by the comment today and wanted to say "I get "A(s)" because I am not stupid and I do the work, idiot". Her question is how many times does she ignore the hostility before she defends herself and why is it ok for him to make what she sees as discriminatory comments? Beyond listening to her I really didn't have any real advice to give her on how to handle this situation now or in the future. Generally I tell her to ignore it because it is not going to change anyone's mind to argue.
↧