By AVA TURNQUEST
Tribune Staff Reporter
aturnquest@tribunemedia.net
OUTRAGED parents yesterday defended Tambearly School and its administration against allegations of racism and prejudice towards students.
Speaking for the first time since allegations were made public last week, Principal Alice Langford categorically denied the negative characterisation of the school at a press conference jointly held with more than 20 parents at the school’s auditorium.
Mrs Langford said: “Neither Tambearly nor its Principal deserves to be labelled as racist. All their years of service to the Bahamian community strongly suggests the opposite. Tambearly and its faculty and staff are dedicated to the Commonwealth and have sacrificed mightily, giving their time and energies with no corresponding monetary gain, to contribute to the education advancement and high achievement of so many in the Bahamas.”
“Tambearly does not support or condone prejudice of any kind, whether based on gender, race, religious beliefs or sexual orientation.”
She said: “It follows, then, that racism will not be tolerated at Tambearly.”
The Tribune published a report on the allegations of Chavaz Cassar, the mother of a 4-year-old and 6-year-old at Tambearly last week.
Mrs Cassar alleged that beginning in January this year both her children were called derogatory racially-charged names by their Caucasian peers on at least four separate occasions.
She claims that Mrs Langford failed to act appropriately when her children became the targets of racial slurs while in school.
Since then, Mrs Cassar’s concerns were broadcast on ZNS, who also aired the concerns of another parent with similar allegations of racial tensions at the school.
Yesterday, Mrs Langford said it was regrettable that the isolated incident between four young students was made public and referenced a dispute with a parent over the handling of a disciplinary matter.
She added that the school’s overarching mandate is to sensitise students, faculty and staff to treat each other with mutual respect, a sentiment fully supported by the large group of parents also present.
According to parents, media attention over the incident has caused distress to the entire school community.
Mrs Langford said: “Although the precise reaction desired by the parent in question was not effected at the time or in the manner desired, Tambearly has addressed the matter in a way that it considers fair and reasonable in all the circumstances.”
“Routinely, a matter such as this would have been addressed privately and Tambearly would make no public statement. We break this routine in an effort to avoid the misunderstanding that our silence might suggest some guilt or wrongdoing on the part of the school.
Mrs Langford added: “Any incident of this type is unfortunate. We all learn from it and expect to emerge stronger, notwithstanding any setbacks.”
The school’s principal did not take questions from the media and left shortly after reading from her prepared statement, which was said also to reflect the position of the school’s board of directors.
In her wake, a number of parents gave emotional, personal testimony to the school’s high moral and academic standards and its positive impact on their children.
Some parents expressed anger over the manner in which allegations were made public as they felt Mrs Langford was unfairly victimised and disrespected as a veteran educator.
More like this story
- ‘School did not protect my kids from racial slurs’
- Tambearly School celebrates 30th anniversary
- Tambearly International School founder honoured with Beacon of Light Award
- School principal denies allegations of racism
- INSIGHT: When the doors were ordered closed, a new world opened up for students and teachers
Comments
proudloudandfnm 10 years, 5 months ago
Look if ya racist the Bahamas aint for you.
sheeprunner12 10 years, 5 months ago
Here we go again................. if u white, u alright, if u brown stick around, if u black stand back ..............Bumpy Watkins (quote)
Money talks ........................ there will always be customers in the niche market (for bigots)
Straight_Talk_Bahamas 10 years, 5 months ago
Some Questions:
I maintain that the problem was the way the incident was handled. I couldnt care less about your "history" and "sacrifices" if you failed to responsd appropriately to such an incident, then you tacitly condone it.
sheeprunner12 10 years, 5 months ago
Good points.......... I agree with you. Its not the school per se, its the personnel ................ Parents have a right to have their queries addressed by the school
thomas 10 years, 5 months ago
Maybe this school caters to foreigners who live and work her and it is their right to have their children taught by foreigners. If ya want ya children taught by local teachers enough other schools out there to choose from. If you don't like their philosophy don't send your children to that school.
sheeprunner12 10 years, 5 months ago
Yeh but some Negroes gatta identify with dem white folks....... dont want to be seen as "Wulff Road".......... wat u talkin bout???????????
ThisIsOurs 10 years, 5 months ago
This is the Bahamas.
andrew7777777 10 years, 5 months ago
Buncha bull.......the owners are nice people. Its between two 5 year olds!!! Anyone else getting in that is dumber than the 2 five year olds.
P>S. Growing up.....I cant tell you how much I heard "white boy cant jump!!' I took it just fine.
Get a grip people
ThisIsOurs 10 years, 5 months ago
Those five year olds picked up their rhetoric from "someone", you get a grip
MartGM 10 years, 5 months ago
Children don't say things they haven't heard before.
andrew7777777 10 years, 5 months ago
The parents of the child that was insulted about the way he played soccer are to blame for bringing this media circus. To them I say "grow up!"
Why does it have anything to do with them or the school or the Langfords??? Just ridiculous.
