State lawmakers and city activists rallied Wednesday in support of a bill that would require black history studies in every New York school.
State Sen. Jesse Hamilton and Assemblywoman Diana Richardson, both Brooklyn Democrats, said they want to see the legislation reach the governor’s desk in the coming weeks.
“We will not allow black history to be erased, to be denigrated, or to be put to the sidelines by ignorance,” Hamilton said during the demonstration outside Dr. Betty Shabazz School in Brownsville.
“We are here to make sure that our educational system embraces the accomplishments of people of color.”
The push for the new bill comes amid a troubling spate of racially tinged controversies at city schools.
Intermediate School 224 Principal Patricia Catania has come under fire for ordering an English teacher not to give lessons about the Harlem Renaissance and abolitionist and statesman Frederick Douglass.
The Bronx principal ignited a new round of outrage this week when she confiscated a student-made poster celebrating the pioneering black singer Lena Horne.
In addition, a PTA co-president of Public School 118 in Park Slope apologized last week for using an image of people in black face to advertise a 1920s-themed fund-raiser.
And Christ the King High School student Malcolm Xavier Combs, 17, made headlines after an assistant principal at his school rejected a request to print his first name and middle initial on a school sweater.
The lawmakers, who were joined Wednesday by Combs, said they were spurred to action by the Daily News’ coverage of the disturbing incidents.
“The truth is African-American history is American history,” Richardson said. “Now is the time for this bill to come alive.”
