Daily Mail
May 19, 2014
A top grammar school was forced to apologise after a group of pupils ‘blacked up’ for a fancy dress party held as part of a leavers’ day celebration.
A picture of four students wearing dark face paint during a fancy dress event at the top boys’ school was posted online by Stephen Lehec – headmaster at Aylesbury Grammar School in Buckinghamshire.
The year 11 pupils had dressed as the Jamaican bobsleigh team from the film Cool Runnings to celebrate the end of their school careers.
Three of the pupils are white and one mixed race. In the image, they can be seen wearing wigs and with their faces painted black.
Mr Lehec tweeted an image of them, writing, ‘#AGS2014 #AGSmemories Jamaican bobsleigh team comes to the party! #coolrunnings’.
He swiftly deleted the tweet but not before it was criticised by other twitter users.
One Julie Davies wrote: ‘Aylesbury grammar school students ‘black up’ for a bit of fun? @AGSheadmaster’s timeline makes the 1950’s come alive!’
Her son Harry Davies then wrote: ‘Why did @AGSheadmaster think it acceptable for pupils to do this?’