Posted on 09/14/2002 1:39:33 AM PDT by Michael2001
ASHEBORO -- The Board of Education took no action Thursday on a request by the local NAACP to suspend all cheerleading after the chapter president complained that all of the students on the middle and high schools squads are white.
Wesley Fennell, the president of the Asheboro/Randolph County branch of the NAACP, asked the board to suspend cheerleading activities until a better way of selecting team members could be developed and implemented.
"The current selection process has resulted in the total elimination of African American cheerleaders from the Asheboro City Schools system," Fennell said.
The city schools have cheerleaders for sports teams at Asheboro High, and South Asheboro and North Asheboro middle schools, Fennell said. Total African American student enrollment in the system is 14.6 percent. Another 21.9 percent are Hispanic.
The board did not discuss Fennell's concerns and gave no indication of how it might handle them. Superintendent Diane Frost instead provided a copy of a letter she sent to Fennell on Aug. 30.
"Our goal is to provide a wide array of extracurricular activities for our students," Frost's letter stated. "We hope students will choose to participate in at least one school activity every year, because there is a strong correlation between participation and high student achievement.
"We encourage any student who is interested in cheerleading, or any other activity, to pursue it. We strive to have an inclusive process, and certainly encourage participation from all groups of students."
Fennell said he has also learned that no African Americans participated in selecting cheerleaders. He said that the college cheerleaders brought in to help judge high school tryouts come from predominantly white universities. He said the system should also bring in cheerleaders from historically black colleges.
"This could have served as an opportunity to expose this school system to potential future minority teachers, and to expose Asheboro school students to positive role models of all races," Fennell said.
Fennell complained that the $18 fee charged for Asheboro High School's Blue Comet Cheerleading Clinic to be held later this month could exclude low-income students from participating in cheerleading. The principal told him that no student would be excluded because of an inability to pay the fee, but Fennell said he was concerned that students who couldn't afford it would be too embarrassed to admit it.
"This certainly seems to contradict the concept of an inclusive process," he said.
"Legislation is powerless to eradicate racial instincts or to abolish distinctions based upon physical differences, and the attempt to do so can only result in accentuating the difficulties of the present situation."
Plessy v Ferguson 163 US 537
Suspend the NAACP. All the members are black.
I don't begrudge her any of this, only to point out that the NAACP complaint is so specious if they think that an $18 fee is holding back lower income kids, minority or not.
Now, thanks to our Robin Hood school funding system in Texas, she (I) will have to pay $150 (not including uniforms, dance classes, etc.) so that she can participate in Lariats (drill team), while $25 million of our local tax money goes to other school districts in the state.
My daughter is Hispanic (Mom's side), will LULAC help us out? Didn't think so.
Honey, are you awake yet?
Good point. Been waiting for the same thing myself. The only cry is for more representation as owners and coaches, eventually a complete monopoly.
Yeah, that's equality!
Any male NOT awake after viewing those lovelies is: six feet under; or gay.
I, for one, am now WIDE AWAKE. Thanks, mh!!!
In short, all they see is an outcome they can complain about so they do, just like those "racist and culturally biased" SAT scores.
Attention NAACP: I'm not whining about not being a starter on the numerous all-black NBA starting line-ups, because I know that my talent does not merit a spot on that team. When you whine about "unfair" outcomes without addressing the selection process, the percentages of blacks applying, and the reasons for the "inequity", you're simply playing the race card and intentionally trying to remove merit-based decision-making. Hopefully America is tiring of that nonsense.
I'm not going to say whether its good or bad. Rather, an indication that the rest of the world is catching up in the level of basketball skills. Just look at the improvement of Dirk Nowitzki over the past four years! If the rest of the Mavericks could show the same improvement, we MIGHT have a chance this year against the Lakers! :^)
IMHO, there are only three things that can stop the Laker juggernaut: boredom, injuries to Shaq or Kobe, or Father Time. However, it will be fun to watch motivated owners like Mark Cuban do their best to prove me wrong!
No I did not forget the "s".
Check that. Racism 2000 = LEFTIST Blacks not getting their way.
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