Sewanhaka students, parents protest systemic racism

In a protest against police brutality and systemic racism on Sunday night, more than 100 Sewanhaka Central High School District parents, students and alumni marched through the residential streets leading from H. Frank Carey High School to Sewanhaka High School, chanting, “If we don’t get no justice, then you don’t get no peace!” and “Humans don’t deserve to be slaughtered!”

The protest was organized by Elmont alum Erik Blan and Carey alumna Julia Gornicz, who connected on Twitter and made a plan after both attended a similar protest in Elmont and Valley Stream a few weeks before. They wanted to show administrators in the Sewanhaka district that the black community is “tired of racism,” Blan explained, and gain support for the anti-racism movement, because not everybody in the community was behind it.

“I just think it’s good to have the whole district show solidarity,” Blan said before telling the crowd that gathered outside Carey that they should educate themselves and others about systemic racism and hold their friends and families accountable for their words and actions.

In 1985, the State Education Department ordered that the Sewanhaka district reintegrate its five high schools, after the Board of Education developed a plan to make the schools more racially imbalanced. Elmont Memorial High School’s minority population had been increasing over the years, while the others remained mostly white. As a result, state officials gave the district until that November to integrate the high schools or face de-accreditation.

It did so, but last weekend, protesters said there was still a problem with racism in the district. According to ProPublica, black students in the Sewanhaka district are more likely to face suspension, and four times more likely than their white peers at Sewanhaka High to be suspended.

“This district has blood on its hands,” Elmont alumna Tamar Paoli-Bailey said while standing in front of Sewanhaka High on Sunday. “We can no longer stand for this.”

Additionally, Blan said, black people in the U.S. are more likely to be incarcerated than white people, and majority-black schools tend to be underfunded. To help solve the problem, he said, he would like to see prison reform and the county reallocating the money it gives to the Nassau County Police Department funds to majority-black schools.

He also claimed that his barber had to go through more training than a county police officer, saying, “I would definitely prefer a barber to mess up my haircut than for a police officer to mess up and shoot me.”

Others agreed. Jordyn Ferguson said she decided to join the protest “to fight for my rights when I’m older,” and her mother, Kisha, said, “It’s not a good feeling to see someone who looks like you get subject to police brutality.”

Jesse Ulysse, a Valley Stream-based artist, added, “People like us are in a tremendous amount of pain,” and another protestor, Vincenzo Milione, said it meant a lot to him to see so many people fight racial injustice. 

The demonstrators, of different ages and from different backgrounds, held signs saying, “White silence is consent,” and “This is a human rights issue,” as they marched. Ilyas Asrar, a seventh-grader, made one that said, “Why is ending racism a debate?”

“We feel like that will get people’s attention, and you can’t really disagree with that,” said Ilyas’s mother, Nilufar. “We definitely feel strongly to stand up for what’s right, and we believe that things can change for the better.”

District Superintendent James Grossane wrote a letter to community members saying, “We as a school district stand for an inclusive, safe environment, where all our students are cared about, and are treated with respect.” He added that the staff would engage students and community members on “meaningful dialogue on how we can all grow to better understand, appreciate and support what makes us such a rich, diverse community.”

“Let us strive to be an example on how communities can come together for positive change,” Grossane wrote. “Let us instill in our students the knowledge, skills and fortitude to lead our society in the direction of equality for all.”

The district did not coordinate the protest, Grossane posted on the district’s website that morning, but had made preparations to ensure everyone’s safety, including calling local authorities to ask that they be on school grounds and escort the protesters during the march to all five high schools.

By the time the march neared Elmont Memorial High School, its last stop of the night, the activists stopped traffic and formed a circle around Blan, who recited George Floyd’s last words in Minneapolis on Memorial Day, as Ulysse knelt above him. Then all held their fists in the air for 8 minutes and 46 seconds — the amount of time Officer Derrick Chauvin dug his knee into Floyd’s neck as he died.

When it was over, Blan asked the marchers how it felt to hold their fists up that long, and they all replied that it hurt and their arms got tired. But Paoli-Bailey said, “I’m more tired of racism.”