Listen: We have seen our share of stories about “educators” who, honestly, have no business whatsoever teaching children, especially Black children.
Source: Elena Chernykh / Gett
We’ve seen teachers get sued, fired or disciplined for bullying Black students and unabashedly using the n-word. We’ve seen education officials come under fire for lying about Black history and disparaging Black students in recorded discussions. We’ve even seen a teacher declare with his whole chest that white people represent the “superior” race, despite losing the leg-washing Olympics every year and having Donald Trump, Kid Rock and Roseanne as members of their demographic. But there are certain cases where it’s not even the racism displayed by these so-called “educators” that stands out the most—it’s the audacity.
Meet Alex Nguyen, an “educator” in biology at Luther Burbank High School in Sacramento, California.
According to the Sacramento Bee, Nguyen, for whatever inconceivable reason, thought it would be appropriate to include students’ actual names in test questions included in his class’s biology final, which mentioned less than flattering physical attributes of said students. Not only that, but one question in particular that mentioned a Black student by name was explicitly racist AF, which could lead one to wonder if this “educator” was actively trying to lose his job. This man really included a question that insisted there exists “a gene for the pimp walk, which is dominant” in Black people.
From the Bee:
“In high school, there are individuals who are cross-eyed like (the name of a fellow student) and (the name of the student previously mentioned), which is a dominant trait. We call those individuals ‘weirdoes’. So, if you crossed two weirdoes (the two students named again), that are heterozygous for being cross-eyed, what is the offspring that would result?”
Many students in the class were targeted by first and last name on the exam. Teacher Alex Nguyen chose to describe these students by their ethnicities and physical features, and then paired them up, posing questions about what traits a theoretical child of these two students would have. On one question, the teacher wrote a disclaimer, saying “in no way do I promote students being sexually active,” but the student’s parents and other teachers at the school said that the implication of any sexual relationship between students is inappropriate.
The student, whose parents requested The Sacramento Bee not name him, is half-Black and half-Mexican. He shrugged off the question where he was disparaged, but another question shocked him for its racist overtones against African American students at Luther Burbank.
The question starts by discussing the high school’s diversity and noting that so-called African American traits have infiltrated students of other races.
“For some reason, the African American culture has influenced most of the student body. How? In African Americans, they have a gene for the pimp walk, which is dominant. What is the result if you cross (student name) homozygous dominant Latina with a homozygous recessive Hmong like (student name)?”
First of all, “the African American culture has influenced” most of the world, and certainly most aspects of American pop culture, not just “the student body” at Luther Burbank. It’s not this way “for some reason,” it’s because Black people are so dope we can’t dance, make music or create slang/vernacular without being imitated on a global scale (which still does nothing to dissuade society from disparaging us as “ghetto” and “rachet” when we start these trends just be being Black in public).
Nguyen’s dismissive attitude regarding the influence of Black American culture aside, it’s very telling that the one attribute associated with Black people that he chose to include in his ridiculous test is the swagger in our walk, which he described as a “pimp walk,” likely because he doesn’t know many Black people outside of his classroom, but he is very much familiar with anti-Black stereotypes. (It’s also worth mentioning that, according to the Bee, the student body at Luther Burbank is 97% non-white.)
Nguyen has been accused by students and parents of using his test to target students he has had problems with in the past. For example, one question targeted two students who previously had gotten in trouble for sleeping in class.
“Here at the wonderful school of LBHS, we have certain students who love to sleep in class,” the test question read. “I even see students fall asleep during exams! Can you believe that?! I don’t like it when students sleep in class… it’s rude! So, WAKE THE #$%K UP! Well, through much study, I have concluded that the gene for falling asleep is dominant. Not only that some students sleep, they snore in class. This too is a dominant trait. What are the possible offspring if you cross a homozygous sleeping, heterozygous snoring student (student name) with a homozygous attentive, non-snoring (student name) student?”
District spokesperson Al Goldberg said in a statement that the administration was not initially aware that the test, which Nguyen reportedly defiantly put up on a projector after Principal Jim Peterson pulled the physical exams from students due to how obviously offensive they were. (Again, this man must have been trying to get fired.) Goldberg said Nguyen is currently on administrative leave while his behavior is under an ongoing investigation.
Please, at the very least, fire this man, and keep Black children and children of color as far away from him and his “education” as humanly possible.