During a Nature’s Classroom field trip organized by Hartford Magnet Trinity College Academy last year, a 12-year-old black girl was forced to pretend she was a slave as part of a historical reenactment. During the simulation she was called the N-word, chased through the woods, and threatened with physical violence including whipping and cutting her Achilles. Nature’s Classroom has been criticized for this same reenactment in the past, but continues do it.
Now, Sandra and James Baker–the girl’s parents–have taken their complaints to the Connecticut School Board and the Human Rights Commission after 10-months of trying to get an apology from their daughter’s former school. Other students who went on the same trip were recently debriefed, and described being similarly horrified by the experience.