Students at an Oklahoma City high school said they were shocked after being made to line up by skin tone and hair texture during a visit by a college recruiter last week.
Now, that recruiter is out of a job, according to KFOR-TV.
Students at Harding Charter Preparatory told the outlet a recruiter from Oklahoma Christian University stopped by the school Monday, Feb. 24, and, during an assembly in the gym, instructed them to line up from darkest to lightest complexion. The teens say then the recruiter asked them to line up by their hair from “nappiest” to “straightest.”
“He told us to line up nappiest hair in the back and straightest hair in the front,’’ junior student Rio Brown recalled.
Fellow student Korey Todd said the exercise made him uncomfortable and that she thought to herself, “Okay, this isn’t right.”
Both the high school and university addressed the incident in statements acknowledging the bizarre incident.
“The OC admissions counselor who visited Harding Charter Preparatory Academy [last] Monday is no longer an Oklahoma Christian University employee,” university officials confirmed, adding that school leadership hadn’t approved the “inappropriate activity” prior to the recruiter’s visit.
Administrators at Harding Prep also decried the recruiter’s “inappropriate and hurtful statements,” and said it will not tolerate “any behavior and/or language that undermines our community’s values.”
The incident comes on the heels of two similarly racist episodes at learning institutions across the Sooner State. Last month, a University of Oklahoma professor faced backlash after arguing the N-word was no more offensive than the phrase “OK Boomer.” A second professor would repeatedly use the slur in class weeks later while reading from historical text, The Oklahoman reports.
Brown recalled seeing his own teachers upset and in tears after the recruiter’s visit to his high school. The man remains unnamed, but is described as a white male who didn’t seem “knowledgeable on how to speak to people.”
“Teachers left. Their faces just looked disgusted,” Brown said. “I hope it is a wake-up call because many people at the school need to hear how we feel.”
OC has said its admissions staff plans to visit Harding Prep on Monday to apologize to students and staff.
Watch more in the video below.
