A Massachusetts cheerleading coach will not return this season after a video recording of her on Snapchat went viral.
The Daily Item reports that Stephanie Cuevas, a cheer coach at Lynn (Mass.) English, was captured on a Snapchat video with her fist raised, yelling the phrase “white power,” before breaking down in laughter.
The video was posted to Snapchat by a friend of Cuevas, but wound up being posted to another social network and going viral after it was seen by a former coach with whom Cuevas had had a dispute.
Jarod Dennis, the coach, had been a volunteer with the Lynn Chargers Youth Football and Cheering Association, where Cuevas had been a board member. During his tenure, he coached Cuevas’ son, but didn't name him team captain.
“Board members want their kids to be in certain higher positions on the teams, and if you don’t please these people they make your coaching experience hell,” Dennis told the Item.
Dennis believed the "white power" comment was directed at him.
After the video was posted on Facebook, parents and residents contacted school administrators to voice their concerns. An investigation followed, and it was determined that Cuevas would not be brought back to coach at the school.
Patrick Tutwiler, Lynn Public Schools superintendent, told the Item that coaches within the school system are only technically employees during the season for which they receive payment, so while Cuevas was not technically fired, she will not be brought back to coach this season.
“I’ve received a lot of questions around whether or not she is actually going to be fired and I could only fire her if it was during the fall season, but we have concluded she will not be extended an agreement to coach with us this fall,” Tutwiler told the Item.
Since the incident, Cuevas has deleted all of her personal social media accounts, and removed herself from the board of the football association. Before deleting her accounts, she issued a statement on social media attempting to explain the video, saying, “I was making fun of myself in the video because that’s my personality...and for the record, I’m white power, Black power, Mexican power, and human race power, period.”
