Hallway justice may not be color blind

Junior Namerud Admasu walks into her homeroom class without wearing her ID. Her teacher immediately reprimands her and makes an example of her to the class. As Admasu puts on her ID and shamefully retreats to her seat, another girl walks into the classroom without an ID in sight. The teacher looks at her, talks with her, but never mentions the absence of her ID. Same teacher, same time, same situation; the only difference Admasu can see is the color of their skins—she is black and her classmate is white.
According to many students at Blair, Admasu's experience is not a unique one. Although many teachers and administrators maintain that they are "color blind" when searching the halls for students without IDs, a number of students allege that ID racial profiling exists at Blair.

"Racism is everywhere"

Richard Wilson, ninth grade vice principal, believes most teachers stop anyone they see who is not wearing an ID. "I'm not saying [racial profiling] doesn't exist because racism is everywhere," he says. "But I haven't seen any here at Blair."

However, Walker Davis, a white junior, says Wilson discriminated against minority students on two separate occasions. "I've been walking down the hallway without my ID right next to minority students not wearing IDs," he says. "And Dr. Wilson has asked the other students to put on their IDs but not me."
Wilson explains that when he walks down the hall, it is impossible to see every student not wearing an ID. "Sometimes you see things, and sometimes you don't," he points out.

"It hurts"

Not all teachers share Wilson's perspective. "My gut reaction would be yes, there is racial profiling," says social studies teacher David Whitacre. "Any time you have a situation where people have to use discretion, there's going to be profiling."

Racial profiling in schools is a reflection of society, according to social studies teacher Kevin Shindel. "There are stereotypes in society that will carry over into school—preconceived notions of who the bad kids are and who needs to be dealt with," he says.

According to an informal Silver Chips poll of 100 minority students and 100 white students on Oct 21 and 22, 94 percent of white students say they have gone without an ID for an entire school day without getting stopped by a teacher or administrator. By contrast, only 67 percent of minority students say they have lasted a whole day without being caught.

"It hurts," recalls junior Aynalem Geremew, who says she did not expect racial profiling in such a diverse environment as Blair. According to Geremew, who is black, she was in the hall with a group that included two black people not wearing IDs. Nearby was a group of white students, most of whom had no IDs. "A teacher stopped us and gave us a lecture. After, I saw the teacher was talking to the other group of students and didn't even mention their IDs," Geremew explains. "[The teacher] was all nice to them and mean to us. I felt inferior to the other group of kids."

Playing the "racism card"

Junior ChiChi Otigbuo, who is black, believes anyone can get stopped for not wearing an ID. "Everyone should just put their ID on and suck it up," she says. "They're just mad because they have to spend money to buy another ID."

Minorities at Blair hide behind accusations of racism when they are caught doing something wrong, according to a minority security guard who wishes to remain anonymous. "I think that minority students play the racism card a lot," he remarks.

Repeat offender profiling, not racial profiling, may be the issue. "It has nothing to do with my being a minority," junior Anand Shrofs says. "It's because I don't wear my ID a lot, and [the administrators] know it."

Taking a deeper look

To further investigate racial profiling, Silver Chips conducted an informal test. Two minority students and two white students voluntarily walked the halls between classes for two days without IDs. Only twice did faculty members ask the white students to put on their IDs, while one minority student was stopped seven times and the other four times.

According to former Justice Department attorney Mark Posner, who investigated racial profiling in law enforcement, the only way to know definitively if racial profiling exists at Blair is to conduct an elaborate statistical study. However, Posner says such studies are often complicated, time-consuming and costly.
Posner suggests that Blair consider alternative solutions. "Some sort of training or instruction to the teachers to say, ‘This is an important issue, you should not discriminate,'" says Posner. "Make sure that they are sensitive to the concerns that students have about the issue."

Although Admasu's experience occurred last year, its effects remain. "It made me feel like being black is bad, and black people are nothing, nobody important," Admasu says.