FLOYD COUNTY, Ga. — Floyd County School District has come under fire for allegedly failing to address racism and bullying at Coosa High School.
Five students and two parents from the high school announced Monday that they are taking legal action against the district citing a “deliberate indifference to acts of racial animosity toward Black students perpetrated by white students and teachers,” according to the lawsuit.
“This is a case not just for Floyd County School System or Coosa High School, but a case that can set a measure and the tone for school systems across the nation,'' plaintiff Attorney Harry Daniels said. “This will not be tolerated in our schools. This discrimination, unequal, unfair treatment will have no place in our school.”
The civil suit describes multiple instances where teachers and the district ignored racist remarks, actions and bigotry perpetrated by white students against Black students.
This includes the disbursement of a viral video of two white students and one biracial student re-enacting the death of George Floyd in the hallway of Coosa High, racial intimidation over social media, and referring to Black students as "slaves."
The suit also alleges that while the school’s dress code permits “certain viewpoints including white nationalism and white supremacy” it prohibits alternative ideologies.
They cite an instance where African-American students wore Black Lives Matter T-shirts to school but were “deemed to be indecent, inappropriate, or disruptive to the school learning environment.”
However, clothing and apparel that displays the confederate flag do not violate this code.
During the school's annual Spirit Week, the lawsuit claims that white students were permitted to carry a Confederate flag around the school for the duration of the day, despite complaints from multiple black students and their parents.
Another white student was also permitted to carry a whip around the school during this time and when asked by a Black student what the whip was, the student replied "you should know what this is, we used to whip you (or y’all) with this," according to the lawsuit.
In response to the lack of action, both Black and white students planned a protest that was quickly shut down by school administrators.
However, the lawsuit states that while the Black students who organized the protest were suspended, white student organizers were not disciplined.
In addition, Coosa High parent Jessica Murray claims that she was randomly stopped by the Henry County police while driving home and they served her daughter with suspension papers along with a ban notice stating that Murray was not allowed on school grounds.
“The next communication I had was that I was banned and my kids were suspended. I've never known for a police officer to pull parents over and serve them with a suspension letter,” Murray said.
Lekisha Turner is also involved in the lawsuit with her child, and she claims that multiple complaints were made by parents regarding these instances but teachers, administrators, and the Floyd County Superintendent never followed up on these grievances.
“I feel like these administrators should have been morally compelled to protect our children. They took an oath to do this, and they did not. They failed us,” she said.
According to the lawsuit, many Black and African-American students have transferred out of Coosa High due to the continued racism. However, both Murray and Turner said that they do not have the means to remove their children from the school.
In response to the allegations, Floyd County Superintendent Dr. Glenn White told 11Alive in a phone interview that the “Floyd County school system looks forward to presenting the facts of this situation in court.”
The plaintiffs and their attorneys said they hope to do the same and want to bring light to the prevalence of racism that still goes on in schools across the U.S.
“We are going to fight, but we're going to fight in a different way. We're going to get some things changed. We're going to get the culture changed around here,” said Turner
“We all need to stand up to make sure that our schools are fulfilling their duty, their obligation to educate our children in a peaceful, safe environment where they can learn and not be subjected to discrimination on the basis of race, on the basis of anything, and that they can speak their mind and that they will be protected by their teachers and the administrators,” attorney Shannon Liss-Riordan added.