August 4th, 2020

Mr. Andrew Ellison

Executive Director
Great Hearts San Antonio

Dear Mr. Ellison,

I am a teacher at Great Hearts Western Hills and am contacting you with deep concern. I
am a firm believer in equal rights for all people and have been working more than usual recently
to fight for them. One thing I have done to help people safely express their moral stance
wherever they go, is to create various masks that support the belief that Black Lives Matter.

I was disappointed then to get the following message at the end of day Friday from my Assistant
Headmaster, “Hey can you start bringing a different mask on campus? We dont discuss the
current political climate on campus. Parents will start coming around more now. Thank you!”

My response: “I can wear a new one, but I made all masks to show my support of equal
rights for all, and have vowed to wear only those for the duration of this pandemic. I do
not quite understand why this is a problem, I should hope all students and faculty at Great
Hearts would be happy to know I will love all of my students and treat them all equally,
regardless of race, religion, or gender. And if anyone is offended by the idea of equal
rights for all students at our school, does that really seem like the kind of person that
belongs in the Great Hearts family? Our motto is Truth, Goodness, Beauty. These
transcendentals are inalienable rights, and Great Hearts should be proud to declare that
they work unceasingly to provide them to scholars of all colors and creeds. As the great
philosopher Cornel West so powerfully and eloquently put it, “We’ve got to fight all
forms of dogmatism, all forms of self-righteousness, all forms of believing one has a
monopoly on TRUTH or GOODNESS or BEAUTY.””
 I was told I was not disagreed with and we could discuss it further on Monday. Monday
morning, I was told I just needed to bring it up to you and the best way to contact you would be
via email. Which brings us here.

I have several concerns I would like to address regarding this policy:

Firstly, I disagree with the reduction of Black Lives Matter to a political statement when
it is a human rights issue. As the adults in an educational institution we have a sacred obligation
to keep all scholars safe, and if you do not even feel comfortable saying their lives matter, how
can any of our black, brown, or indigenous scholars and their parents ever trust us to truly act
like their lives matter? In the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, “A time comes when silence is
betrayal.” For Great Hearts to stay quiet on this simply because they prefer to avoid the political
climate seems a betrayal of the population they claim to exist for.

I have been overjoyed at the fact that many of teachers I have spoken to over the past few
months have said their principals and superintendents have sent out statements declaring their
support of Black Lives Matteri. As a school system that so honors the teachings of Socrates, I
had hoped that Great Hearts would have long since followed in the footsteps of that revered
gadfly, in a declaration of support of the upheaval of the unjust status quo. “I must run the risk to
the end with law and justice on my side, rather than join with you when your wishes were unjust,
through fear of imprisonment or death.” ( Apology, 32c)

When we begin to come back to school, there will be no avoiding this issue. Scholars and
their families have been quarantined for several months under a constant barrage of news stories,
articles, radio broadcasts, and live footage of violence against innocent people. I cannot imagine
the fear that is eating away at the black children who see video footage of people who look like
their parents being attacked because of their skin color. I cannot fathom the pain that gripped
every mother of color’s heart as they heard the audio clip of George Floyd crying out for his own
with his last breath. Those feelings will be all over our campus as children begin to return to
school, some leaving the security of their parents’ side for the first time since the quarantine
began. What will Great Hearts do to reassure these children and their parents that we will protect
them from bigotry with every fiber of our being? Refusing to acknowledge the current political
climate will not help diminish fear, it will not make scholars feel safe, and it will not do.

I think it pertinent to now revisit some key points that Great Hearts makes throughout
their website.

-Philosophy tab, Our View of Learning:

Liberal education consists of cognitive, emotional, and moral education—thinking deeply,
loving noble things, and living well together. We believe, with Plato, that the highest goal of
education is to become good, intellectually and morally.

-Classical Education:
• Values knowledge for its own sake;
• Upholds the standards of correctness, logic, beauty, and importance intrinsic to the
liberal arts;
• Demands moral virtue of its adherents; and
 • Prepares human beings to assume their places as responsible citizens in the
political order.

-From the Family Handbook:

“The danger we presently face as a nation is that, in the words of Hirsch, “many young people
today strikingly lack the information that writers of American books and newspapers have
traditionally taken for granted among their readers from all generations.” The same observation
applies to the realm of politics, the financial and industrial world, and all other facets of
American life. / In politics, the pregnant allusions of a Lincoln would fall upon deaf ears. Make
no mistake. Cultural literacy is not merely ornamental trivia. Our purpose is not to make
Jeopardy champions. Rather, cultural literacy is essential to a nation and its citizens. A
culturally illiterate America cannot live up to the demands placed upon us by history and
the present condition of the world. A culturally illiterate individual cannot comprehend
vast areas of human knowledge necessary for his political, economic, social, and moral
well-being.”

