A School board in a conservative Missouri district revokes an “anti-racism” resolution that was passed in response to George Floyd’s death, claiming, “How effective has it really been?’”
The school board in the Francis Howell School District Board of Education (FHSB) in St. Charles County, Missouri, along the Mississippi River just north of St. Louis, voted to rescind several resolutions automatically. However, the resolution that has drawn the most attention is the one passed in 2020, shortly after the death of George Floyd.
The resolution in question was supposedly designed to “promote racial healing, especially for our Black and brown students and families.”
Though the “Resolution in Response to Racism and Discrimination” denounces “racism, discrimination, and senseless violence” in all forms, it repeatedly suggests that “Black and brown” people are often the main victims of racism. “We will promote racial healing, especially for our Black and brown students and families. We will no longer be silent,” it says. It also claims that “Black and brown students and families” may face unique “challenges” in the pursuit of “an equitable and anti-racist system that honors and elevates all.”
The official reason given for ending these resolutions is the fact that most current board members never signed or voted to adopt them. Many of the members were elected in April 2022 and 2023 after a strong push from a conservative organization called Francis Howell Families, which aims to recruit school board candidates who support teaching students “our Nation’s founding principles” and who reject “attempts to divide people by race, gender, or other immutable characteristics or to teach that those characteristics determine their destiny.”
In 2021, FHF referred to the resolution as an example of “woke activism.”
Current board members, some of whom received strong support from FHF, expressed misgivings about the supposedly anti-racism resolution. Randy Cook, the vice president of the board, argued that several terms used in the resolution, including “systemic racism,” were never clearly defined.
His colleague Jane Puszkar indicated that the resolution had been ineffective. “What has it really done?” she asked. “How effective has it really been?”
Last week the FHSB members ultimately determined that “resolutions are a reflection on a moment in time” and that resolutions passed in previous years under different leadership will no longer “be used as a rationale for decisions within the District.”
Since passing, the resolution has been on display in district schools. Now that the resolution has been revoked, those displays will be taken down, and the resolution will also no longer appear in any district publications.