Nationwide — A daycare in Miami, Florida is being criticized for reportedly painting children in Blackface apparently in celebration of Black History Month. Courtney Politis, a local African American mom, is one of several parents upset over the racially offensive incident.“You’re a certified, established institution, you should know better. I mean, ignorance on — about racism in 2023 is no longer ignorant, in my opinion,” Politis, whose children attended Studio Kids Little River at the time, told CNN.
On February 3, a teacher from the daycare reportedly shared photos of students in blackface on the school’s messaging app for the parents to see. It has a message that read “Black history month.”
Even though Politis’ children were not part of the class where the incident happened, she received a screenshot of the disturbing photos from another parent. It turns out the teacher reportedly made the class wear costumes of different professions and then covered their faces in brown paint.
Out of anger and disbelief, Politis said she immediately reached out to the daycare’s owner, Patricia Vitale, to say that the incident was racist. But Vitale allegedly didn’t understand what she meant at first and asked, “What is racist?”
Vitale eventually sent out a message to all the parents on that same day, saying, “We have not intended to offend anyone, and we are sorry about any inconvenience. The parents that know us, know that we have never had a bad intention in our institution. This was activity planned for this month.”
A few days after, Vitale informed the parents that the teachers and staff would receive several ethical training in response to the incident. She also apologized and said that it would never happen again.
However, Politis said she is still disappointed and she decided to pull her 2 children from the daycare.
“The bottom line is we can’t trust them with our children all apologies aside,” Politis said. “I thought we would have more time before these sorts of things or racism or microaggressions would have to be experienced by our children. So the fact that you can’t, I feel like I can’t protect my children from what’s happening is probably the most disappointing and upsetting of all of this.”