FL School's Black-Only Assembly Over Test Scores Draws Outrage

FLAGLER COUNTY, FL — A Florida elementary school singled out Black students by requiring them to attend an assembly about improving standardized test scores and offering them fast-food gift cards as possible rewards, according to Flagler County school officials and multiple reports.

Fourth- and fifth-grade students were pulled out of class at Bunnell Elementary School and taken to the cafeteria, where high-performing students were brought to the front and used as role models, WOFL in Orlando first reported.

During the assembly, teachers noted how Black students — identified as AA, or African-American, students in the presentation — underperformed on standardized tests for the past three years, according to the Washington Post.

Flagler Schools spokesman Jason Wheeler told the Post students were selected to participate in the assembly based on their race, even those with passing grades.

Flagler County schools confirmed the incident Tuesday in a statement posted to the district's website. Interim Superintendent LaShakia Moore said that while no malice was intended with the assembly, sometimes "when you try to think 'outside the box,' you forget why the box is there."

"While the desire to help this particular subgroup of students is to be commended, how this was done does not meet the expectations we desire among Flagler Schools," Moore said.

Bunnell Elementary School serves approximately 1,050 students, according to U.S. News & World Report. About 19 percent of the student population is Black.

The assembly drew ire from some parents whose children were required to attend.

When Darryl Williams' 10-year-old told him about the assembly, he told WOFL it "made my blood boil."

"It told my child that she was not good enough," Jacinda Arrington also told WOFL. "The color of your skin means that you are not good enough, when, in fact, she's one of the smartest kids in her class."

Two mothers told WFTV their students were told if their test scores didn't improve, they could end up dead or in jail.

Alexis Smith told WFTV that after the assembly, her son asked, "So I'm going to die, I'm going to get shot, I'm going to go to jail if I don't do right?"

While district officials have not commented on what was said during the presentation, the superintendent and school board members offered more apologies during a news conference Tuesday.

"To the parents and students affected by these actions, we make no excuses but extend our apologies," school board chair Cheryl Massaro said. "It should not have happened. If we had known about it, it would not have happened."

Superintendent Moore said the district has also launched an investigation into the incident.

"My appeal to our families and to this community is that we continue to work together in order to help each other and improve the academic performance in Flagler County," Moore said. "We make no excuses of what happened, and we offer our apology."