Update: Officials order stickers to cover photos, ask students to return copies
BOYNTON BEACH - For a mother who remembered the senior superlatives in her own high school yearbook hewing to "Most Likely to Succeed" and "Best Smile," the picture came as a surprise to Jacqueline Nobles. In Boynton Beach High's 2005 yearbook, her son, Robert Richards, is shown with a leash around his neck.
Students voting on superlatives — a staple of yearbooks for decades — elected Richards as "Most Whipped" by his girlfriend, using the slang term for a person who is controlled by another in a relationship. The accompanying photo shows Richards, who is black, on a leash held by Melissa Finley, who is white.
Nobles wants the books recalled.
"I know it's supposed to be in fun, but there are people still having trouble with African-Americans' past and this will be offensive," said Nobles, who said the picture reminded her of the poster for the 1970s miniseries Roots, which featured a manacled slave. "This picture, to me, is very distasteful."
Another photo, of the winners of the "Most Likely To Be On Jerry Springer" category, features a male student pretending to be on the verge of hitting a female with the back of his hand.
The pictures are inappropriate, school district spokesman Nat Harrington said. The professional standards committee will investigate the situation, Harrington said, and there could be "serious disciplinary consequences" for yearbook adviser Jordan Barenburg and "anyone else who should have brought it to the forefront for review before it was published."
Harrington said the review likely will include Principal William Latson.
"We expect the adviser to apply good judgment, good common sense, ethical standards, moral standards and standards that reflect the level of respect and dignity we expect in our schools," Harrington said.
About 240 copies of the yearbook made it into students' hands before Nobles called the school Tuesday to complain to Latson. The principal is holding an additional 460.
Neither Barenburg nor Latson returned calls for comment.
Perhaps least upset by the photo is Richards, 19, who is bound for Florida Atlantic University after graduation next week. In fact, he came up with the idea.
Richards said he and Finley thought it would set them apart from the other superlative students striking traditional poses. They have broken up since the photo was taken, he said, but remain close friends and have the same opinion of the photo.
"We don't see a problem with it," Richards said before referencing the Roots character that haunted his mother when she saw the photo. "Kunta Kinte — that was over 300 years ago."
He also believes his mother and those who might share her anxiety think differently about racism and slavery because of their age. He and his peers aren't as conscious of race, he said.
"If there was a black girl doing this in the picture, it wouldn't be an issue," Richards said.
A number of black students were standing around when the photo was taken and nobody protested, he said. "These are people who if they had a problem would have let us know," he said.
Yearbooks have evolved from their early days as catalogs of smiling students in tuxedos and gowns and cheerleaders in knee-length skirts shouting into megaphones.
In recent years, yearbook editors at some Palm Beach County schools have had to edit slang and obscenities from senior quotes, ban senior superlatives and study photos closely for indications of drug or alcohol use. At least one yearbook company offers principals the option of using stickers to cover offending photos. The page tears when someone tries to remove the sticker.
Along with such traditional or uplifting categories as "Best All Around" or "Next Bill Gates," Boynton Beach High's superlatives also featured students under the headings "Biggest Slacker" and "Worst Case of Senioritis."
The district will explore the feasibility of recalling the first batch of yearbooks and having them reprinted without the leash photo, as Nobles is requesting, Harrington said.
"I don't want this to be the memory any student has of my son," Nobles said. "Just like these books went into circulation, they can come back out."
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/local_news/epaper/2005/05/18/m1a_skyearbook_0518.html
