A war over critical race theory is tearing this town apart
School district’s resolution in wake of mock slave auction drew ire of white parents
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. — Nevaeh Wharton was busy with homework one evening in late April when her phone pinged with a warning. A friend had texted to say something disgusting was happening in a private Snapchat group chat.
When the 16-year-old woke the next morning, another message was waiting for her: She had been discussed in the group. Pretty soon the whole story trickled out. A group of mostly white students attending two of Traverse City’s high schools, including Nevaeh’s, had held a mock slave auction on the social media app, “trading” their Black peers for money.
“I know how much I was sold for: one hundred dollars,” said Nevaeh, who is half-Black. “And in the end I was given away for free” — to the friend who first warned her about the group.
The Snapchat group, titled “slave trade,” also saw a student share the messages “all blacks should die” and “let’s start another holocaust,” according to screenshots obtained by the Washington Post. It spurred the fast-tracking of a school equity resolution that condemned racism and vowed Traverse City Area Public Schools would better educate its overwhelmingly white student body and teaching staff on how to live in a diverse country.
But what happened over the next two months revealed how a town grappling with an undeniable incident of racism can serve as fertile ground for the ongoing national war over whether racism is embedded in American society.
The equity resolution was unprecedented in Traverse City, an idyllic lakeside vacation spot with a population of 16,000 that is more than 90 percent white and politically split between red and blue. The two-page document, inspired by nationwide protests in the wake of George Floyd’s death last year, suggested more training for teachers and adding overlooked viewpoints to the school system’s libraries and curriculum.
Although at first it drew vocal support — especially from families and children of color — it has since inspired equally vehement opposition, led by mostly white, conservative parents who contend that the resolution amounts to critical race theory in disguise. The theory, known as CRT, is a decades-old academic framework that holds racism is systemic in America, but which has become a catchall phrase conservatives wield to oppose equity work in schools.
In interviews, children of color in Traverse City reported enduring years of harassment in the classroom and on the playing field. Black, Native American and LGBTQ students said casual racism, sexism and homophobia form part of daily life. Some white children said they have witnessed this, too.
The Snapchat incident was unsurprising to them: “I was more surprised that somebody found out about it and it got to the news,” said Eve Mosqueda, 15, who is Native American and Mexican, adding that other kids throughout elementary school had asked her if she lived in a teepee.
But white parents say their hometown was never racist — at least not until an obsession with race began infecting the school system through its embrace of CRT, an allegation school officials have denied. Now, these parents say, their children are coming home from school feeling ostracized for their conservatism and worried they must adhere to a liberal agenda to earn good grades on their assignments.
Sally Roeser, 44, a white mother of two who graduated from Traverse public schools, said: “We were all brought up not to take someone’s race into consideration. That’s what we’re guaranteed in America.”
The Snapchat scandal drew intense local media coverage, widespread outrage and, pretty soon, investigations from Traverse City Area Public Schools and the Grand Traverse County prosecutor’s office — which culminated in the recommendation that the students in the “slave trade” chat receive counseling and empathy training.
It also meant that Marshall Collins Jr., 44, an African American father of two children in the school system, received an urgent message from Traverse City school officials.
“It was like, ‘We need to speed up the equity resolution and get it there now,’ ” said Collins, who serves on the Traverse City schools social equity task force and heads an anti-racist group known as E3 Northern Michigan, whose triple E stands for “Educate, Elevate, Engage.”
The equity resolution stated that the school system condemned “racism, racial violence, hate speech, bigotry, discrimination and harassment.” It called for holding more “comprehensive” training for teachers, adding historically marginalized authors to school libraries and reviewing the district’s “curriculum and instruction (to) address gaps … from a social equity and diversity lens.”
At first, reaction was muted. Not too long after the May meeting, 11-year-old Eden Burke and her best friend, Estelle Young, 12, were picked up after school by their mothers, who had something to tell them.
Estelle’s mother explained what happened on Snapchat. She said the adults at school were trying to fix it by putting out a statement that would let everyone know that sort of behavior is not OK.
Estelle, who is white, recalls feeling horrified. She could not understand why anyone would think it was funny to suggest owning their Black classmates. Then she thought about one of the only students of color in her grade whom kids called “Lilo” instead of her real name, because they said the girl’s dark skin made her look like the Hawaiian protagonist of the movie “Lilo and Stitch.”
Eden, who is also white, thought about the boys in her math class. The ones who sat behind her and whispered “niagra” to each other as a stand-in for the n-word, to avoid getting in trouble with the teacher.
