According to a statement from the Rochester City School District Board of Education, a Rochester, New York, teacher has been placed on leave after parents complained that he had their children pick seeds out of cotton during a lesson about slavery.
Last week, Patrick Rausch, a teacher at Rochester School of the Arts, allegedly gave cotton to his seventh-grade students and asked them to pick seeds out of it as part of an assignment, say two parents of students in the class.
Rausch allowed White students in the class to throw their cotton away and forgo the assignment to work on their Chromebooks, Precious Morris, mother of a 13-year-old student, told CNN on Sunday.
Morris said that when her daughter Ja’Nasia Brown, who is Black, attempted to throw her cotton away, Rausch allegedly said she was not allowed to do so and if she did, she would receive a poor grade on the assignment. Morris said Rausch’s actions were rude and disrespectful.
“He is making a mockery out of slavery,” Morris said.
“I never would have thought a teacher would do such things. When you send your kid to school, you are sending them to school in the hands of those teachers.”
Another mother, Vialma Ramos-O’Neal, said her 13-year-old son Jahmiere O’Neal was taught the same lesson by Rausch in a separate social studies class. He is half Black and half Puerto Rican, she said.
Both parents are calling for Rausch’s teacher’s license to be revoked.
