Chalkbeat

Shootings often rise in Philly when school’s out. Violence prevention groups have plans to change that.

2026-06-02T20:25:33+00:00

Ian Dugan remembers James Easterling as “loud” with “a lot of smiles”. The young man used to be a regular in the Salvation Army Kroc Center computer lab where Dugan is an instructor.

“He liked to talk a lot,” Dugan said, pausing for just a moment while planting a flag bearing Easterling’s name on the center’s lawn.

Easterling was fatally shot in Germantown in September 2016 at age 22. His flag is one of roughly 700 the center has planted for gun violence victims since 2025.

“All of us who have been affected by people who’ve died over the years believe the more love we spread, the less flags there will be.”

Dugan was one of several dozen attendees at the center’s “Spread Love Not Bullets” event Monday that focused on preventing youth gun violence during the summer months. Shootings tend to rise in Philadelphia when the weather warms up. And even though gun violence has fallen recently in the city, children make up a growing share of shooting victims.

In response, gun violence prevention organizations are mounting programs to provide safe environments for Philadelphia’s young people in the summer.

“They’re going to have more freedom, they’re going to be exposed to violence more, because they’re not in school for half the day,” said Capt. Dana Bradley of the 39th Police District, who spoke on a panel at the Monday event. “It’s very important for our entire community to provide structured activities.”

This summer, 30 public schools will be part of the School District of Philadelphia’s “extended day, extended year” program, which includes a six-week summer camp. That’s up from 20 public schools last year.

“It gives our students an opportunity to be actively engaged and supervised by adults, and it keeps them out of the streets,” said Craig Johnson, the district’s deputy chief of school safety.

Philadelphia shootings are down about 40% since this time last year. Still, community leaders say young people are at high risk because of social media pressure to escalate violence, combined with the feeling that adults don’t care about or believe in them.

“It’s very important that we understand that kids want to do good,” said John Solomon, the 34-year-old founder of Endangered Kind, a violence prevention effort.

He said the “old school” mentality of approaching teens with a heavy hand doesn’t work with this generation.

“We have to come with a lot of respect,” he said. “If we don’t, then the trust is not built, and the connection is lost, and it makes it that much more difficult for us to begin to deter them or have conversations with them.”

Kyeme Hunter, 19, listened in on the panel and afterwards agreed that more summer activities could help teens avoid violence — but only if they feel safe attending in the first place.

“You got kids that want to do programs, but they’re in fear of the people they’re beefing with going to the same program,” Hunter said.

If adults know about young peoples’ needs, they can design spaces that incentivize them, Hunter said. For example, he said that for young people who are making rap music, programs can provide equipment to help them explore that. Being responsive in that way means “they’ll probably come here more often to relax themselves, just to get some space,” he said.

Michael “OG Law” Ta’Bon will be touring his “mobile community crisis event unit.” It’s a large truck equipped with a roof deck, a stage, a basketball hoop, a grill, and a movie projector. But the unit doesn’t just feature fun activities: Inside the trailer is a replica prison cell that Ta’Bon uses as an educational tool.

The truck has a sign that says: “Summer Onto September.”

“The key is making sure that as many young people make it from summer vacation to back-to-school in September safe, sound, alive and free,” Ta’Bon said.

Correction: June 2, 2025: A previous version of this story misstated the neighborhood where Playin’ it Safe in the 8th operates.

Sammy Caiola is Chalkbeat Philadelphia’s gun violence reporter, and this summer she’s focusing on education for justice-involved youth. If you have experience or ideas on that subtopic, reach her atscaiola@chalkbeat.org.

Colorado law that allows school shooting victims to sue may contain an unintended loophole

2026-04-22T00:00:37+00:00

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When Colorado lawmakers passed a law in 2015 allowing school districts to be held liable for school shootings, they intended to give both staff and students the opportunity to sue.

“Should our schools have a duty to protect our kids and those who work there? Should our schools provide ‘reasonable care’? Senate Bill 213 says yes,” former state Sen. Bill Cadman said at a 2015 hearing on the bill that created the Claire Davis School Safety Act, named after a Colorado student who was killed in a school shooting.

But more than a decade later, it’s not clear whether the law applies to school staff. Two deans who were shot and injured by a student at Denver’s East High School in 2023 are believed to be the first staff members to file lawsuits. Last month, a judge in one of the cases threw out the Claire Davis claim, spotlighting that the law may contain an unintended loophole.

Colorado has a high-profile history with school violence dating back to the deadly mass shooting at Columbine High School in 1999. The parents and classmates of Claire Davis, who was shot by a fellow student at Arapahoe High School in Littleton in 2013, advocated for the bill that bears her name in the hopes that it would curb the violence.

“If there is any state in the country that should be getting this issue right, that has the experience to help us get this right, it should be Colorado,” former state Sen. Andy Kerr said in 2015.

But in removing the immunity provisions in state law that protected school districts from lawsuits and clearing the way for staff members who are seriously assaulted to sue, it appears lawmakers may have overlooked a hurdle: the state’s Workers’ Compensation Act.

In a March ruling, U.S. District Court Judge Gordon P. Gallagher ruled that former East High dean Eric Sinclair can’t sue Denver Public Schools under the Claire Davis law. The law allows individual victims to collect up to $505,000 and multiple victims to split a total of $1,421,000.

Even though Sinclair’s attorneys argued that blocking the former dean from suing under the Claire Davis law would make the law “meaningless or absurd” to school staff, the judge was not convinced. Because Sinclair was injured on the job, Gallager ruled that his claims fall under the state’s Workers’ Compensation Act.

“Mr. Sinclair would not have been injured but for the fact that he was engaged in employment-related duties,” Gallagher wrote.

Sinclair’s attorneys declined to comment for this story.

Did state lawmakers foresee this problem?

Workers’ compensation doesn’t appear to have come up when state lawmakers were debating whether to enact the Claire Davis law. Instead, much of the discussion focused on protecting students and ensuring that victims’ families had access to information about what happened.

That discussion was likely driven by Davis’ death. The 17-year-old was shot in the head while she sat on a bench eating a cookie between classes. The 18-year-old student who shot her had exhibited threatening behavior and said he wanted to kill his debate coach.