These are only a few excerpts from the Great Hearts website that serve to illustrate what
a mistake it is to turn a blind eye to “the current political climate”. Great Hearts constantly
declares that the purpose of the classical education model is to build moral fortitude, to groom
the scholars we have been entrusted with into leaders who will “have the character necessary to
ensure that everything they do improves their community and our world.” We must teach our
scholars by example; how will they ever have the courage to stand up for what they believe in,
when they do not see their teachers and headmasters practicing what they preach?

Since this began, I have been messaged by a few friends and family, attempting to
discourage or dissuade me from this path. I have wavered and fretted. One of my biggest
supporters in this has been my twin brother. When I told him that people encouraged me to back
down, he said, “They’re right. It is okay to back down. But would it help you? Would it help
your students? Would it help the school? Would it help the community?”

I responded that I got nauseated just thinking about it. Again, he came back with the
perfect response; “Then don’t feel hurt by your decision. Don’t allow others to shame you for it.
You gave this thought, you approached it intellectually and emotionally and came to the same
conclusion in both regards. If someone knows this is right and can’t support it, they should carry
the shame, not you.” He is quite smart, there is a reason he works with NASA. Which brings me
to my next point.

At the Faculty Orientation a few weeks ago, Headmaster Vlahovich discussed the
“theme” for the 2020-2021 school year. Last year, it was “The Man in the Arena” speech by
Teddy Roosevelt, a spookily appropriate pick considering the year ended in the struggles of
quarantine. This year, Mr. Vlahovich was inspired by the determination with which the Apollo
13 crew overcame their challenges to get the crew home safely. He chose the quote, “Failure is
not an option.” While he explained that this was the attitude with which he wanted us to
approach remote learning, I think it is an even more appropriate quote than he may have realized.
As teachers, we are the ground controllers, and our scholars are the crew fearing for their lives.
The black community is running out of oxygen, and it is our duty to address the problem head on
in order to get them home safely. The Apollo 13 lunar module was not originally designed to be
able to navigate the crew back to Earth. It wasn’t built for the 90 hour lifetime they needed to
stretch it to, and it was not built to support 3 men for 4 days. But it did. It did, because the
ground controllers worked unabatingly- troubleshooting, constantly communicating, and
supporting each other in their efforts. NASA estimates that over 400,000 people worked to
make the Apollo program successful, and cost the equivalent of 152 billion dollars today. NASA
was willing to put all that effort into the pursuit of Truth- the hunt for knowledge, and for the
achievement of Goodness- the lives of 3 brave men. Just 3 men. What about the billions of
oppressed black people worldwide? It is perfectly reasonable to admit that while the avoidance
of the current political climate education model may have worked before, it needs to change. We
must follow in the steps of the Apollo ground crew, we must adapt, we must do what is best for
the quality of life we hope to create for our scholars. It would cost Great Hearts nothing to make
a simple statement that they support the lives of not just 3 men, but of all of the black, brown, or
indigenous children at our school, all over San Antonio, Texas, America… throughout the entire
world. That they will work to make sure every child feels supported and safe in their pursuit of
Truth, Goodness, and Beauty, because we know that our family does not end at 4pm or at the
edge of campus. Our family is our community, our city, and our people. Avoiding the issue is
failure. Failure is not an option.

I understand that many people are showing support in various ways, but this is mine. I
have never been a good liar, as I wear my heart on my sleeve. Now, I am asking you to let me
wear it on my mask.

Sincerely,

Lillian White

“Worthy of honor is he who does no injustice, and more than twofold honor, if he not
only does no injustice himself, but hinders others from doing any.”
-Plato

i
https://www.ajc.com/news/local-education/read-statements-from-atlanta-school-board-superintendent-
black-lives-matter/AYg1S04X6fZMikLc6c1o7K/?ecmp=intown

https://www.berkeleyschools.net/2020/06/resolution-in-support-of-black-lives-matter/

https://www.nthurston.k12.wa.us/site/default.aspx?PageType=3&DomainID=1&ViewID=6446EE88-D30C-
497E-9316-3F8874B3E108&FlexDataID=90994&PageID=1

https://www.sanantonioalliance.org/post/statement-on-black-lives-matter