Stuyvesant While Black

George Floyd was murdered on May 25, 2020 in Minneapolis, Minnesota by policeman Derek Chauvin, who knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes, despite Floyd’s repeated cries of “I can’t breathe.” A widely circulated video of the murder sparked nationwide outrage, and protests against police brutality erupted across the country, shining a spotlight on the U.S.’s systemic racism and extensive history of discrimination against African Americans.

While many non-Black students were shocked by the murder, their Black peers—who make up just one percent of the Stuyvesant student body—were far from surprised by George Floyd’s death. “I hate to say this, but I’ve become sort of desensitized to everything that’s happening because I start to see it more as a cycle. And I don’t know whether that cycle’s going to end or not, and that’s what breaks my heart,” freshman Sukanya Ferguson said.

Freshman Samantha Farrow agreed, saying, “I was numb because police brutality is a normalized thing in the United States. So I was just like ‘Okay, it happened again but this time it’s getting press.’ I wasn’t really surprised. I was more surprised that it got the media’s attention this time.”

While acts of police brutality began receiving widespread attention through the Black Lives Matter movement in 2012, the history of police violence against Black people in the United States stretches back as far as America itself. “You watch enough lynchings, which is what these are, you know, Ahmaud Arbery and Eric Garner, and after a while [it’s] hard to just be surprised,” senior Gordon Ebanks said. “I don’t see how you can live in this country and continue to be surprised by things like this.”

Growing up, William Lohier (‘19) and other Black students were always aware of the history of racism in the United States and of police brutality against African Americans. “It is an experience that every Black person has become accustomed to because it happens so frequently,” he said. “I understand that the killing of George Floyd was a wake up call for a lot of people, [but] like most of the Black people I know have been actively grappling with this for years and years.”

Despite this knowledge, Stuyvesant was the first place where several Black students were exposed to racism. “When I came to Stuyvesant, I realized I was Black, and it had never been such a formative part of my life before, but it has continued to define my experience here at Stuyvesant,” junior Sarai Pridgen said.

Stuyvesant has also altered their perceptions of anti-Black racism, which is traditionally depicted with white perpetrators. While Venus Nnadi (‘18) was not surprised to hear racist comments from her white peers, she was taken aback when hearing those same comments from other students of color. “The first time I experienced a non-Black person saying the n-word—with a hard r—was an Asian person. An Asian boy threatened to lynch me,” Nnadi said.

The use of the n-word by non-Black students is a frequently cited example of racism and prejudice at Stuyvesant. “A lot of people say that saying the n-word colloquially if you’re not Black isn’t racist, but it’s about respect. If Black people tell you that that’s not a word they’re comfortable with you using or disrespects their humanity, but you continue to say it, well then I don't understand how you can say you respect Black people,” Ebanks said.

Racism can come in other forms too, such as casual stereotypes or microaggressions. “I guess it is just instances where I was hearing the n-word or having the n-word addressed to me or other racial assumptions about who I am, where I live, my family background, my income, education, maybe my vernacular, my music taste—things like that,” junior Tolulope Lawal said.

Other incidents of racism, however, are far more extreme. Nnadi described an encounter she had with a peer in her junior year. “We were having presentations in AP Chemistry, and basically the more people who participate in your presentation, the more points you would get,” she said. “We’re outside the class, and he goes, ‘Venus, you better participate in my presentation or I’ll lynch you.’ And I remember this was on the eighth floor because it was [after] physics, and I’m going down the escalator all the way to the second floor because I had lunch, and I’m literally just going through the entire alphabet thinking of all the words that rhyme with lynching, like what could he have possibly said? The only thing was pinch, but like who goes up to you and says they’re going to pinch you?”

The next year, as a senior and Copy Editor for The Indicator, Nnadi received a yearbook submission in the form of an acrostic that spelled out a curse word followed by the n-word. To her dismay, the administration did not respond the way she hoped. “We brought it to [SPARK Counselor] Angel [Colon] first, he brought it to administration and [Assistant Principal of Security Brian] Moran’s concern was like, ‘Oh my god, are they going to take this to the press,’” Nnadi said. “The concern is always the outrage and the punishment you know, it’s never actually about how we feel about students who are literally using racial slurs against us.”

News outlets frequently reach out to Nnadi and other Black students. The New York Times reporter Eliza Shapiro, in particular, has written numerous articles detailing the experiences of the few Black and Hispanic students at Stuyvesant. “The press is in our inbox every single day. We could really light Stuy up. But we choose not to a lot of the time,” Nnadi said. “So it’s frustrating when we choose to remain silent when literally all these news sources are in our emails asking us to speak about our experience at Stuy and we ignore it, when Stuy administrators don’t listen to us.”

Current students have noted, however, the school’s attentiveness to racism aimed at Black students, from Assistant Principal of Guidance Casey Pedrick’s extensive support of the Race Round Table Talks, to the administration’s enforcement of regulations following the Poly Prep incident two years ago, when a video of a former Poly Prep and current Stuyvesant student in blackface was leaked. “Once [Eric] Contreras became principal, he would come to our meetings, sit in, and listen to us, and obviously being a Latinx man himself—and his daughter was also in ASPIRA while I was there—he was more sympathetic to the cause,” Nnadi said.

Though blatant racism at Stuyvesant, such as use of the n-word, does not come from all students, Black students have noted their peers’ complicity when witnessing this racism. “The danger that I think Stuyvesant specifically has is that a lot of the students here are just completely complicit about it. And I think that’s because we don’t have a school environment that has always pushed students to stand up for what is right,” Pridgen said. “Most people just feel comfortable letting it slide, which isn’t a good alternative. It just means that a lot of hatred and a lot of these ideas fester and go unchecked.”