At the time the bill was being debated, Davis’ parents were in the midst of arbitration with the Littleton school district to gain access to information about the circumstances surrounding her death. In return, the Davises agreed not to sue.

“Please don’t make the next mother beg for answers as to why her child was killed in a public school in the state of Colorado,” Claire’s mother, Desiree Davis, told lawmakers in 2015.

Even though the scenario of teachers and other school staff being shot didn’t come up much in the debate, the law clearly intends to protect them. It says school districts and charter schools have a duty to exercise reasonable care to protect “students, faculty and staff” from reasonably foreseeable acts of violence, including murder and first degree assault.

Former state Sen. Mark Scheffel, who co-sponsored the bill, said faculty and staff were purposely included. But he said he doesn’t remember any discussions about how the law would interact with workers’ compensation, likely because the issue wasn’t top-of-mind at the time.

“In the testimony and the committees that followed, all of the discussion did tend to center around students,” Scheffel said in an interview this week.

Joe Goldhammer, an adjunct professor at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law and a longtime labor law attorney, said that if state lawmakers wanted to allow school staff to essentially double dip by getting hundreds of thousands in damages on top of their workers’ compensation money, they should have made that clear in the bill.

Cadman, the other co-sponsor of the bill, declined to comment for this story. So did the Colorado Attorney General’s Office. Several local and national school safety and gun violence prevention experts said they haven’t followed the implementation of the law.

Scheffel said he’d be hesitant to encourage state lawmakers to tweak the law just yet, after only one ruling in one lawsuit. He said the law was “delicately drafted” with input from the Davis family, and he wouldn’t want any changes to create more unintended consequences.

“Working on this bill was one of the more gratifying moments I had as a senator,“ said Scheffel, who served in the state legislature for eight years. “It was heartbreaking and gratifying to try to wrap our brain around something we thought would make a difference.”

Few lawsuits have been filed under the law

Few lawsuits have been filed under the Claire Davis law, and it’s not clear how many have resulted in monetary damages.

The family of Kendrick Castillo, an 18-year-old student killed in a 2019 school shooting, sued under the law and collected $387,000 from the charter school their son attended, according to court documents. Kendrick died after he lunged at a fellow student who had pulled a gun in class at STEM School Highlands Ranch.

But the courts denied the Castillos part of what they wanted: a jury trial and public airing of the facts. The Colorado Court of Appeals ruled last year that a trial wasn’t necessary because the family had already collected the maximum amount of money allowable under the Claire Davis law. The school had deposited that sum in the court’s registry early in the case.

Other lawsuits filed under the Claire Davis law have been dismissed.

They include a lawsuit filed by the family of Luis Garcia, who sued Denver Public Schools after Luis was fatally shot while sitting in his car outside of Denver’s East High School in 2023. A judge dismissed the lawsuit because she found that Luis, a 16-year-old junior at East, was not killed on school grounds because his car was parked on a public street.

Attorney Igor Raykin said several of the lawsuits he’s filed under the Claire Davis law have also been dismissed. His cases mostly involved bullying, including one where a student with autism was allegedly pushed down a flight of stairs by a classmate. All but two of the handful of lawsuits Raykin has filed have been thrown out, he said. The other two are ongoing.

“It is still very, very difficult to sue a school for an injury to a child at the school,” Raykin said. “This is one of the things that pisses me off. Schools are going around and saying, ‘We’re going to get sued, and this is awful.’ No. It is still really hard to sue school districts under state law.”

That’s not to say the Claire Davis law hasn’t had any effect. School safety experts say that in the wake of the law, schools sharply increased how often they conduct threat assessments to determine whether a student’s threats are credible and how the school should intervene.

Chris Harms, director of the Colorado Office of School Safety, said the office provided about 20 threat assessment workshops to school districts in the six years before the Claire Davis law was passed. In the 10 years since, it has done more than 200.

Harms declined an interview for this story. But she said by email that “even if (the law) hasn’t resulted in successful lawsuits, it has certainly resulted in trained threat assessment teams in our schools, which we believe has prevented targeted violence.”

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

This program teaches Chicago teens about the risks of gun ownership. It’s changing some minds.

2026-04-03T20:16:39+00:00

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Fifteen-year-old Josiah Owens is considering owning a gun one day because he wants protection. He doesn’t want to suffer the same fate as his best friend, whom he says survived a shooting a couple of years ago.

Owens, a sophomore at Disney II Magnet High School on the Northwest Side, was one of 23 Chicago teens ages 13 to 17 who took part in a recent weeklong program to learn about the risks of gun ownership and how to share those statistics with peers through a flashy social media campaign. He joined after a nudge from his mother, who wanted him to “build connections” with other Chicago kids.

The program, which took place from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. each week day of spring break, was led by nonprofit Project Unloaded in partnership with nonprofit After School Matters, which paid the teen participants $150.

Since 2023, the organization has run a six-week summer program where teens get more time to research gun violence statistics and create catchy social media videos. But the spring break program was a first for Project Unloaded, according to Nina Vinik, founder and president of Project Unloaded.

Project Unloaded focuses on social media creation because that’s where “young people today are going to find information,” Vinik said.

“All of our programs combine firearm risk education for young people with social media skill building, so we’re effectively teaching young people how to use social media as a way to make positive change in their communities,” she said.

Last year, 18.6% of the victims of fatal and non-fatal shootings in Chicago were 19 years old or younger, almost one percentage point higher than the year before but a drop from about 20% in 2023, according to city data.

A 2022 survey of 989 Chicago parents found that more than one-third of their children were exposed to gun violence, ranging from hearing gunshots to being shot. One-fifth of those children experienced mental health symptoms as a result.

Last week during Chicago Public Schools’ spring break, Owens and his peers showed up to the After School Matters offices in the Kilbourn Park neighborhood and learned some gun ownership statistics: People with a gun at home are twice as likely to be killed, according to a California study conducted in the 1990s. According to another study published in 2011, people who owned a gun were four times more likely to be shot during an assault compared with those who didn’t have a gun on them.

