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The London District Catholic school board has put a teacher on paid leave pending an investigation after she spoke out about the board’s policy on books containing the N-word, The Free Press has learned.
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Lawrence Hill – author of 11 books, including the Book of Negroes – spoke with Heather Hamilton last month about how board administrators had barred her from teaching The Book of Negroes to her Grade 12 class because it contains the N-word.
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Hill expressed his thoughts in an op-ed piece published Friday in The Globe and Mail that used Hamilton’s name.
Asked about Hamilton’s status, board spokesperson Mark Adkinson said Tuesday the board “can’t comment on any individual employees.”
The Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association said Tuesday it is unable to comment on cases involving individual members.
Hamilton declined comment Tuesday.
Hill said he was outraged to learn Hamilton is facing an investigation for “going public with their conscience about a significant issue.
“I admire she feels strongly about introducing Black literature to her students and I admire that she opposes firm instructions not to teach to entire classroom books that contain the (N)-word,” he said Tuesday.
Hill believes going public with the issue will force the board “to reckon with this specific issue,” he said. “I think they will come to a better policy.”
For example, he said, Toronto District school board policy allows teaching of books containing the N-word, but they must be by Black authors.
“Other school boards have dealt with this issue in a much more thoughtful way,” Hill said, predicting the London District Catholic board and its trustees will rethink its position “over time.”
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But the board, in its statements, is “bouncing around the real issue,” Hill said.
“Are they instructing teachers to not teach texts (containing the N-word) to entire classes of students? . . . ” he said. “They have to answer that: Are you continuing to tell teachers that they cannot teach any book that contains that word?”
The board’s Adkinson has said “the well-being of our students always comes first” and the board “is not banning or censoring books.
“We take an informed approach that certain books containing triggering language and content should not be required or mandatory reading for assessment in our schools,” he said. “We must be mindful of the diverse sensitivities and experiences of our students.”
“I understand from my own lived experience how hostile and painful (the word is) and I understand that it accompanies atrocities against Black people,” Hill said in an interview Friday. “It’s not just a word – it accompanies rape, murder and other forms of violence.”
Though Hill accepts the board’s stance comes “from a place of good intention,” he said he’s concerned by its consequences.
A board ban on teaching books by him and other Black writers containing the N-word essentially will erase their work from the classroom curriculum, Hill said.
@HeatheratLFP
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