DACULA, Ga. — Some parents in Gwinnett County are upset over a photo in their children’s yearbook. They said it showed students making a racist gesture towards Asian people.
Tommas Xiong said he reached out to Dyer Elementary with concerns this week.
“As a parent, you don’t want your kids to be exposed to these kinds of gestures or racial underlinings,” he said.
11Alive has blurred the faces of the students and their gestures in the yearbook photo because they’re minors.
Tommas said the yearbooks are from last school year, but due to the pandemic, the yearbooks were sent home this week. Some of the kids were photographed pulling their eyes back, making them smaller, a gesture Tommas said is racist against Asian people and something he experienced growing up.
Bee Xiong’s sons also go to the same school.
“I understand the kids may or may not know what that means, but we as adults know what that means. We grew up in that environment. We were made fun of,” said Bee.
Stephanie Cho is the Executive Director of civil rights group, Asian Americans Advancing Justice Atlanta. She thinks the gesture is less common nowadays, but still has the same meaning.
“It’s sort of a resurgence of old school racism,” said Cho.
Gwinnett County Public Schools released the following statement:
“The photo that appeared in the Dyer Elementary yearbook last year is a concern that we are addressing. We apologize for the actions of some of the students in the photo who made faces and gestures that were offensive to members of our school community. We see this as a teachable moment for our students, helping them to understand that their actions can hurt others even if they did not intend to offend. As a diverse school community, our goal is to cultivate respect for all cultures and to provide a welcoming environment for all. We are committed to doing that and plan to review the school’s yearbook processes to ensure this type of situation does not occur again.”
The district also said it believes whoever took the picture asked the students to make a silly face.
“We’re first generation Asian-Americans and we were going through this process and I don’t want my kids to go through the same process,” said Tommas.
Tommas and Bee said they accept the apology.
After 11Alive reached out to the district, Tommas said the Gwinnett County schools called him to offer a written apology. The district also said it plans to review the school’s yearbook processes to make sure this doesn’t happen again.