A Los Angeles elementary school is under fire for sending kids home during Black History Month with a math assignment that included a question about slaves picking cotton, according to a report.
Second graders at Windsor Hills Elementary School on Overdale Drive were given the assignment earlier this month with the question: “The master needed 192 slaves to work on a plantation in the cotton fields. The fields could fill 75 bags of cotton. Only 96 slaves were able to pick cotton for that day. The missus needed them in the Big House to prepare for the Annual Picnic. How many more slaves are needed in the cotton fields?” NBC 7 San Diego reported.
Parent Kelly Gray was stunned when she saw her 7-year-old daughter’s homework.
“When I read it I immediately told her she would not complete that assignment,” Gray told NBC 7 San Diego.
“It’s definitely disturbing using terms like plantation, master — my daughter doesn’t know what these things mean,” the mom said.
Since the assignment was handed out to the entire second grade class, Gray said that she doesn’t put the blame on her daughter’s teacher.
Gray’s mom and her daughter’s grandmother was just as outraged.
“Someone could have said, ‘No! Are we really giving this assignment?’” Karole Gray said.
“I can’t image a month of any year of any era when this would be appropriate.”
Another irate parent, Karla Clark, told the network, “This is Black History Month – it’s hard enough to know you have ancestors who were slaves, but to hear it’s blown up in this type of way is disturbing.”
The school has launched an investigation.
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