By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
Princeton High School student and aspiring journalist Jamaica Ponder has used her blog and later an online magazine she started to write about race and racism in Princeton, including exposing the now infamous Nazi-themed beer drinking game that fellow high school students had played last year in a private home.
But Ponder, a senior due to graduate next week, found herself getting in trouble with the high school administration about a photo collage that she had submitted for the high school yearbook. She was suspended last week because of the contents of a photograph, of her and some friends in her basement, with her father’s art in the background.
The art contains the n-word, although the full word is not visible in the photo. Off to the side, is another art piece showing O.J. Simpson, Michael Jackson and others being lynched, in what is supposed to be a statement about their treatment by the media. Their inclusion in the collage was unintentional, according to Ponder’s father, Rhinold. Jamaica Ponder, who is black, is the daughter of former Princeton Township Mayor Michele Tuck-Ponder.
"Evidently, I had used ‘explicitly racial language’ in my senior collage," Jamaica Ponder wrote June 11 on the online Multi Magazine that she had founded. "Upon reaching the realization that I had been suspended on fabricated grounds, I quite literally laughed out loud."
To Ponder and her family, they see the punishment as a way to silence her and get long-awaited retribution against someone who has shown the community in ways that the community does not like to be seen. Since exposing the beer-drinking game, she has written on other race-related issues. But it has a come at a cost.
According to the Ponder family, eggs were thrown at their home three times last summer; Jamaica Ponder has been harassed by fellow students in the hallways at school; and she has been accused of harassment, intimidation and bullying by anonymous people, also at the school.
"This is the culmination of a number of attempts to intimidate and harass Jamaica," said her father by phone Monday.
He said the school "is sending a message to my daughter and other children of color and their allies that they should be quiet about the racial ignorance and intolerance of their peers."
Ponder said he and his daughter had met Monday with high school Principal Gary Snyder, who did not indicate who was offended by his daughter’s collage. Ponder said he wants to see the suspension rescinded, and the family went to head of the school district this week to have it repealed.
For his part, Superintendent of Schools Stephen C. Cochrane on Monday would not discuss the Ponder case.
"While I am not able to comment on the discipline of any particular student, I remain committed to joining with others in fostering racial literacy in our schools and in our community," he said in a text message Monday. "And I am proud of all our students who continue to help us learn and grow."
To Rhinold Ponder, the incident involving his daughter is about something much bigger: how minorities feel anger toward and disconnected from the school system – something that has been the case for years. In Princeton, once home to racially segregated public schools until the late 1940s, the current student enrollment is 55 percent white and the rest made up of all other groups. Asians are the next largest demographic, at 20 percent, while blacks make up 6 percent.
The timing of the Ponder suspension came the same week the district had sought to focus on racism in the community. She was a panelist during a community discussion on the issue on June 7, but the next day, she wrote in the magazine about the yearbook issue and getting called to Snyder’s office.
On Sunday, she then wrote about her suspension. "Princeton High School," she said, "is sending the public a message: Jamaica Ponder can and will be stopped." She served her one-day suspension on Monday, her father said.
Mayor Liz Lempert, at her regular press conference Monday, said she "was shocked" to read that Ponder had been punished.
"And I was confused by it," said Mayor Lempert, who offered that she has some "calls out" about the matter. She did not elaborate on whom she had tried to contact.
"I want to try to find out what exactly happened first, too," she said, "so I want to find out some more details."
But Ponder’s submission was not the only problem in the yearbook. While the district did not release any details, Snyder touched on the issue in a message to parents.
"Princeton High School values and strives to instill in our students compassion, respect, equity and unity. This year’s Princeton High School yearbook was designed to celebrate those ideals, but unfortunately, there were a few senior collages that undermined that goal with insensitive, offensive and provocative words and symbols of racial bias, bigotry and anti-Semitism," he wrote.
"Both faculty and students on the yearbook staff have acknowledged shortcomings in their editorial review process that enabled the inappropriate content to slip through and have apologized for unknowingly publishing such content," his message continued. "Those students who submitted the inappropriate collages are responsible for their actions, and those actions are being addressed within the parameters of school discipline."
"The words and symbols that were used in the yearbook are neither appropriate or acceptable," he wrote. "While we encourage our students to have thoughtful dialogues and challenging academic discussions within safe spaces and with established ground rules, the use of historically offensive words and symbols in a yearbook crosses the boundaries of productive dialogue and into the realm of offensive speech that is not permissible within the domains of our school community."