The teens then learned how to create effective social media campaigns that direct people to a website with more information on studies related to gun ownership. They spent a day with staff from iO improv theater to “come out of their shells,” said Olivia Brown, associate director of youth engagement at Project Unloaded who led the spring break program. They also watched videos from other content creators to learn that a good video has a hook, a main message, and then a call to action, Brown said.

Olivia Brown, associate director of youth engagement for Project Unloaded, speaks to a group of teenagers who participated in the organization's weeklong program aimed at teaching them about the risks of gun ownership and effective social media campaigns.

“They were like, ‘Oh, it’s kind of like writing a persuasive essay,’” Brown said, who agreed with them. “It’s like, you got to get your reader, aka your viewer, on your side.”

The teens practiced shooting videos with their phones. Then, Project Unloaded’s digital strategist helped them create their final videos with his equipment.

On the Friday of spring break, the last day of their program, the teens presented their videos in groups of three or four. They walked up to the front of the room, some appearing shy, facing their peers and invited guests who included content creators.

Their videos, which lasted less than 30 seconds, will be added to an ongoing advertising campaign created by last summer’s cohort of teens, called “Goofies Got Guns.”

One group presented a video showcasing a fictional “Totally Safe News” network, where one of the participants played a correspondent who initially says owning a gun offers safety. Then, the screen bleeps out, and the correspondent fixes the newscast to say owning a gun doubles the risk of homicide.

“Facts don’t care about opinions,” the correspondent says.

Owens’ group made a video where the camera toggles between the teens playing a video game while they discuss the statistics associated with owning a gun.

In another group’s video, one of the teens says he owns a gun, and his peer walks up and puts a clown wig on him. The audience in the room laughed.

Vinik emphasized that they don’t “tell any young person what to do or what to think or what not to do,” rather, they want to arm them with information “to make the best decision that they can for themselves.”

The program did appear to change some of the teens’ minds: Project Unloaded representatives said they saw a 30% drop among the participants who are interested in owning a gun. One of them is Makayla Mason, 16, who’s a junior at Lane Tech High School, who said she considered buying a gun when she gets older.

“I wouldn’t even want to get one anymore,” she said.

Owens, who wants to be a boxer when he gets older, said the social media skills he learned could be useful in helping to promote himself one day.

As for gun ownership? The program didn’t change his mind: He’s still considering buying a gun one day.

“Now I just know the risks of it, which is good,” he said.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Judge rules that East High school shooting lawsuit can move forward, calling DPS’ conduct ‘baffling’

2026-04-02T21:52:01+00:00

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A lawsuit filed against Denver Public Schools by one of the deans shot by a student at East High School in 2023 will move forward, a judge has ruled.

U.S. District Court Judge Gordon P. Gallagher wrote that “DPS appears to have exhibited a shocking disregard” for the risk that the student posed to his peers, the East High staff, and himself. The student took his own life after the shooting.

Gallagher cited the student’s prior expulsion from a high school in Aurora after police found guns in his bedroom and DPS’ decision to remove police officers from schools. He also referenced a general rise in students bringing guns to school and the fatal shooting of an East High student outside the school a month before the deans’ non-fatal shootings.

Taken together, Gallagher wrote that DPS seems to have “knowingly opened the door for a mass shooting and/or outbreak of gun violence at East High School. This conduct is illogical, baffling, and plausibly conscience shocking.”

In a statement Thursday, DPS noted that at this stage in the lawsuit, the judge was required to view the facts in the light most favorable to the former dean, Eric Sinclair. The judge’s ruling doesn’t mean that the district violated the law, DPS said, but that the lawsuit can move forward to the next stage, which involves presenting evidence.

“Denver Public Schools is confident that the evidence will demonstrate that its actions in this case were consistent with legal requirements and looks forward to the opportunity to present its arguments in court in the near future,” the statement says.

Michael Mihm, an attorney for Sinclair, said his legal team had no comment Thursday.

Judge’s ruling provides more details about shooting

The judge’s March 25 ruling provides more details about how the shootings of Sinclair and fellow East High dean Wayne Mason unfolded three years earlier.

The shooter, Austin Lyle, had enrolled at East High in January 2023 because he was living in the school’s boundary. He’d previously been expelled from Overland High School in Aurora “after police found an AR-15 assault rifle, two fully loaded magazines, a zip-lock bag with spent shells, boxes of ammunition, and a silencer in his bedroom,” the ruling says. Overland is part of the Cherry Creek School District.

After Lyle started at East High, an assistant principal, Shawne Anderson, created a safety plan that required Lyle to verbally check in with Anderson each day, the ruling says.

The check-ins escalated to a daily backpack search after another student reported what appeared to be a gun in Lyle’s pocket on March 2. When a campus security guard tried to search Lyle, he “became agitated and fled the school,” according to the ruling. Lyle’s father refused to let police search his son’s bedroom.

On March 23, Anderson didn’t respond to radio calls to search Lyle’s backpack. Sinclair, who didn’t know about Lyle’s history with guns, offered to do the search instead, according to the ruling. He noticed a bulge in the front pocket of Lyle’s hooded sweatshirt.

Lyle implied it was a phone and “grabbed Mr. Sinclair’s hand and put it on the outside of the hoodie, saying ‘here, touch it,’” the ruling says. “Upon feeling the object, Mr. Sinclair immediately knew it was a gun and became alarmed.”

Hundreds of students were across the hall at a school assembly. When Lyle tried to leave the office where Sinclair was searching him, Sinclair blocked the exit and Lyle pulled a gun.

Sinclair radioed for help and Mason responded, the ruling says. Lyle then fired multiple shots at Sinclair, hitting him in the abdomen, chest, and thigh. He also shot Mason.

Judge finds that risk of violence was obvious

Sinclair and Mason each sued DPS last year, alleging that the district’s safety policies and practices were too lax. DPS asked the court to dismiss the lawsuits, arguing that the risk posed by Lyle was not “immediate and proximate,” which is the legal standard to find DPS liable.

Gallagher disagreed, finding that the risk that Lyle would use a gun at school was obvious.

“He had been expelled from Overland High School for possessing guns and ammunition, he was suspected of having a gun on March 2, and no measures aside from a daily backpack search conducted by an untrained staff member were implemented to prevent him from bringing a gun into the school,” Gallagher wrote.

