(Rapid City, SD) — The Rapid City Area Schools District superintendent is on a 30-day leave after making “discriminatory statements” during an investigation by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights. The school board also announced Tuesday superintendent Nicole Swigart will have to complete cultural competency training. The OCR’s 2023 investigation of the school district found that Native American students were unfairly disciplined more often than white students. During the probe, Swigart told the OCR certain Native American tribes “do not commonly value education and inform their students they do not need to graduate.”
