Fresno Unified hires firm to investigate racist photo. The public won’t get any details
Fresno Unified School District has hired an independent investigator to follow up the district’s own investigation into a racist photo taken at Bullard High School earlier this month, district spokesperson Nikki Henry confirmed in an email to the Education Lab Tuesday afternoon.
The district has contracted Ellis Investigations Law Corporation, a firm based in Sacramento that specializes in employment, compliance, and Title IX investigations, according to its website.
“There have been a number of concerns that have been expressed by staff regarding the incident specifically, as well as other concerns that were expressed from events/actions directly related to the incident,” she wrote in response to why this follow-up investigation is necessary.
The incident involved a photo of a student wearing a white garment resembling a Ku Klux Klan hood in a Bullard High School weight room earlier this month, which circulated widely on social media.
Hundreds of Fresno students, led by the Black Student Unions at Bullard and Edison High School, organized walkouts in response and have called out additional racist social media accounts in the following days, pointing to a larger pattern of racism in city schools. Several of these students also spoke at a recent FUSD school board meeting.
BSU leadership from each school has made various demands of district leadership in response, including that the school discipline the students involved in the photo and staff who would have been supervising them.
FUSD informed the Ed Lab that the district has taken disciplinary action against the students involved and continues to investigate.
Henry wrote that the external investigation will hopefully be completed in the next couple of weeks but that the results of this investigation “will not be made public” due to attorney-client privilege.
The Education Lab is a local journalism initiative that highlights education issues critical to the advancement of the San Joaquin Valley. It is funded by donors. Learn about The Bee’s Education Lab at its website.