P.S. Mrs Langford taught me when i was 6 years old. I know her and her husband, they are very good people.
Again just between two 5 year olds.
AW
sheeprunner12 10 years, 5 months ago
U stay rite dere .............. go drive tru Wulff Road. .......... and talk dat
JohnDoe 10 years, 5 months ago
And because it is between two five year olds the school does not have a duty and responsibility to protect its students and responsibly address concerns from parents? I do agree that there is some culpability for the parents of the child insulted, however, that culpability, in my view, is due to the fact that they knew or ought to have known that the core business model of this school and others like it is based on discriminatory practices based on perceived social status, race and attracting the children of ex-pats working here or other foreigners. In fact the reason the parents most likely sent their children to this school is as a result of this bias that they are happy to brag about and be the beneficiary of but not so happy when it is turned on them. This however, does not absolve the school from the duty and responsibility of protecting these children. A parent has a right to raise issues of concern to the school, even between five year olds, and the school has a duty to respond to those concerns with dignity and responsibility. Using this standard, the Langfords may be "nice", but their public behavior have fallen well short of dignified.
thomas 10 years, 5 months ago
why would anyone go drive thru wulff road to talk...there is a great big world out there
birdiestrachan 10 years, 5 months ago
I was quite surprised how so many Black parents allowed themselves to be used in the manner they were used. The children who were insulted. I do not believe made up their stories . they should be showed some sympathy. and the child who insulted them should be given a lesson on how God who is a God of Variety made us all. Just do not pretend that all is well.
SP 10 years, 5 months ago
No need for you genus's to continue speculating. If racial tensions exist it would be well known by other past and present students and parents.
Can we simply have more parents of students at Tambearly School comment on this matter please?
TheMadHatter 10 years, 5 months ago
Sounds like some people are afraid foreigners might be importing knowledge into the Bahamas without paying customs duty.
TheMadHatter
thomas 10 years, 5 months ago
Sounds like this woman's children became the same element at the school that she was trying to get away from when she chose this school. Welcome to the bottom of the totem pole. A little "buyer's remorse"
ThisIsOurs 10 years, 5 months ago
Sounds like racism exists everywhere, even in the Bahamas. Five year olds tend to repeat what they hear and see at home
ThisIsOurs 10 years, 5 months ago
Yeah racism can go both ways, no argument there...but to say "they're just five year olds, there's no problem" is crazy
Hogfish 10 years, 5 months ago
this same woman Chavaz (don't sound bahamian to me!) lives in Sandyport. sip sip sayin her boy was bein a bully at the school and got called out on it. So chavaz turn it around and called poor mouth black woman. She lives with a fella that has SEVEN kids at the school (including her own). Now you think this aint an issue at home and maybe there's an unhealthy enviroment? No wonder the boy got issues.. but instead of concentrating and trying to help the boy this woman wants to mess up what i understand is a good school. Lord only there aint too many on this island. If it wasn't for the children i tell her 'carry ya stink ass!'
sheeprunner12 10 years, 5 months ago
She says she is the grandaughter of a black Bahamian Majority Rule "freedom fighter". Maybe she picking a different fight now......... just leave them ex-pats alone in their happy little world in "Paradise"............ SMH
242orgetslu 10 years, 5 months ago
PLEASE READ AND PASS ON! This is the link where the full story is: http://si.com/vault/article/magazine/MA…
Across the inky-blue Gulf Stream from Florida, near the sheer edge of the Great Bahama Bank, a new island is emerging from the sea. Although it bears the appealing name Ocean Cay, this new island is not, and never will be, a palm-fringed paradise of the sort the Bahamian government promotes in travel ads. No brace of love doves would ever choose Ocean Cay for a honeymoon; no beauty in a brief bikini would waste her sweetness on such desert air. Of all the 3,000 islands and islets and cays in the Bahamas, Ocean Cay is the least lovely. It is a flat, roughly rectangular island which, when completed, will be 200 acres and will resemble a barren swatch of the Sahara. Ocean Cay does not need allure. It is being dredged up from the seabed by the Dillingham Corporation of Hawaii for an explicit purpose that will surely repel more tourists than it will attract. In simplest terms, Ocean Cay is a big sandpile on which the Dillingham Corporation will pile more sand that it will subsequently sell on the U.S. mainland. The sand that Dillingham is dredging is a specific form of calcium carbonate called aragonite, which is used primarily in the manufacture of cement and as a soil neutralizer. For the past 5,000 years or so, with the flood of the tide, waters from the deep have moved over the Bahamian shallows, usually warming them in the process so that some of the calcium carbonate in solution precipitated out. As a consequence, today along edges of the Great Bahama Bank there are broad drifts, long bars and curving barchans of pure aragonite. Limestone, the prime source of calcium carbonate, must be quarried, crushed and recrushed, and in some instances refined before it can be utilized. By contrast, the aragonite of the Bahamian shallows is loose and shifty stuff, easily sucked up by a hydraulic dredge from a depth of one or two fathoms. The largest granules in the Bahamian drifts are little more than a millimeter in diameter. Because of its fineness and purity, the Bahamian aragonite can be used, agriculturally or industrially, without much fuss and bother. It is a unique endowment. There are similar aragonite drifts scattered here and there in the warm shallows of the world, but nowhere as abundantly as in the Bahamas. In exchange for royalties, the Dillingham Corporation has exclusive rights in four Bahamian areas totaling 8,235 square miles. In these areas there are about four billion cubic yards—roughly 7.5 billion long tons—of aragonite. At rock-bottom price the whole deposit is worth more than $15 billion. An experienced dredging company like Dillingham should be able to suck up 10 million tons a year, which will net the Bahamian government an annual royalty of about $600,000.
