By Lindsay Tice,Staff Writer

AUBURN – Weeks after an assault that may have been racially motivated, some Edward Little High School students say their school has a problem.

School leaders say everything is under control.

Deshawn Goyette and his classmates say they hear racial slurs two or three times a week, always in the halls. It happens so often – and has gone on for so long – that Goyette said he’s gotten tired of reporting it to school officials.

“I went to the assistant principals, but they don’t really do anything,” said Goyette, who is African-American.

Others say the name-calling comes from both white and black student and often leads to fighting.

But school officials say racial issues aren’t out of hand and any student who has a problem need only go to administrators to get it resolved. They say they’re doing everything they can to address racial tensions and harassment issues, including hiring an expert to work with students and teachers.

“We don’t shrink from our problems,” said Assistant Principal Steve Galway. “We tackle them head on.”

A lot of fights’

Goyette and his friend, Ian Bailey, say they’ve been taunted at Edward Little since freshman year. Most often, they said, they’re called “nigger” by a group of classmates, all of them white.

“I think those words, those racial words, put people down the same as physical violence does,” said 17-year-old Bailey.

Both boys said they reported the incidents at first, but stopped when they didn’t see anyone disciplined. School policy calls for the punishment, including suspension, of any student who uses racial slurs.

Goyette said he still hears racial slurs in the halls and sometimes hears groups of white kids and black kids trading insults. He tries to ignore it, and when someone uses a racial slur against him, he said, “I just laugh.”

Bailey tried something else. He transferred out of Edward Little and enrolled in Lewiston High School earlier this year. He made the change, he said, in part because of the name-calling and in part because his family moved across the bridge. Although he hasn’t been at the new school long, he and his mother say things have been better so far.

Other teenagers agree that racial tensions are running high at the 1,060-student school.

Junior Lori Goddard and her friend, Sharlie Foss, for example, said they see it a lot. Both are 16 years old and white.

“There are a lot of fights,” said Foss as the pair left school one recent afternoon.

“Yeah, between people in different ethnic groups, definitely. A lot of racial slurs,” said Goddard.

Both girls said problems usually start with name-calling by both white and black students. They believe the insults get blown out of proportion and situations escalate.

That’s what some people believe happened three weeks ago when three black teens were accused of jumping and beating a white teen in an Edward Little hallway.

Several people involved in the dispute, including the victim, said racial issues were not directly involved in the alleged assault. But other students say the incident was tied to a verbal exchange earlier this year in which, they say, a racial slur was used at a basketball game. They believe the three black students got tired of being harassed.

Those students have been charged with assault. Because they are black and the alleged victim is white, police have forwarded their investigative findings to the Attorney General’s Office for possible prosecution as a hate crime.

At least one of the students will face a disciplinary hearing Tuesday. The school committee, which leads the hearing, has the power to suspend or expel students.

Report, report, report

Until several years ago, Edward Little was nearly 100-percent white. As Maine became more diverse and the Twin Cities became a destination for African immigrants, demographics changed at the high school. Assistant Principal Galway estimated that 10 percent of students this year are African-American, Somali, Chinese or members of other ethnic minorities.

Galway acknowledged that Edward Little is having some racial problems as a result. But he and other school officials – and some students – say tensions aren’t any higher in Auburn than at other schools.

“There’s some, but it’s not, like, widespread,” said Tyler Sawyer, a 17-year-old senior who is white. “Usually someone accidentally says a racial word and everybody gets upset.”

School officials said harassment and bullying sometimes occur at the high school, but they believe race isn’t often a factor. Karen Boucher, a science teacher and adviser for the school’s Civil Rights Team, said she and other teachers closely monitor the halls for all kinds of harassment. She said students call each other names, but racial issues are not typical.

Still, she said, “We don’t catch everything.”

But when a student accuses another of racism, administrators say they are quick to investigate. Principal James Miller bristles at the suggestion that his school isn’t handling complaints.

“If we’re told about it, we will act on it absolutely, 100 percent,” Miller said. “We never take it as just kids being kids.”

Tom Poulin, a police officer assigned to the schools, said he’s seen administrators investigate racial incidents and punish offenders. But he said students sometimes wait too long to report incidents, making investigations difficult. Other times, he said, bullies are punished, but their victims may not see it.

“They don’t see what they think should happen,” Poulin said.

Goyette said he reported the racial slurs when they started freshman year. Despite administrators’ assertions that the school immediately deals with all claims of racism, Goyette still believes nothing ever happened to his harassers. He didn’t see them suspended from school, he said, and his harassers’ friends gloated that there was no punishment.

“I heard they didn’t even get in trouble,” he said.

Eventually, Goyette said, he stopped reporting it.

Galway believes that’s the worst thing a victim can do.

“It helps us if kids would do three things: report, report, report,” he said. “The more we know, the more vigilant we are and the more we act.”

Edward Little tracks reports of racial slurs and harassment. But school officials said they couldn’t determine how many complaints had been lodged so far this year because of problems switching from one computer system to another. Poulin estimated that he’s involved in eight to 10 general harassment or racism complaints a year.

Solutions

Although they believe their problems aren’t any worse than at other schools, Edward Little officials have worked over the years to improve the school climate in general. They say their efforts are not tied to racial incidents.

The school has formed a Civil Rights Team and a peer mediation group and holds a team-building day with freshmen. The high school also invited Stephen Wessler, director of the Center for the Prevention of Hate Violence at the University of Southern Maine, to work with faculty and students. He has trained dozens of teachers and students to better spot harassment of all people and take a stand against it.

After the fight a few weeks ago, Wessler held special meetings with student leaders interested in easing racial tensions. He commended both students and officials for their efforts.

“The good news is nobody is trying to ignore it,” he said.

Galway said an accreditation team lauded the school last fall for its work on racial issues.

“We’re doing a lot of things to make this school a special school for every student,” said Galway. “But we need to make more and more changes and we will.”

Ian Bailey’s mother, Karla Bailey, said the fight three weeks ago proves to her – and should prove to school officials – that Edward Little has a larger problem than anyone realized. Despite what they say, she believes administrators aren’t doing enough.

“I think that beating speaks for itself. That never should have happened. They should have dealt with that situation,” she said. “I think they close their eyes and ears to a lot of what happens.”

She said more diversity education at the school and harsher consequences for both black and white students might help. And, she believes, so would a change in attitude about racism at the school.

“It needs to be out there,” she said. “People need to understand it. It’s here.”