	The Haitian Community Says: No to Racism

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Sunday May 1, 2005

Principal must go, Haitian parents say

Source: Daily News

Now it's time to can the principal.

That's the word from outraged parents of Haitian children who were forced to sit on the floor and eat with their hands at Public School 34 in Queens.

Assistant Principal Nancy Miller already is facing dismissal after investigators found she called the fourth-grade bilingual class "animals" and made them eat a lunch of chicken and rice with their hands as punishment for misbehavior.

But parents and Haitian community activists said the principal, Pauline Shakespeare, also needs to go.

"We cannot accept a principal in our school who is disrespectful of students, parents and the community," Sony Isac, the father of two children involved in the incident, said yesterday.

A spokesman for the Department of Education said it plans no action against Shakespeare, who investigators found was never told all the details of the March 16 incident. But Isac insisted yesterday that Shakespeare failed to properly report the abuse and "participated in a coverup."

Councilman Leroy Comrie, a Queens Democrat, said the principal has "an opportunity for redemption" by apologizing and taking remedial action when school resumes Monday after its week-long break.

"If she can't do it, she's got to go," he said.

Frank Lombardi

Press Release, March 21, 2005

The Haitian Community Says: No to Racism! No to Discrimination!

No to the Denigration of our Children in their Own Schools!

Express your support Superintendent Janet Won at 718-281-3436 or Chancellor Joel Klein at 212-374-0200

New York - 'On March 16th 2005, following an altercation between some students in the lunchroom of PS 34 in Queens Village, Mrs. Nancy Miller, the Assistant Principal of the school, singled out the 13 Haitian students of the school's only 4th grade Bilingual class and forced them to sit on the floor to eat their lunch of chicken and rice with their bare hands. When the students protested, she screamed at them in front of the all the other students in the lunchroom: "In Haiti they treat you like animals and I will treat you the same way here".

Instead of acknowledging this cruel and inhumane treatment of our children and the entire Haitian community, the Principal of the school, Mrs. Pauline Shakespeare, who according to a Haitian parent described her child's behavior as "animalism", has chosen to stand with her Assistant Principal. She has been repeatedly pulling some of the 13 Haitian children out of their class to try to convince them that the March 16th incident never happened. According to one of the students, Mrs. Shakespeare has even gone as far as offering the children free ice cream if they were to "say something else".

We vow to our 13 children, who were so savagely humiliated by this racist white woman who we are paying to educate them, and to all our children everywhere that we will not allow this crime to go unpunished.

We demand no less than the firing of both, Mrs. Nancy Miller and Mrs. Pauline Shakespeare. We don't want them transferred to another school where they will simply continue to abuse other parents' children.

Support us by calling to express your outrage and echo our demand:

Local Instructional Superintendent Janet Won at 718-281-3436 extension 3436, Regional Superintendent Judith Chin at 718-281-3407 Chancellor Joel Klein at 212-374-0200

For more Information: Call 718-464-6068