In addition, non-Black students frequently brush off their Black peers’ achievements, crediting their academic accomplishments solely to the color of their skin. For example, while admission to a highly selective college should be cause for celebration, Black students are often told that they owe their success not to the hard work they have put in but to the advantage they gleaned from affirmative action. “A lot of Black students at Stuy get [EXPLETIVE] about affirmative action, about just college stuff in general,” Lohier said. “I do not understand why it has not registered, that [being against affirmative action] is racist, that is literally anti-Black.”

The issue of school admissions also extends to the SHSAT, a controversial topic in and out of Stuyvesant. “[Stuyvesant] students are by and large smart enough to know the historical and psychological reasons why Black students are struggling in schools, why their schools are underfunded,” Ebanks said. “But when it comes time to talk about real change, well then suddenly everybody is an advocate for educational reform in the middle schools, which is kind of a way of saying, ‘Well, we want to help Black people as long as it doesn’t interfere with anything we want.’”

For many, the racism at Stuyvesant has made their overall high school experience a negative one. Others have a more positive take on their time as Stuyvesant students. “It’s kind of bold to assume that just because you are a racial minority at a school [...] you’re going to have a terrible time and you're not going to enjoy anything,” Lawal said. “Of course, coming from a predominantly Black neighborhood and a predominantly Black education, I was kind of culturally shocked when I came to the school, but I met really good people and I have experienced many good things that I would never regret experiencing.”

Middle schoolers are aware of Stuyvesant’s reputation, however, and often avoid enrolling due to its environment. “The few Black people and few Latinx people who get into Stuy, a lot of them don’t come because they hear about these things,” Nnadi said. Farrow, for example, expected Stuyvesant’s environment to be much worse than it is for her. “I don’t hate the Stuy community—I love Stuy. I feel like it's a nice place to learn and grow to be a better person, I just want a little bit,” Farrow laughed, “a lot more diversity. I don’t hate Stuy.”

But the issue of Black students’ enrollment at Stuyvesant has proven more complex than their perceptions of the school. “I do think that we need to find ways to get more [...] Black and Latinx people into Stuyvesant, but also, how do we justify bringing those students in, especially freshmen, into a school environment that doesn’t really want them to be here, that’s not conducive to them?” Ebanks said.

With so few Black students—in the 2018-2019 academic year, there were 29 Black students—at Stuyvesant, change has been difficult to enact. “When you’re in a place where there’s so few people of one group, their voices will never be heard as much as they scream and shout,” Nnadi said.

Furthermore, the small number of Black students at Stuyvesant means that they are often pushed into the role of the racial mediator. “I have been singled out as one of the very few Black people—Black freshmen, at least—I’ve been singled out as the person that’s more sociable and more able to talk to other races more easily, but yeah, I never really liked that,” Ferguson described.

It is especially difficult for Black students to carry the burden of dismantling racism at Stuyvesant. “A lot of the onus for educating, for calling people out, falls on Black and Latinx students, and that should not be the case. Just like everyone else, Black students are there to learn, to get an education,” Lohier said. “The Black students are amazing, and talented, and outspoken and so willing to do this—the burden should not entirely fall on Black students to educate you, to educate anyone.”

The outsize burden shouldered by Black students in combating racism at Stuyvesant is only made more difficult when peers criticize them for speaking out. “When we start shaming people who are simply taking what should be a normal step to make this environment less racist, when we start condemning them and making fun of them, as far as I’m concerned, you can contribute to the same sort of racist rhetoric that’s problematic in the first place,” Pridgen said.

Lohier agreed, adding, “If you don’t want Black students to be calling you out, then you should call each other out for your anti-blackness. It is literally as simple as that. People are mad at Black students for calling stuff out but then don’t call each other out.”

Black students are not only disappointed with how their non-Black peers approach racism at Stuyvesant, but also how some of them approach it on social media. “There’s a part of me that feels like a lot of people are posting out of guilt, and there’s also a part of me that feels like some people actually do care but I can’t really tell whether it’s one or the other,” Ferguson said. “If you care, then show that you care, but if you’re doing it out of guilt it doesn't feel the same.”

Pridgen also expressed her frustration with the hypocrisy and disingenuousness of her peers on social media. “What disturbs me the most is when I see social media posts from people that I know don’t take that sort of [anti-racist] mentality seriously,” she explained. “That’s when I think we approach virtue signaling, and that’s a very dangerous mentality, because it’s hard to fix.”

Many Black students feel that their peers have not just been posting out of obligation, but also to prove that they are just as, or even more progressive than, others. “It seems like a challenge. You’ve turned the movement into a challenge. And just something about that doesn’t sit right with me,” Ferguson said. “I know the intentions are to spread awareness, but at the same time, you’re telling me to tag 10 other people that are going to say Black lives matter. And especially me, I know Black lives matter. My Black life matters.”

Instead, the Stuyvesant community must face its entrenched racism head-on to make more welcoming spaces for future Black and Hispanic students. “I want people not to just post a lot and do a lot right now while everythings happens, but to internalize what you are posting, internalize what you are reading, so that when you go into Stuy, it's a better environment for Black and brown kids who are coming later,” junior Falina Ongus said.

Similarly, Lawal would like to see not only more conversation, but more constructive action on both sides. “It should be equal effort on both parts to try to understand each other, and try to come to a compromise,” she said. “And so not only should people be speaking, but people should also be listening and as much as they can, people should try to care and educate themselves.”

Black students hope to see their non-Black peers not just actively confront racism at Stuyvesant, but also reflect on and address their own internal biases. “I understand that not everybody can go protest and that not everybody can vote,” Farrow said. “But I am expecting them to change how they approach these situations, how they talk to people who aren’t from their same race, how they deal with situations in school, and how they sit back and watch people be stereotyped in school. I want to see actual change.”