Students, alumni seek Ardrey Kell principal’s ouster over handling of racial incidents

Since he took over Ardrey Kell High School in 2010, David Switzer has been considered one of Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools’ top principals, winning the district’s principal of the year award in 2013-2014 and a national award in 2017.

But days after a Black Lives Matter display on Ardrey Kell’s spirit rock was vandalized and repainted amid protests over the police killing of George Floyd in Minnesota, the latest in a series of racial incidents at the school, a petition calling for Switzer to resign has drawn more than 3,000 signatures.

Former and current Ardrey Kell students said that Switzer directly contributed to a culture of intolerance at the school, using crude language, berating students and failing to seriously discipline those who made racist comments. The nine students who spoke with the Observer said despite the school’s series of racial incidents, Switzer and Ardrey Kell leadership did not pursue meaningful changes or discussions to educate the entire student body about race and racism.

In multiple cases, Switzer referred to predominantly black or lower-income schools in CMS, such as Rocky River, as “the ghetto,” according to five former students. They said that Switzer sometimes contrasted Ardrey Kell to predominantly black schools in derogatory ways, including one instance where he verbally reprimanded black students on their clothing by telling them they were not at West Mecklenburg High School.

Switzer also made comments they found derogatory to women, including an instance where he said female students could wear yoga pants during a certain time period as a reward “for the boys,” according to five former students who spoke to the Observer.

Switzer declined a phone interview, and asked for questions to be sent by email. In response to emailed questions from the Observer, Switzer denied making those statements. He said the petition does not reflect the “equitable educational experience we work hard to develop at Ardrey Kell High School.”

Switzer said he was proud of the work Ardrey Kell has done to address racism and bias, but that he was aware the school had a long way to go in undoing racism, along with the rest of the country. He said that he was continuing to evolve as a leader, and welcomed feedback from parents, students and staff.

“The events that have occurred at our school are not singular to AK, as they are pervasive issues in our country,” he said. “Despite the challenges that we face, we are doing our best to address these events in a proactive manner when possible and a reactive manner when necessary in support of our school community, especially our students of color.”

Under Switzer, Ardrey Kell’s graduation rate climbed steadily and the school has excelled in performance metrics. He has the vocal support of a large number of parents and former students, many of whom say he went above and beyond to remember students’ names and support them through personal crises.

A petition created Friday in support of Switzer’s leadership and in response to the first petition had attracted more than 3,000 signatures by Saturday afternoon. Many signers in support of Switzer said he should not be blamed for students’ actions in the recent racial incidents at the school.

Two alums said they appreciated the difficulty of Switzer’s job and that he did some aspects of it well, particularly when it comes to running a crowded school with more than 3,000 students, but that did not excuse the lack of concrete action over racial incidents at the school.

On Monday, CMS released a video of Switzer in front of the spirit rock.

“I am sorry that incidents have happened at Ardrey Kell High School,” he said. “One incident is one too many, and it pains me to my core that some within our community continue to express racist views and spew hate speech. Let me make it clear that we believe black lives matter. If you harbor hate, if you identify with racist thinking, you have no place at Ardrey Kell High School.”

Three days later, more than 2,000 people were calling for his resignation. Some noted that it was awkward to hear Switzer condemn racist speech weeks after he was in the news for using a derogatory term.

In August of 2019, Switzer apologized to Ardrey Kell teachers and employees for using the term “colored folks” during an earlier staff meeting, attributing it to a slip of the tongue, the Observer reported. CMS said in May that the district had no record of disciplinary action taken as a result of the incident.

Corine Mack, the president of the Charlotte chapter of the NAACP, said CMS and the school board should not tolerate Switzer’s behavior and said it was past time for him to resign. She said that given the current moment, as Charlotte enters its third week of protests related to Floyd, there should be no tolerance for racism and harm to black students.

“The (CMS school) board’s responsibility is to get rid of him, period,” Mack said. “If you’re allowing people to use racial epithets and racially motivated statements and there’s no accountability for those statements, then black lives don’t matter to you.”

In interviews with the Observer, eight alumni who attended Ardrey Kell between 2010 and 2018 said that the recent incidents, including the vandalism of the rock and Switzer’s use of the term “colored folks,” were disappointing but not surprising, given their experiences at the school.

Many said Ardrey Kell needed new leadership to implement progress on issues of race, gender and inclusivity.

“Switzer has been a big part in promoting this culture,” said Dylan Bucey, who graduated from Ardrey Kell in 2018. “He can’t be the one to change it when he’s done so much to promote it.”

‘Complacency’ regarding race

Current and former students said that those who were disciplined for racist incidents at the school rarely faced material consequences for their actions. Many pointed to March 2019, when a white Ardrey Kell basketball player used a racial slur in a Snapchat post before a playoff game against West Charlotte High.

The student was not allowed to play in the the game, though he returned for offseason summer camps and was on the team again this year, the Observer reported. This spring, one year later, he was selected as Best Athlete in the yearbook, an accolade voted on by the student body.

