Prior Lake High School investigating another racist video

A month after a Prior Lake student left the district after being seen in a racist video, the school is investigating a new racist video.

Prior Lake High School Principal John Bezek says an investigation was launched as soon as the school was alerted to the video and "we took swift and appropriate action with the students involved."

Last month, a video targeting a Prior Lake High School freshman went viral on social media. The school said last week the student in that video was no longer enrolled in the district.

Below is Bezek’s full message that was sent to families and staff.

Prior Lake High School families,

This week another racist video on social media involving PLHS students, and students from another school district, was reported to us. As soon as the video was brought to our attention, we launched an investigation and we took swift and appropriate action with the students involved.

Prior Lake-Savage Area Schools will not tolerate racism or hate speech. We believe everyone in our schools needs to be accountable for their words and actions. Therefore, we will continue to take action when we hear racial slurs or hate speech, or when an incident is brought to our attention.

As you know, this week we met with all PLHS students to take active steps to promote conversations about the culture of our school and help ensure a safe learning environment. We will continue to support our students, listen to them, and help them implement their ideas to help us drive change in our school.

As a reminder, we have a confidential reporting system available where anyone can report dangerous or potentially harmful situations. https://docs.google.com/a/plsas.org/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfKBiqJjtezbxsEsNwj9yKiO0ZkUJyvMtV_cgkbJsySYN6EQA/viewform?c=0&w=1

Thank you to those who reported the video to us. It will take all of us working together to bring the positive changes needed to continue to ensure we have safe learning environments for all of our students.