This article is one of a series of articles produced by The Seattle Medium through support provided by the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative to Word In Black, a collaborative of 10 Black-owned media outlets across the country.
By Aaron Allen
The Seattle Medium
River Ridge High School (RRHS) in Olympia, Washington is living its own civil discourse as young Black students from the River Ridge Black Student Union (BSU) and Black Student Unions across Thurston County have taken it upon themselves to fight for their right to exist in a safe educational environment.
Embattled in their own struggle with members of the Olympia School Board and River Ridge High School administration, the BSU is fighting for their dignity against racism and sexual harassment.
The roots of the controversy stem from an incident that took place on January 14, when students at Capital High School in Olympia were videotaped using profane and racially charged language towards basketball players from River Ridge High School. The incident sparked outraged in the Olympia community, but Black students from River Ridge did not find this to be anything new as their school environment experiences battles with racial divides, discrimination and sexual harassment of its own.
One alleged incident occurred when Manuel “Mannie” Dartey, an African American student, shared his spoken word poetry on MLK day over zoom with his school. Unfortunately, it is alleged that a parent then shared the zoom with a neo-Nazi organization that circulated it online, putting him at risk of potential harm.
Since that time, members of the BSU have taken action to address the issues of racial rhetoric, discrimination and allegations of sexual harassment at the school. Their actions, which included a walkout where nearly 200 students walked out of class, have inspired many to become young leaders in their community.
However, instead of having their issues/concerns fully supported by school officials, members of the BSU claim that the school’s administration “has made them out to be dangerous rebels.”
In a letter fromSuperintendent Deb Clemens and School Board President David Newkirk of North Thurston Public Schools, said that the chanting by students during the protests “has become disruptive to the work and learning environment of staff and students,” and that the students enrolled in the life-skills program, a special needs program at the school, had “been particularly impacted.” Therefore, the school would “no longer allow students who are participating in the walkout to protest on our campus.”
However, three teachers in the life-skills program released their own statement in solidarity with students stating, “not once had anyone from our administration, or the district leadership, checked in on our classes during the demonstrations to see how our students were doing. While our students were affected by the demonstrations, saying that they were “…particularly impacted.” is a fallacy.”
“Specifically, calling out a group of students for being more impacted by the events on campus not only continues to create a culture of ableism, but creates divides between students, staff, and the larger community,” the statement read. “This is not acceptable and must stop.”
Laila Markland, a senior at River Ridge High School and a member of the River Ridge BSU, says that she didn’t realize how bad race relations were at the school.
“This [racial relations] is so much bigger than I ever realized,” says Markland. “Just in the work I have done in the last couple of years with the BSU I didn’t realize how big this was. How intense the systems really are that are in place to oppress people of color and that allow racism and white supremacy to exist. I didn’t realize how big they were.”
Despite what the students believe is a lack of support by administrators, the members of the BSU have received a wide range of support from parents, staff and the community at-large.
“I have the privilege of living with several of these magnificent humans,” says Laila’s mother, Amber Markland. “And I get to bear witness to their greatness daily. But the work being done in our community is by a group of many students and a few advisors. While we get home from work, Netflix and chill, these students stay up on the phone planning, organizing, and articulating what moves need to be made to create safe schools for all of our children.”
“The youth is very powerful,” says Serenity Sharp, a sophomore at RRHS. “And, if the generations above us refuse to change we are going to make that change happen regardless. Hopefully they can take a step back and listen to us and try to understand where we are coming from instead of trying to be against us.”
Although the students have courageously stood up for what they believe is right and have worked to make their school a safer place, one thing that they are learning from the process is that change does not come easy.
“It is difficult because I see us doing the work, but it is not really making a crack yet,” says Markland. “It has barely tapped into the surface of all of these issues and so I think it is kind of crazy to see how deep this really is and I have only experienced it in a school environment, and I’m interested to see just how deep it is outside this bubble I live in.”
According to Sharp, she joined the BSU to ensure a sense of belonging and comradery amongst other people of color as she found the culture change a bit challenging after relocating to the area from a majority African American community in Alabama.
“It [the racial tension at her school] was kind of uncomfortable, I would say,” says Sharp. “It’s the reason I joined the BSU to find a sense of community because being a Black woman I didn’t see a lot of representation for myself, and so I understand that there are a lot of racist systems throughout the country at every level.”
“For the school to make it seem like we were hurting or being disruptive was upsetting,” continued Sharp. “We communicated with the life-skills students and the teachers to see what we can do so that we don’t disrupt their classes.”
“When we protested, throughout the school we would see signs in the life-skills class windows saying that they supported us and that they wanted to see us succeed,” she added. “So, for the school to kind of use us as bad guys, to try and get anger from other parents about us disturbing their kids was very upsetting.”
According to the BSU, the group has had four meetings with education officials to ensure that students of color and all sexes have a safe educational environment, and to date the students and their parents are not confident that school officials are fully onboard with addressing the issues.
“Basically, the students are fighting to end racism, sexual harassment and discrimination in the schools,” says Laila’s father, Anthony Markland. “The district fought back, opposed everything initially from the protest and then after some harsh negotiations they came back and agreed with the students demands, and then the students found out that all of the demands were already policy and should have been upheld anyway.”
Laila Markland says that the students will continue to press forward to create change and hope that the greater community will support them in their efforts.
“I think the biggest thing [the community should know] is to listen to the students, going to these meetings and interacting with these adults, it is clear that they don’t think we have the power and strength that we really do have,” says Markland. “I also think this is about being in community with us, that’s a big part of all of this, joining in community while also fighting for justice and change and so we need community, and they need to know that there are people who are listening to us and stand by us and really understand that we have power and we have strength.”
