Craig and Kelly Robinson appeared on Good Morning America and spoke with Robin Roberts, explaining why they are suing the University School of Milwaukee after the school expelled their two young sons, ages 11 and 9, in 2021. 

When the couple raised issues about the racial, ethnic and socio-economic bias present in the private school’s curriculum and the student conduct policies, the school dismissed their children.  

“As a lot of parents, we heard what was going on in the classroom because of COVID and there were repeated use of racial and ethnic stereotypes that were in actual assignments,” Craig said. “The use of the word plantation and things of that nature. In addition to the racial and ethnic stereotypes, there was an insensitivity to socio-economic status as well as a disregard for the children who weren’t physically in the classroom.”

Kelly added to her husband’s comment, saying the school previously included a reenactment of the Underground Railroad in its fourth-grade curriculum. 

“Students dressed up as slaves and ran through the school in the dark, and the teachers were actually the slave masters who captured these students,” she said, The Hill reports.

She continued, telling GMA that “hearing these stories and understanding the pain that other families have gone through are one of the reasons why we wanted to come forward with this story.” 

Kelly also pointed out that during the 2020-2021 school year, she and her husband expressed concern about how the school treats students of color and underrepresented children.

“The Robinsons communicated directly with USM faculty and staff about the inclusion of language in various worksheets and projects that was offensive to persons of color, persons with disabilities, indigenous Americans and other underrepresented students,” the lawsuit states, GMA reports.

Kelly also recalled submitting two different bias incident reports that summarized the couple’s concerns about how the classwork displayed socio-economic insensitivities, according to GMA. 

“The first bias that we noticed I did put a report in and was told that the reporting system was not working,” she said on the morning show. “The head of school told me that this was not a bias — each other time following when any bias was reported, instead of acknowledging and working to make it better, they ended up dismissing our students.”

She added that “one of the other stories that we heard was about how the Black students seem to get more harsh punishments than their white counterparts.” 

The Robinsons’ two young sons have now enrolled in a different school, The Hill reports. 

“We want to hold the University School of Milwaukee accountable not just to our two children who they retaliated against, but more importantly, there’s a whole community of people who are out there that we wouldn’t feel right if this happened moving forward,” Craig said, The Hill reports.