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Cinco de Mayo event bruises feelings
OMAHA — The debates over illegal immigration and about dividing the Omaha school district largely along racial lines may have raised racial and ethnic tensions at an Omaha high school.
A school assembly sought by some Hispanic students at Omaha Bryan High to mark the Mexican holiday of Cinco de Mayo became an optional event after other students complained that it was not their holiday for their country.
Maria Torres and some other Hispanic students had wanted to share their heritage. The holiday marks the victory of Mexican forces over French forces in the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862.
Administrators were receptive to the students’ idea of an assembly and set aside time for the whole student body to attend. But it became an optional event after the other students objected.
Said Bryan Principal Dave Collins: “They felt that because it wasn’t part of their culture, they didn’t want to go.”
Tensions already were up, some students said, in part because of the new state law divides Omaha Public Schools into three districts. Bryan will be in the southeast Omaha district, characterized as largely Hispanic.
The school population of 1,700 is 52 percent white, 32 percent Hispanic and 13 percent black, officials say.
In addition, many Hispanics in Omaha, elsewhere in Nebraska and across the nation have been on the march in support of changing U.S. immigration laws.
Had the Cinco de Mayo event come at another time, without the local and national tensions on the other issues, there would have been no objections, said some of the students.
“It was a time when kids tried to step up and say, ’Enough is enough,“’ said Paul Cordes, editor of the school newspaper, the Orator.
Tensions may be higher at Bryan, where Hispanic numbers are rising toward the white majority, said Gary Kastrick, an Omaha South High teacher.
South High — 45 percent Hispanic, 34 percent white and about 20 percent black — might be less tense about the immigration issue, he said, because South High has more foreign-born students.
Collins said about 500 students — nearly 30 percent of the student body— attended the 40-minute program of mariachi singers, dancers and student speakers. He said students of all backgrounds attended.
Students who didn’t attend went to a study hall.
Torres, who was born in Mexico, said members of Bryan’s Latino club felt slighted when the event became optional. After all, she said, students have to attend pep rallies and other school-time functions that don’t directly affect them.
Like other public schools, Bryan has a yearly assembly to honor the slain black civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. Collins said King’s birthday is a recognized U.S. holiday, but Cinco de Mayo is not.
Torres said school tensions were still palpable.
“Sometimes I hear ignorant comments,” she said. “But I’m not going to lower myself to their level.”
Information from: Omaha World-Herald, http://www.omaha.com