Parents at Montclair Elementary School in Oakland, California, discovered that the school's yearbook included a reprinted 1940s newspaper article containing a racial slur, according to a KTVU report. The article, originally from the Montclarion, referred to a carnival game once held at the school's annual Otterwalk event, using the term "N-word babies" to describe the game.  

PTA President Sloane Young stated that volunteers compiling the yearbook overlooked the offensive content, having only skimmed the first paragraph before scanning the article into the publication software. Young became aware of the issue just before Memorial Day weekend, after the yearbooks had already been distributed to students.  

"The description of the game, once you start Googling it, is horrific," Young said, according to the outlet. 

"It was never to erase, turn a blind eye, or whitewash this horrific time in history," Young told the outlet. "It was really to give parents agency, and so we provided them with resources and options.” 

Young added: “I have a very bold, outspoken eight-year-old, and when she saw it, she said, ‘Mom, why did you allow this to go in the yearbook when you’re Black?” 

In response, the PTA ordered reprints of the yearbook and provided stickers to cover the offensive language in existing copies, particularly for fifth-grade students who had already collected signatures. Additionally, the PTA offered educational resources to help families discuss the incident with their children. Young accepted full responsibility for the oversight and emphasized the importance of confronting such issues to foster learning and reflection within the community

"This is something that, especially today, in the world we live in, we have to face," said Young, to KTVU. "We cannot think that it was so long ago that we don’t have to talk about it or learn from it."

As of the report's publication, the Oakland Unified School District had not provided a comment on the matter.