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School Board Member Apologizes For Response To Complaints About N-Word

SAN JOSE (KPIX) -- A Campbell high school board member is apologizing after telling students to toughen up when students complained that racial slurs were thrown around campus.

"We heard how at certain campuses how slurs like the N-word or the F-slur were very common," a student trustee told the Campbell High School Board.

The allegations were alarming.

"Theyre thrown around," she said. "Students even say them to teachers."

But it was Campbell Union High School Board member Matthew Dean's response to the student report that's been blasted as tone-deaf and out of touch.

"I tried to teach my kids that when someone told you something that you didn't like, to look for what was the nugget -- what was the gem that you could take out of that," Dean told her.

"When you're called the N-word, there's no diamond in that. There's no justification," she said.

Dean refused KPIX's request for an on-camera interview Wednesday, but backpedaled from his comments at the board meeting, and referred us, instead, to an apology he posted online.

He wrote, in part:

"To our student leaders, I simply want to state, from the bottom of my heart, that I am deeply sorry if I made you feel as if your voice did not matter. Not only does your voice matter, it is so strong that I feel that the teachable moment I was seeking to achieve for you became a teachable moment for me."

"Surprisingly enough, a lot of people use racial slurs," says Zander Ivers, a Del Mar High School Freshman.

Ivers says racial slurs are disturbingly common on campus.

"I've even seen a couple of fights start over it," says Ivers. "Maybe, a white guy says the word and then a black guy comes in and they start to fight."

"The N-word? Yeah, I've heard people say it," says Fabian Norberto, a junior. "But thankfully I don't hear it all the time."

KPIX asked the Superintendent if he'd like to weigh on what's going on and what's apparently being said on his campuses. He declined. But given the gravity of the allegations, we asked a second time if parents and students deserved more than his silence on this issue, but still no response.

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