TYLER, Texas — Less than a week after the Tyler ISD Board of Trustees unanimously voted to change the names of both its main high schools, some parents saying changing the names is not enough.
“Over the last four weeks, I have been bombarded by parents, teachers, other administrators emailing me," said parent Laura Owens. “They have been providing me with stories and evidence of horrible things that happened in the schools or under their leadership and they are scared that they will lose their jobs."
Owens is the mother of Trude Lamb, the TISD student who made national news earlier this summer when she announced she would no longer wear the name Robert E. Lee.
Owens says the district should have an external systemic racism review done.
“So [Monday] and every upcoming board meeting, we plan to be there protesting until the school district orders an external review for systemic racism for the entire district,” Owens said.
A systemic review would focus on a number of points in the district including school names, district redlining, hiring and firing practices, discipline protocols, curriculum, transfers and more.
“Simple things like AP classes and the gifted and talented program, when we look at the racial breakdown of those classes they are very disproportionate when it comes to race,” said Owens. “A very big issue all over the place is the disproportionate discipline practices.”
Protesters gathered with Owens Monday night at the TISD board meeting to not only demand the review, but to also discuss the unfairness of the school’s ‘Return to Learn’ plan for the fall.
“A very simple example of how the reboot policies do not promote equity, by saying things like 'We are going to boost the Internet in the parking lot of schools so that way people who don’t have Internet can come to the parking lot and do their work,'” she explained.
Owen said while this might seem like it would help students, it assumes everyone would have a way to get to a school’s parking lot.
“Are they going to have a parent who’s going to sit there and then they’re going to sit in a car with some device? Do they have a device? Do they have to have power to plug in the device?” Owens questioned. “So those kids are going to be forced to do in-person learning even if that’s not the safest for them or they’re going to be left behind.”
As for the cost of having the systemic racism review done, she said doing it sooner rather than later could save the district money.
“By ordering this review, this can be proactive because with this reboot plan, when we have kids who are going to be receiving education levels down here and white counterparts are getting it up here," Owens said. "That’s a civil rights issue and that will get expensive."
As for those people wanting to change the names of the other schools in Tyler, Owens said the review would help with that too.
“The more unified we become, we know that the student outcomes are going to go up and that’s what education is all about,” she said.
Tyler ISD plans to release a draft of the ‘Return to Learn’ plan to parents Thursday, July 23. The plan includes instructional, health and safety guidelines the district will follow.