A Black history lesson in which cotton was passed around to students has stirred controversy about cultural sensitivity at a Virginia high school.
The lesson at Riverside High School in Leesburg took place earlier this month during a college-level U.S. history class filled with juniors and seniors.
A Loudoun County Public Schools spokesperson told local news outlets that the Dec. 5 lesson involved “a discussion surrounding cotton, the invention of the cotton gin and enslavement. As part of the discussion, the teacher passed around a piece of raw cotton.”
However, the lesson didn’t go over well with some of the students, one of whom sent a complaint to the local NAACP branch.
“They explained that the teacher left the room and got a stalk of cotton from another teacher, and that teacher that she got the cotton from was a teacher of African-American history,” Loudoun County NAACP President Michelle Thomas told WUSA9 .
Thomas said the stalk was passed around the class until students in one part of the classroom refused to pass it to a Black student. They placed it on a table and called it “disgusting.” Other students began exchanging jokes about slavery.