Monica Parker, the mother of one of the young girls who Sunnyside High School Vice Principal Fred Veenendaal called “ghetto girls” and “Section 8 people” in a viral video, is calling upon the district to fire the administrator.
“He should know better,” she said in an interview with The Bee’s Education Lab on Thursday. “He works with kids every day.”
Her family is also seeking legal representation on the matter.
“It’s hard for her to sleep at night because of this,” Parker said of her daughter. “So many kids are getting killed by adults (who are) racially profiling them,” she said and pointed to the recent shooting of Black teenager Ralph Yarl in Kansas City after he knocked on the door of the wrong house.
Veenendaal did not respond to the Ed Lab’s request for comment. He remained on paid leave Thursday while the district continued investigating the off-campus incident, FUSD spokesperson Nikki Henry confirmed to the Ed Lab.
In the short video circulated on social media platforms like TikTok over the last week and a half, a tense back-and-forth occurs between Veenendaal and young women behind the camera. Veenendaal appears to call the police and tell an officer, “You got three girls here. Three Section 8 people here. Ghetto girls.”
Parker told the Ed Lab more of the context behind the video and the effects of the incident on her daughter, Kyra Schrubb, a 17-year-old at Bullard High.
Parker said her daughter and two friends were walking, “minding their own business,” in a gated community behind where they live. They noticed Veenendaal appeared to be recording them and began their own recording.
Although he appeared to call law enforcement during the interaction, the police never came, Parker said.
It wasn’t until her daughter later posted a video of the exchange on TikTok that viewers told her the man in the video was a vice principal at Sunnyside High School.
@firemrvenindall Last weekend this video of my VP at sunnyside high school (go to FireMrVenindall on tik tok) of him harassing 3 black women in North Side of Fresno California and called these poor women "section 8 people" "ghetto girls" for simply walking around the neighborhood or area that they were both in. As a student at SHS I find this very disturbing and disappointing. He has not been accountable for his actions and words by our school/school district, even though the video has been shared throughout the school and to teachers. He must be fire. #firemrvenindall #fyp #racism #poc #genz #fresno #fresno559 ♬ Peaches - Jack Black
The detail about his position at Fresno Unified surprised Parker, who previously worked for a school district as a bus driver.
“We work with kids every day,” she said. “They shouldn’t have that type of assumption in their heart, or hate, or whatever that was that he had towards those girls for no reason.”
Parker and her daughter planned to share their side of the story at Fresno Unified’s board meeting Wednesday but had to leave as the meeting — which included a lengthy budget presentation and discussion — dragged on to almost 10 p.m.
Two Fresno housing advocates stuck around late Wednesday night to join Parker in their calls for accountability from the district.
Tyrone Roderick Williams, CEO of the Fresno Housing Authority, said that FHA works with thousands of the district’s children.
“Using the housing status of a child – or economic status of a family – as a slur is low,” he told the board.
“I am a father of two Black daughters,” he added, “and I know that statements such as those made by the vice principal devalue and stigmatize children.”
Central Valley Urban Institute Executive Director Eric Payne also spoke Wednesday night, calling on the district to terminate Veenendaal.
In an interview with the Ed Lab on Thursday morning, Payne emphasized that he sees this as part of a pattern in the district.
“This is not the only isolated incident where Black students in Fresno Unified have been targeted and dehumanized because of insensitivity and bias,” he said. “Because of anti-Black behaviors.”
Payne alluded to an incident from almost a year ago when a photo of a student, who appeared to be wearing a makeshift Ku Klux Klan hood, circulated on social media and sparked outcry across the district.
Hundreds of students walked out of class in protest, and some of the district’s Black student unions made renewed calls to hold the district accountable for racism.
“Students provided the district with a list of recommendations on how they can be supported, and the system has kind of sat on that,” Payne said. “There’s been little to no implementation, even a year later.”
Henry didn’t immediately respond to the Ed Lab’s request for an update on the district’s implementation of the BSUs’ demands from a year ago. She did refer the Ed Lab to a statement from last June detailing the district’s actions.
The district disciplined the students involved in the photo and enrolled them in cultural sensitivity training. Leaders also discussed creating a new position on high school’s student advisory board focused on “Race & Social Action,” as well as adding one of those students on as a third student board member on the Fresno Unified Board of Education, among other measures.
The Education Lab is a local journalism initiative that highlights education issues critical to the advancement of the San Joaquin Valley. It is funded by donors. Learn about The Bee’s Education Lab at its website.
This story was originally published April 27, 2023 3:14 PM.
