A St. Charles, Mo., father is looking for other options after he says that his son and other classmates were called racial slurs by a school employee during fourth-grade recess at their elementary school.
Leon Howard told KPLR 11 that his son was playing football with his classmates during recess at Harvest Ridge Elementary when an employee used the disturbing language.
“I think he’s the gym teacher,” Howard said. “He approached my son and said, ‘Give me the ball, you effing n-word!’”
The kids, knowing that the employee’s behavior was not appropriate, immediately sought out the principal, Howard said.
“He ran and told [the] principal, and the principal made them write a statement about what he said, and I guess they did [an] investigation of their own. I don’t know,” Howard said.
Matt Deichmann, who handles communications and community relations for the Francis Howell School District, insisted that the school was taking the allegations seriously and said it shouldn’t take long to reach a resolution on the matter.
“We take these types of allegations seriously,” Deichmann said. “So the school and district administers immediately began an investigation, and the employee was placed on unpaid leave pending the outcome of the investigation.”
Howard, for his part, says he thinks that there’s only one way to resolve this particular problem.
“I think he should be terminated,” Howard said. “I don’t think he should be able to work around kids at all.”
Howard did not send his son back to the school Thursday, and now he is considering pulling the young boy out of the school altogether and trying another alternative, like homeschooling.
“My son woke up [Thursday] morning and didn’t want to go to school,” Howard said. “He was crying.”
Read more at KPLR 11.