“It is not hard to imagine the terror that students and the parents of other students at East High School would have felt if they had known of this chain of events,” he added.

Sinclair named DPS, the Denver school board, and Anderson in his lawsuit. Gallagher dismissed the claims against the school board and Anderson but not against DPS.

Gallagher also dismissed Sinclair’s claims that DPS violated a state law called the Claire Davis School Safety Act. Named for the victim of a Colorado school shooting, the law says districts can be held liable if they fail to exercise “reasonable care” to protect students and staff from “reasonably foreseeable” acts of violence at school. But Gallagher ruled that Sinclair’s claims fall under the state’s Workers’ Compensation Act instead, since Sinclar was injured on the job.

“Mr. Sinclair would not have been injured but for the fact that he was engaged in employment-related duties,” Gallagher wrote.

Mason’s lawsuit is ongoing. The judge in that case has not yet ruled.

The family of the student who was fatally shot outside of East High several weeks before Sinclair and Mason were injured dropped its lawsuit against DPS earlier this year. The judge in that case ruled that the district was not liable because 16-year-old Luis Garcia was on a public street in front of East High when he was shot inside his car.

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

These student podcasters are calling for resources to address gun violence in Philly

2026-03-09T15:13:42+00:00

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In the hectic two minutes before the cameras started rolling, a producer told high schoolers Jayden Alston and David Torres to keep their sweatshirt hoods away from their eyes.

Next, she reminded Cyniah Goodwin to sit straight and hold the mic up to her mouth. Then, they were ready.

The trio of teen hosts recorded their first-ever episode of the Peacemakers Podcast last month. During a recording session last month, they dug into how Philadelphia students process anger, depression, insecurity, and other challenges that they feel contribute to gun violence across the city. They released a condensed version of that conversation on YouTube this week.

There were 450 to 500 fatal shootings in Philadelphia each year between 2020 and 2022, according to city data. The numbers have dropped significantly since then, with 206 fatal shootings last year, but thousands of kids are still grappling with firsthand loss or the ongoing risk of gun violence in their communities.

Goodwin, Torres, and Alston attend Vaux Big Picture High School in North Philadelphia. They’re producing the podcast as part of a school-based internship with gun violence prevention organization Frontline Dads.

The goal is to show other young people it’s okay to share your feelings with your friends, said Alston, who is 16 and lost a classmate to gun violence in middle school. He said it’s hard to find an adult to talk to at school.

“The adults, they’re not going to really hear us out,” he said. “But students talking to students, that’s real life conversation. … Nobody’s gonna admit that they really going through something. So by hearing other students admit it, they feel comfortable enough to where they can admit it, too.”

The first episode features the students interviewing a special guest from the Philadelphia Anti-Drug Anti-Violence Network. Their next episode will feature a roundtable discussion about the reasons for gun violence in Philadelphia.

“I think gun violence is more so where a person is mentally at,” Alston said during the recording session. “If everything’s not okay at home, your mom’s on drugs, your pops don’t care about you, that’s all gonna be taken out on the world.”

“What I think gun violence come from is not knowing yourself,” said Goodwin, who like Alston is 16. “It’s about love all around, loving yourself as a person, and not even wanting to put yourself in that predicament.”

“I feel like people want to be something, so they look up to the next person, like follow the next leader,” said David Torres, 17.

That missing sense of self-love, combined with pressure from peers or social media and trauma at home, can propel someone toward gun violence if they don’t have a place to process those feelings, the hosts explained.

It’s why they and other students in their internship program are also pushing for solutions on their school campus. They recently submitted a proposal to their administration for a “deescalation room” where students who are feeling overwhelmed can go to take a breather.

During the recording session the teens discussed their ideas for the space, which would be called the “Cougar’s Den” after their school mascot.

“A space where it’s calming, the aroma is right, the music is nice, you got all your necessities in there,” Goodwin said.

She encouraged her fellow students to visit the room when they feel angry “instead of just lashing out on the next person.”

Several Philadelphia elementary schools have deescalation rooms as part of a Temple University-supported program.

The students are planning future podcast episodes on violence and other topics. They record at PSTV, the educational channel for the School District of Philadelphia. The fully staffed, multi-room recording studio in the basement of district headquarters is available for free to all K-12 students in the city. The Vaux students received in-studio coaching from journalist P.O.C at Revive Radio.

Goodwin said it’s important to keep talking about gun violence because it’s become “normalized” in Philly.

“Everybody just goes on to the next day after somebody dies,” she said. “Like it’s just something we are all supposed to experience one day in our life.”

Even with shootings in Philadelphia on the decline, young people still need support as they grieve, as well as guidance on how to not get caught up in conflict, the Vaux students said. They hope both the podcast and the deescalation room can prevent future shootings.

“If everybody just decided what they wanted to do in life and took the time out to think about theirselves, then there wouldn’t be no violence, or maybe no going to jail, stuff like that,” said Alston.

“You have to get vulnerable with yourself to know yourself, so that you can find yourself and you won’t be in dumb situations because you want to be like the next person,” said Goodwin.

This story is part of a collaboration between Chalkbeat Philadelphia and The New York Times’s Headway Initiative, supported by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) via the Local Media Foundation.

Sammy Caiola covers solutions to gun violence in and around Philadelphia schools. Have ideas for her? Get in touch at scaiola@chalkbeat.org.

How often do kids bring guns to school? Here’s what we know.

2026-02-27T20:45:22+00:00

This story was originally published by The Trace, a nonprofit newsroom covering gun violence in America. Sign up for its newsletters here.

Earlier this month, a 7-year-old boy accidentally shot himself with a firearm he brought to his second grade classroom in Maryland.

During a single week last month, three separate K-12 students at different New York City schools were caught with a firearm on campus.

Over the past decade, fear of school shootings has grown among American teachers, parents, and students. Nearly 75% of U.S. teenagers worry about school gun violence, according to a national survey administered by public health researchers at Indiana University.

