Students show up with T-shirts featuring Confederate flag

CANTON - About 150 students came to Cherokee High School on Friday wearing T-shirts which featured Confederate flag emblems, protesting a school ban of such clothing. <br> <br> Officials at the school, about 35 miles north of Atlanta, gave the students the option of changing shirts or hiding the emblem. Several of the them were taken out of school by their parents, principal Bill Sebring said. <br> <br> ``Parents are very upset and supporting their students,&#39;&#39; he said. ``They don&#39;t see it as a problem.&#39;&#39; <br> <br> Sebring said the clothing was banned after complaints that a couple of students felt uncomfortable on campus. <br> <br> According to the Georgia Department of Education, about 4 percent of the 1,830 students at the Cherokee High School are black and 91 percent are white. <br> <br> ``I didn&#39;t enslave the blacks. That happened, I can&#39;t change it,&#39;&#39; said parent Joyce Hughes. <br> <br> She didn&#39;t allow her 17-year-old daughter, Diana, to where the outlawed T-shirts but encouraged her to sign a petition. <br> <br> ``It&#39;s not a symbol of slavery, it&#39;s a symbol of heritage that we fought in the Civil War,&#39;&#39; Diana Hughes said. ``We had our own transgressions, but we were discriminated against.&#39;&#39; <br> <br> Students said they plan to take their protest to the school board.

http://accesswdun.com/article/2002/9/190404