ALEDO, Texas – Students at a North Texas high school are being disciplined for their role in a mock slave auction they conducted on social media.
A group of students at the Daniel Ninth Grade Campus in the Fort Worth suburb of Aledo set up the so-called “slave trade” of Black classmates on Snapchat, civil rights activists told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
The district did not specify what the incident involved and said administrators learned about it more than two weeks ago. A screenshot provided to the Star-Telegram showed a Snapchat group with various names, including “Slave Trade” and another name that includes a racial slur. One person typed they would spend $1 on a peer, and another person wrote in the chat they would pay $100 for someone else.
Aledo school Superintendent Susan Bohn said district officials learned more than two weeks ago of students cyberbullying other students based on their race. The district didn’t specify what discipline has been dealt out to the students, but Bohn said in a statement that district officials have spoken with all the students involved and their parents.
They were told “statements and conduct that targets a student because of his or her race is not only prohibited but also has a profound impact on the victims,” she said in a statement.
Eddie Burnett, president of Parker County NAACP, said he learned about the situation on Sunday, and said he plans to take up the matter with the Aledo Independent School District board