Despite mounting anxiety about school shootings, the task of tracking the number of guns in U.S. public schools is about to get even harder. Shortly after returning to office last year, President Donald Trump’s administration gutted the Department of Education office responsible for collecting and analyzing most school-related data. The National Center for Education Statistics was reduced to just five employees as of March 2025. Those cuts now jeopardize the future of already shaky statistics about the number of K-12 students caught with firearms on campus.

In lieu of accurate, timely federal data, The Trace used past NCES reports, Gun Violence Archive data, and public health research to try to understand how guns end up in American schools. We learned that students are more likely to bring guns to school when they are exposed to violence and have easy access to firearms. We also found fewer U.S. public schools had armed law enforcement officers during the 2021–22 school year compared to previous years, signaling a possible shift away from armed guards as a school safety measure. Mostly, we learned that public health researchers cannot effectively study school safety without robust federal data on guns in schools.

Fear often drives students to bring guns to school

Despite the lack of quality information, available data and research offer clues about why some students bring guns to school, and why school officials have struggled to respond.

For many students, carrying a gun is seen as a necessary form of self-defense in a violent world. A 2022 study of high schoolers by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that youth who are exposed to violence are more likely to carry a gun.

“If kids are exposed to forms of violence in their neighborhoods or homes, they become more fearful,” said Joshua Rosenbaum, a criminal justice researcher at the University of Mississippi. “Fearful individuals, including kids, often feel like they need to protect themselves by keeping a firearm on them.”

The NCES data shows the nationwide rate of children bringing firearms to school spiked during the 2021-22 school year, the most recent year for which data is available. During that time, the U.S. gun violence epidemic hit a crescendo: Gun deaths reached near-record highs as communities across the country struggled to address gun homicides and suicides amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

A Trace analysis of Gun Violence Archive data found that the rate of kids caught with firearms in school returned to pre-pandemic levels as overall U.S. gun violence decreased in 2024 and 2025.

Rosenbaum also told The Trace that children who have easy access to a firearm at home are significantly more likely to carry “a gun to school compared to their classmates who did not have guns available to them.”

In 2019, the U.S. Secret Service published an analysis of 41 school violence incidents that took place between 2008 and 2017. The agency found that most of the young “attackers” used a gun that was accessible to “from the home of their parents or another close relative.”

NCES data suggests that school officials’ strategy for dealing with campus gun violence may have evolved in recent years. After the Columbine High School shooting in 1990, the Department of Justice established a grant program to expand the hiring and training of “school resource officers” — law enforcement officials stationed on public school campuses. For decades, the presence of these armed officers was viewed as a possible deterrent for school shooters.

But armed school security may not be as popular as it was in the past. During the 2021-22 school year, just one quarter of U.S. public schools were staffed with a law enforcement officer that routinely carried a firearm on school grounds, down 26% from the previous school year. This shift in school officials’ approach to gun safety coincided with a growing body of public health research finding limited evidence that armed guards can prevent school gun violence.

It’s important to remember the limitations of NCES reporting. The agency’s data on armed school personnel relies on the School Survey on Crime and Safety. Participation in the survey is voluntary, meaning the results likely depict an incomplete picture of public schools’ use of armed guards. And in more recent years, some school districts have brought back armed officers after violent incidents.

Researchers trying to patch a fragmented data landscape

Research on guns in schools relies heavily on the National Center for Education Statistics, the data wing of the Department of Education. Under the Gun-Free Schools Act of 1994, schools must submit statistics about firearms on campus to their state education officials, who then share that information with the NCES.

The data collection system is deeply flawed. A 2018 Stateline investigation found that school and state officials routinely failed to track deadly school shootings in Arizona and Colorado. Journalists from Stateline, part of the national nonprofit news outlet States Newsroom, found that state education officials who collect firearm statistics from districts “don’t enforce the reporting requirements,” leading to undercounting.

NCES data also suffers from significant time lags, a common problem with federal datasets. The agency’s latest report was published in 2024, but even then the most recent school year included was 2021-22.

The data landscape worsened in 2025, when the Trump administration fired most of the NCES staff, part of a broader dismantling of the Department of Education.

Data from Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit that tracks gun violence incidents using open source research, offers a potential solution. The GVA tracker includes flags for incidents at schools, but unless the event is logged by local media or law enforcement — the organization’s primary sources — it likely won’t be included. Rural areas are especially susceptible to this undercounting.

Because of these limitations, researchers have turned elsewhere. Public health scholars like the University of Michigan’s Rebeccah Sokol have been forced to build their own data tools to track the incidence of guns in K-12 schools. In 2017, Sokol and her colleagues established the FACTS National Survey, a nationally representative study that asks teenagers directly about firearm access, carrying, and exposure to violence.

The approach has built-in drawbacks: It relies on teens’ self-reported behavior and is conducted in onetime survey waves, meaning it can miss rapid changes and cannot provide real-time, local detail. Still, tools like the FACTS survey offer a stopgap in a research landscape where the federal government has largely failed to systematically track how and why guns end up in the hands of children.

“If we received timely, accurate data on where and when students are bringing firearms to school,” Sokol told The Trace, “we could use that data to develop better strategies to prevent dangerous situations from happening.”

Two competing Colorado bills want social media companies to quickly respond to law enforcement

2026-02-20T15:00:00+00:00

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After a student at Evergreen High School wounded two other students in a September shooting, Jefferson County Sheriff Reggie Marinelli knew laws needed to be changed.

“When this happened, I brought all of our legislators together,” Marinelli said, referring to lawmakers who represent the county, “because the bottom line is we work in this community. We live in this community. These are our kids. These are our citizens. We just want to make sure that our community is safe.”

Last week, Marinelli stood with those lawmakers to announce state and federal legislation she helped craft in an attempt to prevent school shootings. A similar bill whose lead sponsor is from neighboring Douglas County was already making its way through the legislature, setting up a showdown that pits lawmakers responding to a tragedy in their backyard against those seeking to resurrect parts of a bill that was vetoed by the governor last year.

The bills would require social media companies to respond more quickly to law enforcement about suspicious online activity like the posts written by the 16-year-old Evergreen High School shooter Desmond Holly, who killed himself after the shooting.

State law currently gives social media companies 35 days to respond to a warrant.

