{"id":151746,"date":"2026-03-03T23:46:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-03T23:46:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/151746\/"},"modified":"2026-03-03T23:46:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T23:46:16","slug":"nyc-scraps-plan-to-close-school-at-center-of-hunter-college-professors-racist-hot-mic-scandal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/151746\/","title":{"rendered":"NYC scraps plan to close school at center of Hunter College professor’s ‘racist’ hot mic scandal"},"content":{"rendered":"

New York City Schools Chancellor Kamar Samuels scrapped a plan to close an embattled Upper West Side middle school at the center of a Hunter College professor\u2019s<\/a> \u201cracist and unacceptable\u201d hot mic comments during a public meeting.<\/p>\n

Community Action School will remain open so students and their families can continue to \u201cprocess and recover from\u201d the scandal sparked by Hunter biology professor Allyson Friedman, Samuels wrote in <\/a>a Monday letter to parents obtained by Chalkbeat.<\/p>\n

Friedman, an Upper West Side parent of a public school student, inadvertently interrupted a black eighth-grade student\u2019s concerns about the impending closure of CAS during a Feb. 10 District 3 Community Education Council board meeting.<\/p>\n

Friedman was caught making racist statements during a District 3 Community Education Council board meeting. Hunter College<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re too dumb to know they\u2019re in a bad school,\u201d she said while her mic was unmuted and as a black student from Community Action School was speaking. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf you train a black person well enough, they\u2019ll know to use the back,\u201d Friedman said<\/a>. \u201cYou don\u2019t have to tell them anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before Monday\u2019s reversal, education officials pushed a plan to close CAS because it enrolled only about 170 students, and the kids\u2019 standardized test scores on math and English lagged behind the city average. <\/p>\n

But students and parents defended the school as vital.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst, the CAS community is continuing to process and recover from the racist and unacceptable remarks directed toward a CAS student at a [community education council] meeting in February,\u201d Samuels wrote in <\/a>the letter to parents.<\/p>\n

Community Action School will remain open despite previous plans to close the middle school. Google Maps<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd second, members of the school community shared a strong desire for stability as they move forward. What the CAS community needs right now is meaningful and comprehensive support \u2014 and that would be difficult to provide authentically in the context of a phase-out proposal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hunter College, which is part of CUNY, placed Friedman on leave last week<\/a> pending the result of the investigation into the tenured teacher\u2019s remarks, which drew widespread condemnation and calls for her ouster.<\/p>\n

She seemed to be referring to a comment made by Reginald Higgins, the school district\u2019s interim acting superintendent, who spoke about scholar Carter G. Woodson, the father of black history, earlier in the meeting.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIf you make a man think that he is justly an outcast, you do not have to order him to the back door. He will go without being told,\u201d Woodson wrote in his 1933 book \u201cThe Mis-Education of the Negro.\u201d<\/p>\n

But she misattributed the quote to civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.<\/p>\n

\u201cApparently Martin Luther King said it: If you train a black person well enough, they\u2019ll know to use the back. You don\u2019t have to tell them anymore,\u201d Friedman said.<\/p>\n

Kamar H. Samuels, Chancellor of New York City Public Schools, speaks during a press conference on Universal Childcare at the Sugar Hill Children\u2019s Museum of Art & Storytelling on March 03, 2026 in New York City. Getty Images<\/p>\n

Two other adults in the virtual meeting quickly called out the professor, while others sat shocked with their hands over their mouths.<\/p>\n

The decision to keep CAS open was a startling reversal, given that Samuels supported phasing out the school when he previously served as the District 3 superintendent.<\/p>\n

Samuels, who was appointed by Mayor Zohran Mamdani, visited CAS on Monday and talked to students. <\/p>\n

\u201cNYC Public Schools is committed to listening to and supporting our students, families, and communities. After thoughtful reflection and a conversation with Community Action School students Monday morning, Chancellor Samuels has decided not to post the proposal to phase out the Community Action School beginning in the 2026-2027 school year,\u201d the city Department of Education said in a statement Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs the community continues to process the harm caused by recent racist comments at a Community Education Council meeting, our focus must be on healing, stability, and ensuring students feel safe and supported. We will continue working closely with District 3 to provide the resources and engagement this community deserves.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York City Schools Chancellor Kamar Samuels scrapped a plan to close an embattled Upper West Side middle…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":151747,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[2397,4337,59695,41579,57,9,56,63,65,64,209,3863,6915,58,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-151746","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-cuny","9":"tag-department-of-education","10":"tag-hunter-college","11":"tag-kamar-samuels","12":"tag-metro","13":"tag-new-york","14":"tag-ny","15":"tag-nyc","16":"tag-nyc-headlines","17":"tag-nyc-news","18":"tag-public-schools","19":"tag-racism","20":"tag-schools-chancellor","21":"tag-us-news","22":"tag-zohran-mamdani"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151746","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=151746"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151746\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/151747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=151746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=151746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=151746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}