By Ron Freeman

Recently LSR7 School Board member Bill Haley supported the district by sponsoring a table at Lee’s Summit Education Foundation event. The theme of his table was “Redneck Lives Matter.”   To give definition to the signage there is a sentence that sums up what he meant. “Warning: You are entering a REDNECK AREA. You may encounter American flags, Armed Citizens, the Lord’s Prayer & Country music. ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK.”

Led by former board President Rodrick Sparks some people are pretending that somehow this should scare Black families and represents disrespect to the Black Lives Matter movement, which he calls and anti-police brutality movement. I wonder if he knows that, according to statista.com since 2017 twice as many whites have been killed by law enforcement. The numbers are clear 425 whites (I am sure many are rednecks) and 225 blacks. If Sparks is calling for inclusivity, he should include rednecks in his movement.

But that is not his goal. The real goal is to leverage racial politics to hold a community captive to a false narrative.  For the past 5 years this community has been accused of being racist and unfair to Black students. Yet if you look at the list of valedictorians, you see diversity in action. If you look at the graduates of LSR7 who have gone on to succeed professionally, you see diversity. There are voices in the community who serve no purpose other than to keep this false narrative alive. The truth is students who work hard and take responsibility to do their work succeed here, from every ethnic background.

The display was nothing more than a satirical statement opposing the prevailing mindset. If you’re afraid of the American flag, the Lord’s Prayer, gun ownership and country music, you have serious issues. Those who are racializing this situation are nothing more than race hustling poverty pimps. They use racism as a tool to win political battles, not to improve the quality of life for communities of color. Mr. Sparks was the board president and under his leadership, no significant academic progress was made. But his campaign was all about oppressed blacks in the community. Ironically, he did nothing to help improve education for minorities.

We finally have a board committed to best practices is education, including structured literacy. When you understand that according to U.S. News and World Report, on 50% of LSR7 students read at grade level. So, while Mr. Sparks complained about racism, he did nothing to improve the quality of education for LSR7 students, blacks or anyone else. The motive is clear, use race to stir up a divide in hopes of crippling your political opponents. Even though their idea may prove to be what helps all students, we’ll defeat them on by calling them racists.

I have met Bill Haley. We have talked about issues we face as a community in terms of improving education. He understands and is committed to doing what is best for all students. Don’t listen to his political enemies. Remember their goal is simply to divide a community to gain control so they can do nothing. Bill Haley is a person of action and wants to do what is right. We should be wary of those who oppose him.

Ron Freeman has been a Lee’s Summit resident since 2015. He is a former leadership consultant to the LSR7 Superintendent’s Leadership team. He is the author of a book on leadership  “Game Changer: Setting Your Mind To Win” He is currently working on his second book titled, “Rethinking Race.” He is a speaker and coach on leadership and building communities of advocates in the workplace.