Four white students at San Marcos High School in Santa Barbara, California, darkened their skin to imitate Black children for a TikTok post, and the district has not said what happened to them. Black students from San Marcos and Dos Pueblos high schools answered by walking out of class, then filled a Santa Barbara Unified School District board meeting to say they no longer trust the people running their schools.
The post recreated an AI-generated meme of Black children. The students captioned it with ninja emojis, which users of the platform employ as a stand-in for the N-word, as the Santa Barbara Independent and Atlanta Black Star both reported. The NAACP Santa Barbara branch condemned the post. Atlanta Black Star reported that the photos were taken in a Black Studies teacher’s classroom while he was out, and that the post circulated for two weeks before the district was notified.
Principal Dare Holdren said the school has contacted families and “instituted consequences” for the students, and is working to “educate the students about the impact of their actions.” The district has not disclosed what those consequences are. Superintendent Hilda Maldonado said: “What happened was racist and harmful. I am committed to listening.”
Students carried signs reading “Stop Ignoring Racism,” “We Want Justice” and “Nothing Changes Unless Policies Do.” One student, Sedenia, told the board: “Instead of making your Black students feel safe, you have made us aware that we cannot trust you.”
Speakers said the post was not an isolated incident. They pointed to a substitute teacher who read a racial slur aloud and to claims of physical bullying of Black students, and said the district’s response to each had been silence. “When these continuous anti-Black hate crimes happen and your response is nothing, it really shows where your priorities land,” community member Faith Kinsbury said.
Teachers spoke too. Abel Gonzalez told the board: “I’m offended that you don’t care about me and my people.”
The students’ demands are specific: a zero-tolerance policy on racism, an expanded ethnic studies curriculum and better retention of Black teachers. Each is a policy the board can vote on. The district’s own discipline decisions in this case remain private because the students involved are minors, which leaves Black classmates with no way to judge whether the response matched the harm.
Board President Bill Banning did not set a date. He said he would put the issue on a future agenda “when we have enough time to give this issue more attention.”
Have your say