andrew7777777 10 years, 5 months ago
To John Doe.
Racism exists in Sandyport, in Wulf road, in the USA, all over the world. It has no bearing whatsoever on the school. To say that the schools model is to attract ex pats, white people and social hierarchy and that this is discriminatory practice by the school is JUST PLAIN LAUGHABLE. It is completely without merit.
I went to St. Andrews (considered white) (15 white people in my graduating class of 60+) I am curious, does this make me racist in some way or of social hierarchy???
Parents want a better, in fact the best education for their children wether that be at LW Young, Gov High, Queens College, St, Andrews, Tambearly, abroad or where ever.
A schools location and level of education surely will be the determining factors of how parents want their children to be brought up and taught? Without the distractions of gangs, violence and a social media circus to which the parents of the insulted child are to blame.
The school acted appropriately in its discipline. Thats where this story should have died period!!! Its sad that racism is still right there under the surface, but we all know that it is otherwise it would not have invoked so many deep down staunch responses to which people have come off of point so far that I dont know to what they are referring.
The real victims here other than the Langfords and Tambearly school are sadly now BOTH boys By all accounts from what I heard on excellent authority, the two boys were the best of friends. Something hurtful was said, why couldn't it have been allowed to work itself out with a quite but firm discipline from the school and stay within the school confines?? The two boys are 5-6 years old! This media frenzy with the parents of the insulted boy calling for the closure of the school, has caused the parents to fight and their children and all the children of Tambearly to be distracted and talking about this and taking sides instead of learning and growing.
Sad....the boys are 5.
Hogfish 10 years, 5 months ago
very well put and agreed.
ThisIsOurs 10 years, 5 months ago
Their parents are 30+? And training them daily
JohnDoe 10 years, 5 months ago
I did not use the term racism or the concept of racism in my post, however, for whatever reason you have responded to my post with references to racism. I don’t know if that was intentional or just a lack of comprehension of the main points in my post. However, either way please note that race is not synonymous with racism. Also, my view is that the objective of an education should be the quality of our learning and that our most important and qualitative learning naturally occurs outside of any classroom. Most schools have become institutions of teaching and not learning. Learning should equip us with the social and interpersonal skills to behave toward each other in a respectful and dignified manner; emotional skills that inform and guide our thinking, inherent biases and behavior and the cognitive skills to comprehend objective facts from which we can draw inherently consistent, logical, rational, reasonable and unbiased conclusions. It is in this light, in my view, that the school missed an opportunity and was derelict in their duty by not facilitating a qualitative learning experience to all parties concerned. The fact that it involved five year olds only heightened that duty because it is during those tender years that most permanent learning and beliefs are crystallized. If it is your view that, given the objective facts in this situation, it is only the parents that have behaved in an undignified manner then so be it. With little effort I can decimate your logic, rationality and inherent consistency of your view but to what end. What I would say to you is that you may want to pay attention to your basic grammar, proper use of words and spelling lest you bring further scrutiny to the quality of the learning imparted at the fine institutions you have noted as attending above.
BahamianAway 10 years, 5 months ago
Personally it sounds to me as though this lady never taught her children who they are. I attending primary school in an European country for a few years and the school was all white. There were only two other black students there aside from my sibling and I. I always was taught by my mother who I was, my father was Caucasian but that didn't make me Caucasian and my mom made sure me and my sibling were both aware of that.
It seems to me that Mrs. Chavez's children might have some misconstrued concept of who they are. I have seen many black children attend white schools and live in affluent areas and forget that they are black because they are rarely around other black people. So when confronted with the very obvious fact that they are black suddenly it becomes an issue.
If Mrs. Chavez had instilled in her child from earlier who they were this situation may have ended differently. I faced many racist remarks and situations during my time abroad but my mother had already made me realize who I was and no amount of insults could change that.
sheeprunner12 10 years, 5 months ago
Please ask some of the white ex-pats and Bahamians to send their children to ANY school on Wulff Road ............. or shut the hell up. Its called status quo........ period
BahamianAway 10 years, 5 months ago
Ummmm keep in mind Bahamas Academy was on Wulff Road at one point, so I think to generalize Wulff Road that way isn't fair.
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