The FBI started an investigation before the shooting into several suspicious social media posts made by the shooter. The FBI filed three warrants during the monthslong investigation, which began in July. But Jefferson County law enforcement didn’t know until after the shooting that it was Holly who’d made the posts because the process moved too slowly, Marinelli said.

On Thursday, Democratic state Rep. Tammy Story, of Evergreen, and Sen. Lisa Cutter, from Jefferson County, filed the legislation that Marinelli helped craft. Senate Bill 1255 would require social media companies to acknowledge a warrant within eight hours and comply within 24 hours unless a judge grants an extension.

The bill also calls for social media platforms to report certain threatening or illegal content to local law enforcement within 24 hours and says the state attorney general could enforce compliance.

The legislation has some similarities to a bill filed in January by Sen. Lisa Frizell, a Castle Rock Republican, and a bipartisan group of sponsors. That bill cleared the Senate this week and is on its way to the House.

Frizell’s bill represents a second effort at tackling aspects of last year’s Senate Bill 86, which Gov. Jared Polis vetoed. Senate Bill 86 would have required much more action from social media companies, including reports and taking down flagged accounts. Polis deemed it “fatally flawed” because it had the potential to infringe on free speech rights.

Frizell, who is the House assistant minority leader, said she and her fellow sponsors slimmed down this year’s bill, Senate Bill 11, to address concerns from the governor. Similar to Senate Bill 1255, Senate Bill 11 would require social media companies to acknowledge a warrant within eight hours but would give them 72 hours to comply. It would also require online platform operators to make a staffed hotline available to law enforcement.

Frizell said she has worked with community groups, including Blue Rising Together, on this issue for almost two years and doesn’t plan to work with Cutter or Story on their bill. She noted that Cutter and Story voted against her bill last year.

“My bill is moving quickly, and I want it to move quickly, because I want it on the governor’s desk and I want him to sign it,” Frizell said. She said she didn’t see any benefit to working together.

Cutter said she voted against Frizell’s bill last year because she had similar concerns to Polis. But Cutter said she agreed with the aspects of Frizell’s bill that would have improved social media companies’ responses to law enforcement.

Story said Thursday that she didn’t remember why she voted against last year’s bill, but noted that it was more broad than just the warrant requirements.

At the federal level, Democratic U.S Rep. Brittany Pettersen filed three Congressional bills inspired by Marinelli that would seek to prevent violence. Pettersen represents Jefferson County, parts of the Denver Metro area, and parts of several mountain counties.

The first bill would set a nationwide standard requiring social media companies to respond to warrants and subpoena requests regarding potential threats of violence within 72 hours. Lawmakers have noted that a Colorado law wouldn’t change warrant response times if a post is flagged in another state.

The second would allow grants for cities and counties to buy and distribute safe firearm storage boxes to community members. The last would create a grant program through the U.S. Office of the Attorney General to provide $500,000 for assistance and training on extreme risk protection orders, which are a court order to remove firearms from individuals who present a risk to themselves or others.

The social media bills aren’t the only legislation that state lawmakers hope to pass this year to curb gun violence. Lawmakers have also filed an update to the state’s ghost gun legislation they said would prevent access to home manufactured guns like the one reportedly used in the 2023 shooting at Denver’s East High School.

Jason Gonzales is a reporter covering higher education and the Colorado legislature. Chalkbeat Colorado partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage. Contact Jason at jgonzales@chalkbeat.org.

‘The hallways are quiet’: Trauma-informed school model uses calm to prevent conflict in Philly

2026-02-11T12:00:00+00:00

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On a regular day in the “reflection room” at North Philadelphia’s W.D. Kelley School, trauma specialist Meah Carruth might facilitate a mediation between students in conflict, a naptime for a group of tired teachers, or a lunch break round of musical chairs.

The dimly lit space contains sofas, interactive playmats, and other items intended to help calm students and staff. It’s part of the Philadelphia Healthy and Safe Schools program, a “trauma-informed schools” initiative facilitated and partially funded by Temple University on five School District of Philadelphia campuses.

The idea behind the program, known by the shorthand “PHASeS,” is to create places where all students and teachers can take a “brain break” when they feel overly stressed. Most classrooms in PHASeS schools have a “calming corner,” and each building has a PHASeS room where students can visit with an adult’s permission. Most of those rooms are staffed by a trauma specialist like Carruth, who is trained to help people understand and regulate their emotions.

“Maybe you need to pick up a beanbag and throw it at a target and let out some steam, maybe you do need to scream,” Carruth said, rolling a blue rubber fidget toy in one hand. “Let’s assess what you need, and if we can offer it and provide it, and you’re safe, let’s do it.”

The PHASeS team from Temple University’s Lewis Katz School of Medicine also provides regular staff training. It helps teachers better understand the chronic trauma students see at home and in the neighborhood, often related to housing insecurity, gun violence, and domestic abuse.

“When you think about some of the things that they have experienced, you kind of handle them better,” said Sherese Knights, an English language arts educator at W.D. Kelley who has received the training. “We are more inclined now to focus on their most basic needs before providing learning.”

A soon-to-be-released evaluation by Temple’s College of Education and Human Development surveyed educators in PHASeS schools. More than three-quarters said the program improved classroom learning, and 85% said the training improved their own well-being.

The data also showed that PHASeS has reduced fights, harassment, and disorderly conduct on two of the three campuses where it was studied.

Kelley Principal Crystal Edwards said teaching kids to take a breath makes it less likely that they’ll act out. She also credits the program with the fact that 98% of the student body has never been suspended, a substantial improvement from a decade ago.

“Learning how to regulate and learning how to calm has a natural effect, to shut down anything that comes behind it,” she said. “So that’s why we don’t have those fights. That’s why we don’t have that verbal assault, and that’s why the hallways are quiet.”

The "reflection room" at W.D. Kelley School on Wednesday, February 4, 2026. It's a space where students or staff can come to take a break and speak with a trauma specialist.