Roughly 53 percent of Ardrey Kell’s student body is white, and 12 percent is black. About 22 percent of students are Asian and 10 percent are Hispanic. The district as a whole is made up of approximately 27 percent white students, 36 percent black students, and 27 percent Hispanic students, according to CMS data.

During the Keith Lamont Scott protests in Charlotte in 2016, students at Ardrey Kell organized a related “die-in” protest on campus. Former students recalled some of their classmates actively trying to disrupt it, shouting “Make America Great Again” and other messages. The alumni said they could not recall students being reprimanded for their behavior.

“There’s just complacency regarding racist actions,” Bucey said. “When stuff like that doesn’t go penalized, it shows the leadership doesn’t care about fixing the problem.”

Switzer said that because he and other school administrators could not share what consequences were assigned to individual students, “individuals may assume that we haven’t done anything in response; however, any race related issue that has reported to us we have addressed appropriately.”

Many who signed the petition in support of Switzer said that he went out of his way to build relationships and get to know individual students, which they said was impressive given the size of the school.

“It was a place where it was easy to become a number and I was a less than remarkable member of the student body,” Olivia Pires wrote. “But he knew my name. He knew all about me when I went to him for guidance during a very difficult time of decision making.”

Switzer’s interactions with students sometimes crossed a line into bullying, three alumni said, picking on them and calling people names like “muffinhead” despite not having a close relationship with the students involved.

At Ardrey Kell, the penalty for being late to class after two warnings was to be sent to “lockout.” Students in lockout missed their class for the period and were assigned to do manual labor or chores around the school, according to six former students, which included mopping the halls, moving mulch, picking up traffic cones or digging holes in the garden.

“So many people complained about it, like, ‘this is unjust, we’re all minors, we’re going to our next class sweating,” Priscilla Bañuelos said. “It was this bizarre form of punishment.”

Switzer said that over the years, the school’s tardy policy has been reviewed and changed based on student, staff and parent input. This past year, Switzer said, students were no longer asked to perform work details or community service during class periods.

Bañuelos said she picked up on microaggressions and sexist undertones at Ardrey Kell, including when Switzer would call her “sunshine” because she didn’t smile in the hallways.

“It was an extension of ‘you look pretty,’ or ‘you should smile,’” she said. “Those little things just create this tone of feeling weird and tense.”

Switzer said that while he spoke to students who misbehaved in a direct manner about the consequences of their actions, he did not berate or call anyone names. He said that he worked toward building more positive relationships whenever a student had a negative experience with him or anyone else on staff.

“I have always built quality relationships with as many students as I could to help them navigate their high school years,” Switzer wrote in his email. “I treat students like I would want my own children treated. Sometimes that means when they do wrong, there needs to be a conversation had about it.”

Black graduates of Ardrey Kell said that they were made to feel different and were singled out by their peers, with little support from administration.

“I have never felt so unaccepted in a place, ever,” said Charisse Thompson, who graduated in 2014. “I remember going to school and just feeling so different, in this environment that’s incredibly intolerant and that made it very hard.”

Thompson recalled her classmates being hostile to her for an entire week for wearing an Obama shirt, while no teacher or administrator intervened.

“I am the kind of person to stick up for myself, but no teacher, and definitely not Mr. Switzer, stopped it from happening,” she said. “No one was around to say, ‘she should be allowed to wear that.’ None of that was happening. There was zero protection.”

One black female student, who graduated in 2018 and asked not to be identified because her family members still attend Ardrey Kell, recalled sitting in class one day when a white boy in the desk behind her cut off one of her braids. The incident was raised with Switzer, who she said responded by asking her whether she had done anything to provoke the boy into cutting her hair.

“Regardless of if I did anything, that doesn’t excuse him violating my space or touching things on my body without consent,” she said.

‘No action steps’

Sunday’s vandalism was not the first time the Ardrey Kell spirit rock has been defaced. In 2016, a “Black Lives Matter” message was painted over with “#MAGA” and “Build the wall.” At the time, Switzer told WBTV, the Observer’s news partner, that he found the message “atrocious” and that free speech should not be derogatory in nature.

Switzer said that Ardrey Kell has provided professional development to staff on culturally responsive teaching. Ardrey Kell has also hosted parent forums on race and bias, Swtizer said, as well as a roundtable discussion with students of color on how to create a more welcoming environment.

“These are just a few examples of opportunities that some of our students and staff have participated in,” Switzer said.

But former students said many discussions needed to happen on a school-wide level, beyond one-time statements made during assemblies or on the morning announcements.

After the spirit rock was recently vandalized, Switzer tweeted that what was painted on the rock was not representative of the school, and that “we stand for & support the movement towards social justice for all.”

Numerous alumni responded to the tweet and said that the vandalism was indicative of the deeper problems at Ardrey Kell, while others criticized his statement for not recognizing that the original message and the vandalism were focused on black lives.

“You need to do more than condemn it,” Thompson said. “There needs to be action steps and there are no action steps. ... If things were going to change under him, they would have already.”

This story was originally published June 11, 2020 at 5:43 PM.