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Fighting Hate
With Kindness

Birmingham Derby Middle School

RONELLE GRIER CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Birmingham
Public Schools
works to raise
awareness,
sensitivity after
incidents.

Drew and Brooke Bell

W

hen anti-Semitic graf-
fiti and other forms of hate
speech were discovered in
various places at Derby Middle School
in Birmingham, including a classroom,
parents, students and school administra-
tors did not respond with more hatred.
Instead, they used the incidents as an
opportunity to spread awareness, toler-
ance and kindness throughout the school
community.
At the beginning of February, parents
were alerted via emails from the Derby
administration that anti-Semitic messag-
es had been found on posters, restroom
walls and student artwork. The damage
included destruction of a musical instru-
ment as well as a vandalized locker that
had been decorated with Chanukah gift
wrap for a student’s birthday.
One student reports seeing the words:
“Jews are evil. Jews are nasty. Jews do
not belong to live here [sic]” written on
the paper in green marker; and Marcia
Wilkinson, director of Community and
Family Engagement for Birmingham
Public Schools, said the vandalism
included a swastika and other racial
slurs.
Administrators believe the destruction
was perpetrated by non-Derby students
who infiltrated the building after hours.
Another incident involved a Derby stu-
dent who arranged a series of “math
manipulatives,” objects of assorted shapes
and sizes used to teach math concepts, to
form the words “Heil Hitler” and a swas-
tika.

When the school
district did not take
immediate action, par-
ents such as Barbara
Stalburg Kasoff became
outraged about the inci-
dents and frustrated that
the school district was
Barbara Stalburg
not responding quickly
Kasoff
enough.
“Our house is on fire,”
said Stalburg Kasoff, who has two chil-
dren, Brooke Bell and Drew Bell, in the
Birmingham school district. “This is an
emergency. Enough is enough. How many
burning crosses would you need until you
would do something? A swastika is the
same.”
Stalburg Kasoff attended a school
board meeting to voice her concerns.
Another Derby parent, Nessa Feller, met
with Derby Middle School principal
Celeste Nowacki to express her dismay
and offer to help with solutions.
“I think we had to light a fire and let
them know how offensive a swastika is,”
Feller said. “We trust the school to take
care of our children, not just teach them
academics. Our trust was starting to be
questioned — we are all committed to
making sure our schools and our society
in general are more tolerant places.”
Shortly after the board meeting, a par-
ent meeting was held with Heidi Budaj,
regional director of the Anti-Defamation
League-Michigan Region, serving as
facilitator. About 60 parents of various
nationalities and religious and cultural

backgrounds attended, in addition to
Derby administrators and staff members.
“Celeste [Nowacki] was shocked that
this happened at her school,” said Budaj,
who had been working pro-actively with
Birmingham school administrators prior
to these incidents. “They [Birmingham
Schools] want to have a culture of
diversity and embracing differences …
Birmingham sets a fabulous example for
other districts.”
Budaj said that while what happened in
Birmingham appeared to be isolated inci-
dents, this type of behavior has become
more common throughout Michigan.
“In years past, we would get calls three
or four times a year from parents,” Budaj
said. “Now I get a complaint on an aver-
age of once a day. It is bad out there.
“Swastikas carved into desks, spray
painted, kids saying horrible things
on buses like Jews should go back to
Auschwitz … and it’s not just happening
in school. We’re seeing things going on
in public that a year ago we thought we
would never see in public … disparaging
remarks aimed at people in hijabs…”

TAKING ACTION

Since the incidents occurred, the district
has been developing programs for the var-
ious schools and grade levels to address
the issues, according to Birmingham
Public Schools superintendent Dr. Daniel
Nerad, including a learning process for
the staff.
At Seaholm High School, where there
was a racial incident earlier in the school

Nessa and Bob Feller

continued on page 18

16

April 27 • 2017

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