‘The conversations weren’t happening’

A growing body of research supports programs like this as a way to improve academic achievement in neighborhoods with high levels of poverty and violence. More than one-fifth of Philadelphia residents live below the federal poverty line, according to the latest Census data. While gun violence is down from a record-high number of shootings in 2022, the problem persists. There were 979 shootings citywide, 206 of them fatal, in 2025.

Tyrique Glasgow, director of an after-school mentorship program called the Young Chances Foundation in Philadelphia’s Grays Ferry neighborhood, said the environment has a profound effect on how children behave at school.

“If at night you look out your window and there’s still the blur of police lights and sirens, are you having a good night’s sleep?” he said. “When they get into the school and someone says, ‘Sit down,’ or ‘Why you not paying attention?’, do you think the child could articulate, ‘Hey, you know, it was a shooting on my block last night?’

He noted a lot of kids he serves also get to school late and often skip breakfast because of stressors at home. The elementary schools in Glasgow’s neighborhood do not have the PHASeS program.

As a result of the PHASeS curriculum, Kelley staff extended breakfast service by about two hours, so students arriving late wouldn’t be hungry and irritable during their morning classes.

Knights, the English teacher, said after the training she started having lunch with students she suspected were struggling. It was during those breaks that heavy topics started to come up.

“The conversations weren’t happening,” she said. “It literally just changed everything. You went from not being able to connect to developing deep connections.”

Making trauma approaches sustainable

Exposure to trauma, and particularly violence, “has an impact on everything from memory to the ability of children to concentrate,” said Pedro Noguera, dean of the Rossier School of Education at the University of Southern California. “When it’s not addressed, it manifests itself as disruptive behavior.”

Noguera has been watching the movement for trauma-informed schools slowly gain momentum across the country in recent years. He’s also seen opposition from people who want more discipline and fewer wellness resources. And he’s noticed school districts spending funds on lockdown drills rather than counselors.

“We have schools that are preparing for school shootings, which can itself traumatize children,” he said. “We’re preparing ourselves for violence, rather than finding ways to reduce the likelihood of violence, which is kind of crazy.”

PHASeS is funded by Temple, the school district, the state, and the federal Department of Justice. Currently all five PHASeS schools have a trauma specialist or another PHASeS staffer on site regularly. There is also a mindfulness coach in two of the schools.

The level of staffing, and how often schools can order new furniture and fidget toys, fluctuates based on availability of district and state funds, program staff said.

“Funding is challenging right now,” said Mary Beth Hays, an assistant professor in Temple’s Lewis Katz School of Medicine and director of the program. “In some ways, what we’re doing is really getting to a place of health and strength within each of these buildings. But it really takes time. We’re in the middle of a conversation that shouldn’t be interrupted by resources or lack of funds.”

The School District of Philadelphia started providing trauma training to teachers in 2017. That same year they launched the STEP program in 21 schools, which connects students to therapists, case managers, and family peer specialists. And some public schools have built “calming rooms” over the years.

But a comprehensive program like PHASeS can change the culture of an entire building, said Hays.

“We’re hoping to create a relational safety that then begets classroom safety, hallway safety, playground safety, cafeteria safety,” she said. “And so when I think about the ways that we are interfacing with gun violence, it is in both prevention and in response”

Edwards, the principal, says it comes down to a simple idea — students having someone to talk to.

“There’s an expectation that someone is listening to how they feel,” she said. “There’s an expectation that they are cared for and concerned for in this building. And that we, all together, have learned and continuously learn about how to work through trauma.”

Sammy Caiola covers solutions to gun violence in and around Philadelphia schools. Have ideas for her? Get in touch at scaiola@chalkbeat.org.

Colorado bill would let schools and colleges seek gun confiscation under ‘red flag’ safety law

2026-02-02T22:38:08+00:00

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Colorado Senate lawmakers gave crucial approval Monday to a bill that would update the state’s “red flag” gun laws to allow K-12 schools and colleges to request that someone’s guns be temporarily confiscated.

Under the current law, individual educators such as teachers and college professors can already make such a request. The bill would allow an educational institution itself to do so, too. Supporters say that by involving the institutions, Senate Bill 4 would help educators who are not familiar with the process file these petitions.

Colorado’s law for extreme-risk protection orders allows law enforcement to confiscate a person’s firearms for up to a year if a judge determines that the person poses a danger to themselves or others. The law was updated in 2023 to add educators, physicians, and mental health professionals to the list of people who can ask that someone’s guns be temporarily removed in response to a safety threat.

State Sen. Tom Sullivan, an Aurora Democrat who sponsored the bill, said he wants to add institutions as well to help streamline the process and add a layer of support for their employees. Along with K-12 schools and colleges, the bill adds healthcare and behavioral health treatment facilities as qualified petitioners.

“Teachers, doctors and therapists were not trained to fill out the forms to file this type of paperwork,” Sullivan said. “That is why it is so important to allow the institutions, hospitals, and others to file because that’s what they were trained for. It’s also what they have the time to do.”

Senate lawmakers approved the bill on second reading after substantial debate. The Senate must pass the bill on a third reading before it can go to the House for consideration.

State Rep. Meg Froelich, an Englewood Democrat, is the House sponsor.

Republican lawmakers and gun rights advocates oppose the bill, including some who object to “red flag” laws more broadly. They said the bill infringes on gun owners’ rights and privacy. They also argue the change would allow petitioners to hide behind their employer or even file a false report.

State Sen. Lynda Zamora Wilson, an El Paso County Republican, said during the debate that the orders can be extremely costly to gun owners and presume guilt.

She said this bill treats owners who have a petition filed against them “like criminals while denying them the rights afforded even to the guilty. By increasing the number of petitioners, this bill multiplies these injustices.”

Republican lawmakers sought to pass numerous amendments on Monday, including one to require listing the name of the individuals involved, such as a teacher or healthcare worker, when an institution files a petition. None of them passed. Democratic lawmakers said the ERPO form already calls for an individual’s signature to file the petition, and the punishment for a false report is perjury.

The bill to allow institutions as petitioners doesn’t include a significant financial impact on the state.

A Colorado Office of Gun Violence Prevention report says between 2020 and 2024, 692 petitions were filed under the “red flag” law. Of these, a judge granted 478 temporary orders and 371 final orders. While full orders last a year, a temporary extreme-risk protection order lasts 14 days.

