BOSTON — Hundreds of students at both high schools in Quincy walked out of class on Friday because they say school officials did not take their concerns about a racist video seriously. One student told Boston 25 he even got suspended after being confronted and got into a fight with the maker of the video.
Their complaint was a racially disturbing video made by a student more than a year ago that ended up being circulated recently. “He said racial slurs and saying racist things about it and it just got worse and worse,” said one student.
Boston 25′s Robert Goulston obtained the video but it is far too graphic to share. The video was shared on snap chat, it was made at last a year ago but it was recently posted. The student uses racist hate speech and stereotypes multiple times.
Jaiden Harris saw the video for the first time this week. “People can’t say the things he said and then get away with it,” said Harris.
Harris got into a physical fight this week with the student who made the video. Jaiden’s mother allowed him to talk to us and he told us he wished he handled his anger about the video differently. “I do regret it because that wasn’t the right thing to do, that is not what I was supposed to do. I should have gone to someone and said something about it,” said Harris.
School officials talked to students after they walked out about the plan they had to talk about what happened. Paul Bregoli is on the Quincy School Committee. He saw the video and said it was appalling and does not represent what Quincy is about at all. Bregoli said the school district was working on having a meeting with students to discuss the situation. “It is disappointing. I’m not sure if the kids understood what we were trying to do,” said Bregoli.
Students and parents say they are frustrated it got to this point. “The systemic racism that we grow up in causes all these problems,” said another student. “These students are not standing for it and they don’t have to stand for it anymore,” one parent said.
The school committee member told Boston 25 the disciplinary hearing for the student was supposed to happen today. It’s unclear if the students who walked will lose credit for school today.