Estelle decided: She would speak at the next board meeting to explain why the adults needed to pass the equity resolution. She wrote her speech in 30 minutes during STEM class, after finishing her work early and getting her teacher’s permission.
“I’m a 6th grader (and) a future leader of the world,” she wrote. “I’m here to talk about how we students need to be educated on discrimination and racism.”
On the day of the board meeting, June 14, Estelle and Eden sat together.
More than 100 people were packed into the red-brick building downtown that housed Traverse City school administrative offices, the Traverse City RecordEagle reported.
Eden walked to the podium and tucked her long brown hair behind her ears. Her voice muffled slightly by a black mask, she told the listening adults about the boys whispering “niagra.” She told about the kids who refuse to sit next to LGBTQ students on the bus, for fear they will somehow catch their peers’ gender identities or sexual orientations.
“At school there are a lot of racist and homophobic kids,” Eden said. “And I’m glad that people are starting to do something about it, because it’s a problem.”
Eden and Estelle, with their mothers, left before Hannah Black, a white parent, approached the podium and asked, “Does skin color matter?” before urging the board to “share publicly why this resolution is needed,” when she believes all it will do is reduce children to their race.
Many white parents in Traverse City agree.
They say their hometown, although imperfect, is not a racist place, and they are not racist people. They say the Snapchat group chat is an isolated incident. They say the school system is buckling to political pressure by pursuing initiatives like the equity resolution that inject race into every setting — when all that will do is spur more division.
The real answer, these parents say, is for the district to focus on enforcing the strong anti-bullying policy it already has. And officials should sit down with the students who participated in the group chat and teach them the golden rule: to love thy neighbor as thyself.
“That’s how I was raised,” said Lori White, a 41-year-old mother of two who has lived in the area her entire life. “I’ve never seen any sort of discrimination. People in Traverse City are just kind.”
White and a half-dozen other women spoke in a joint interview in mid-July. They agreed to be identified as white only if the Washington Post also specified they felt uncomfortable with that designation, because the women do not believe race should ever be relevant.
The women said their outrage with the school system — or “awakening,” as many called it — developed over months.
For Roeser, it started when her teenage son came home from school with a new catchphrase: “That’s racist, Mom.” He would repeat it automatically whenever she mentioned race. She wondered: What exactly were they teaching him in school?
For White, it started during virtual learning amid the pandemic, when she overheard a teacher asking students, including her teenager, to come up with their own version of the American flag. White could not understand the point of the assignment: “With all of the history, there is a reason why the American flag is the way it is.”
All of these women started going to school board meetings in the past six months, motivated by a desire to figure out what their children were really learning in the classroom. What they saw horrified them — nothing more so than the equity resolution.
The women got the word out to other parents. Dozens gathered outside the administrative building before a June 28 board meeting, the Record-Eagle reported,
hoisting signs and alleging the district was indoctrinating children.
More than 200 people then crowded into two rooms to listen to 55 people speak during a public comment session. The vast majority of speakers decried the equity resolution as critical race theory, according to public video of the meeting and the RecordEagle.
By that time, school board members — wary of the building backlash — had already reworked the document. The second version lacks the line about applying a “social equity and diversity lens” to the curriculum. It also no longer suggests that Traverse City schools will give students more opportunities to learn about “diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging issues.”
Officials furthermore deleted the terms “racism” and “racial violence” from a list of things the school district condemns. Also deleted is a passage that stated “racism and hate have no place in our schools or in our society.”
Despite the edits, the women still think the resolution upholds CRT.
“‘Diversity, equity, inclusion, belonging,’ all of those words sound great,” said Nicole Hooper, a 42-year-old mother of three. “But when you drill back and actually look at the meaning of the words … they are interlaced with critical race theory.”
The women say they are unhappy with the level of vitriol in Traverse City. But they are unwilling to stop, they say, because the children’s well-being is at stake.
Estelle, the 12-year-old who spoke at the board meeting, said she has heard a lot of adults warning lately that white children are going to feel scared or ashamed because of what they’re learning in school.
“But this is coming from people who probably let their kids watch horror movies sometimes,” she reasoned. “And life is kind of like a horror movie sometimes. And we have to recognize that.”
Nevaeh, who was “traded” to a person she thought was a friend in the Snapchat group, has another reason for thinking her peers should be ready to hear the difficult truths about America’s past, especially its history of enslaving Black people.
“I feel like if I’m old enough to experience this kind of thing,” she said, “I feel like other people are old enough to learn about this entire thing.”