Student Journalist Who Uncovered High School's Racism Suspended Over Yearbook Photo

A student journalist at Princeton High, who previously exposed the school of racism, was suspended for yearbook photo that featured a racial slur.

yearbook photo
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Unapproved Source: Jamaica Ponder/Multi Magazine

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yearbook photo

A Princeton High School student known for her widely cited writing on social injustices and racism at the school says she was suspended after including the photo above in the yearbook. Jamaica Ponder, the founder of Multi Magazine, was suspended after being accused of including "offensive language and images" in a submitted yearbook photo, NJ.comreported Tuesday.

The language and images in question were actually part of a piece of art created by her father, Ponder wrote Thursday. "Art is trouble, if you're doing it right," she said. "And Ponder art has a tendency to incite and provoke; to make people think. Right now, it serves its purpose from all the way in my basement, from behind the heads of my scooter and balloon wielding friends, from the purposefully innocent and apolitical photo that is my senior collage. My father's art served its purpose without me even noticing and that's how I ended up in the principal's office this morning when I should've been doing my math homework."

A canvas entitled "N***** RICH" is mostly obscured in the yearbook photo. Another piece, showing Michael Jackson and other "(in)famous black men who have been notoriously butchered by mass media," is partially seen on the far left of the image. The submission of the image, Ponder said, was an oversight.

Back in March, Ponder penned a Multi Magazinepiece about a white Princeton High School student using the n-word on Snapchat. In April, she spoke with the New York Times about another Snapchat image showing Princeton High students playing a drinking game called "Jews vs. Nazis."

In a follow-up Multi Magazine piece Sunday, Ponder said her suspension was part of a larger problem within the Princeton Public Schools system. "Your secret is out, PHS," she said. "Everyone knows that Princeton Public Schools has constantly and consistently failed people of color and there is energy wasted in trying to mask the inconvenient truth in arbitrary suspensions. Just because you maim the messenger doesn't mean the truth dies with them."

Ponder recalled the moment she was called into the principal's office and informed of her one-day suspension:

I considered the fact that they just suspended a black kid for allegedly using the N word. I recalled my collage, the photo which hosts 16 of my friends and 5 out-of-focus hanging men, 1 full G, half of an R, and an I which may or may not be an H. I wondered where they explicitly saw the word “n*****,” when I understood that they didn't; that there is no n***** in the yearbook; that the only n***** in that photo is me; that she had said too much, disrupted the show and that she had to be silenced.

Princeton High School officials have not commented on Ponder's case or confirmed her suspension specifically. In a letter to parents obtained by NJ.com, however, Princeton High School Principal Gary Snyder claimed that multiple collages in the yearbook included "insensitive, offensive, and provocative words and symbols of racial bias, bigotry, and anti-Semitism."

This is an interesting outcome given Ponder's recent activity of exposing the school. For more on Jamaica Ponder's work, check out this NewsWorks profile from May of this year.

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