To the editor,
Anyone who had any doubts about the need for Iola to reckon with the Black Lives Matter movement shouldn’t have those doubts any longer. Earlier this week, Iola High School seniors added to their parking lot mural initials that stood for “white power” and “shoot to kill.”
In a district that recently saw a massive — if well-controlled — demonstration by students themselves against gun violence, the response should have been swift and decisive. Instead, Superintendent Stacey Fager was quoted in the Iola Register framing the issue not as a threat of racial violence, but one of code enforcement, because the larger mural supported a presidential campaign.
