Nicole Swigart, Rapid City Area Schools superintendent, has been placed on leave following offensive comments she made during a U.S. Department of Education Office of Civil Rights investigation, school officials announced Monday.
The Rapid City Area Schools Board of Education placed Swigart on a 30-day leave and required her to complete cultural competency training to work toward rebuilding positive trusting relationships with the Indigenous community.
“We are confident in Superintendent Swigart’s ability to lead this District and ensure that all students enjoy a positive, safe, and nondiscriminatory environment while at school,” a Monday statement from the board said.
In a May 29 Office of Civil Rights Resolution Letter, when asked about low attendance rates and high tardy reports among Native students, Swigart said Native families operate on “Indian time,” making students often two hours tardy.
In the letter, Swigart also reported to the Office of Civil Rights that certain tribes, such as those of the Lakota, Dakota and Nakota people, “do not commonly value education and inform their students that they do not need to graduate.”
In an email to the Rapid City Journal and ICT in June, Swigart said she did not make the comments attributed to her in the report.
“I adamantly disagree with those comments attributed to me in the Office of Civil Rights report,” she said. “The transcript of my interview is both misleading and inaccurate as to comments I allegedly made regarding my views of the Native community. I do not hold those beliefs to be true and I have never uttered such hurtful words.”
Weeks prior on June 4, she apologized for her remarks during a Rapid City Area School Board Meeting. In her statement to the Board of Education, she said she did not recall saying those words.
“We will use this incident as an opportunity to reinforce our commitment to our core values and ensure that all students experience a school environment where they feel valued, respected, and supported,” the board said in Monday’s statement. “The Board acknowledges that there is a great deal of work to be done to ensure Native American students are treated equitably in the district and we will not shy away from this work.”
As of July 1, the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights has not completed a request from ICT and the Rapid City Journal for the full transcript of Swigart’s interview.
This story is co-published by the Rapid City Journal and ICT, a news partnership that covers Indigenous communities in the South Dakota area.