California parents are demanding answers from Santa Barbara Unified School District after four teenage girls shared a TikTok video depicting them in blackface last month.
Although the students faced disciplinary measures, parents said the incident reflects a broader pattern of racism they believe the district has failed to address.
At Tuesday night’s school board meeting, parents held signs condemning racism and criticizing the district’s response. Messages included, “Don’t be a bystander, stop ignoring racism,” “What was the reason it took two weeks and some to notify parents?” and “racism doesn’t disappear when it’s swept under the rug.”
The protest was organized in support of Black students, with participants calling on Santa Barbara Unified to take stronger and more transparent action.
Much of the discussion focused on the TikTok, which shows the girls imitating an AI-generated image of four young Black boys in different poses. The post was captioned, “Meet the gc🥷🥷🥷🥷🥷🥷🥷….” The ninja emoji is known to be used as a reference to the N-word.
San Marcos High School Principal Dare Holdren previously said the students had “portrayed blackface” and confirmed that the school had “instituted consequences” in response.
Parents, however, questioned why the school waited two weeks before informing them about the video.
“Parents deserve to know,” said Leticia Forney Resch, executive director of Healing Justice Santa Barbara. “They had pictures and images going out to students for a week-and-a-half… Y’all didn’t do your job.”
The students took the photo inside an African American studies classroom. The teacher who uses the room said he was outraged by what he viewed as racism on campus.
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“When black students are harmed, every student is harmed,” Abel Gonzalez, San Marcos High School’s ethnic studies teacher, said. “Black and brown students are very upset and trying to heal.”
The controversy follows other incidents that have unsettled the Santa Barbara Unified community.
The Santa Barbara Independent reported that a substitute teacher at San Marcos High School read the N-word aloud during a lesson on “Of Mice and Men” last year, despite being instructed not to do so. The substitute was subsequently removed from campus.
One parent said district leaders had allowed racist incidents to worsen rather than confronting them early.
“When a nation refuses to confront institutional and structural racism, the harm does not stay contained, it escalates,” Charlotte Gullap-Moore said. “Santa Barbara Unified has watched that escalation in its own schools.”
The local NAACP has also accused the district of failing to create effective procedures for responding to racism on campus.
“SBUSD has struggled to establish protocols to respond to racial incidents and execute them with humanity. Principals need clear guidance; parents and students need accessible information about district investigations and potential disciplinary actions for racist incidents,” NAACP Santa Barbara President Connie Alexander wrote in an opinion article for the Santa Barbara Independent.
Teachers at the meeting likewise said the district’s next steps would determine whether it can begin repairing trust.
“Doing nothing tells this community that anti-Black bias and racism is woven into the fabric of Santa Barbara schools,” Charlotte Gullap-Moore said on behalf of Santa Barbara Unified teacher Tahnia Mark. “So be honest, do you really care about black students? If you don’t, just say it…Otherwise, show through action.”