Along with educators and medical and mental health providers, a person’s family or household members, law enforcement officers, and district attorneys can ask for a petition.

Experts report few educators have used the law since the 2023 update. Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser has sought to help teachers and college educators understand the law, including a training called the ERPO Curriculum for Educators.

Shalyn Kettering, legal counsel to Weiser, said during a committee hearing last week that individuals who file ERPOs want to be able to elevate concerns to their employers. Weiser has supported these laws and said they’re not used enough.

“It’s been clear from these conversations that clarifications are required of the statute to better match what’s happening on the ground,” Kettering said.

Evie Hudak, who testified last week on behalf of the Colorado PTA, said children have lived in the shadow of mass shootings. She also referenced last year’s shooting at Evergreen High School, where a 16-year-old student wounded two classmates before taking his own life.

“We strongly believe that this bill will help keep our children safer,” Hudak said. “Teachers spend a lot of time with our children and are aware of their potential for violence.”

If the bill is passed during the session, it would be the third time the state has updated its extreme risk petition orders laws. The original bill passed in 2019 and was sponsored by Sullivan, who has been a leading gun control advocate since his son was murdered during the 2012 Aurora theater shooting.

Appeal dismissed in wrongful death lawsuit related to fatal shooting outside of Denver’s East High

2026-01-24T00:20:23+00:00

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The family of a 16-year-old student who was shot and killed outside Denver’s East High School in 2023 has dropped a wrongful death lawsuit against Denver Public Schools.

The Colorado Court of Appeals dismissed the lawsuit Friday, a court order shows. DPS and the student’s family agreed to the dismissal, according to court documents. The documents do not give a reason. Each side will pay its own legal fees, the documents say.

An attorney for the family said he could not comment Friday. Denver Public Schools said in a statement that the district remains saddened by the death of the student, Luis Garcia.

“We respect the judicial process and the court’s decision to dismiss the appeal, marking the conclusion of this legal matter,” the school district’s statement said.

No one has been charged in connection with Luis’ death. The Denver Police Department said Friday that there are no updates in the case.

In their lawsuit, Luis’ family alleged that a juvenile male, identified only by a pseudonym, shot and killed Luis. The lawsuit alleged the juvenile male stole a white Kia Sportage, ran a red light near East High, drove the Kia “on a direct path straight to Luis,” and opened fire.

Luis was a junior at East and a talented player on the varsity soccer team when he was shot in February 2023 after dropping his cousin off at the school. Luis died of his injuries about two weeks later. His family sued DPS, East High, and the Denver school board in 2024.

They alleged that DPS “subverted and weakened” the security at East after the school board removed armed police officers from DPS schools in 2020, which the family said allowed “potential shooters to believe they would be able to execute an attack.”

Under a state law known as the Claire Davis School Safety Act, districts can be held liable for acts of violence at school if they fail to exercise “reasonable care” to protect students and staff.

But in 2025, a Denver District Court judge ruled that DPS was not liable for Luis’ death because his car was parked on a public street when he was shot.

Luis’ car was parked “where City Park Esplanade intersects East 17th Avenue, where both roads are used for the purpose of public transportation,” Judge Kandace C. Gerdes wrote. “The Court is not persuaded that these roads are ‘within the school facilities’ of East’s Property.”

Luis’ family appealed the ruling but has now agreed to dismiss that appeal.

DPS returned school resource officers to its schools in 2023 after Luis’ death and a separate shooting inside East High a month later. Two former East deans who were injured in that shooting are suing DPS as well. Those lawsuits are ongoing.

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Memphis turned an old elementary school into the district security hub. Here’s an inside look.

2025-12-11T22:02:40+00:00

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Tucked inside a former South Memphis elementary school is a room with 18 televisions and 30 computers showing live footage of campuses across the state’s largest public school district.

This is Memphis-Shelby County Schools’ new real-time safety center, where leaders say 20 trained staff will monitor video feed and use artificial intelligence tools around the clock to more quickly coordinate emergency responses. It’s part of a yearslong project to overhaul the district’s security system, which includes upgrading cameras at every school building to include AI detection technology.

At a grand opening of the safety center Thursday, MSCS leaders dodged questions about how AI technology is being used in the new cameras. It’s unclear how much money the district spent on that technology and renovations to the old Alton Elementary school building.

Carolyn Jackson, the district’s interim chief of safety, said the changes were in large part motivated by a 2021 shooting at Cummings Elementary School that injured one Memphis student and put another in custody.

“That’s what kept me up at night. That’s why we’re here,” Jackson said. “Cummings was really a unique situation … it made me say, ‘We can’t have this anymore.’”

MSCS leaders said Thursday that they worked with the global technology company Bosch to design AI-enhanced cameras that fit the district’s needs. But they declined to share details. According to Bosch’s website, the equipment typically uses visual and audio AI to detect guns and recognize other “unsafe behavior” like crowd formations or students lying on the ground.

Districts across the country have started turning to AI in recent years to boost weapons detection security as the number of school shootings remains at a nationwide record high. Those moves are often met with concerns about the over-policing of students and the likelihood of false alarms.

And there have been recent instances of AI-assisted detection systems failing to work at all, such as the Nashville school shooting last January where the school’s detection technology failed to detect the gun used to kill a 16-year-old student.

A team of 20 staff will monitor live footage of MSCS campuses all day, every day.

MSCS board members approved a nearly $500,000 contract with Bosch to upgrade security cameras in 2022. And in 2024, the district set aside nearly $4 million to transform the old Alton building into a security hub. Interim Superintendent Roderick Richmond said Thursday that the district also used Title IV funding and state grants to finish the project.

Richmond said the center “will allow us to respond faster to potential threats or emergencies, reducing officer response times significantly.”

Jackson said over 50% of the district’s schools are equipped with the new cameras. The real-time safety center, she said, opened around three weeks ago. On top of monitoring and dispatch services, the building is also used as a training center.

Up the stairs from the TV monitoring room, there’s an active shooter simulator that Jackson said both MSCS officers and other local police departments use to practice responses. In a demonstration Thursday, an MSCS officer fired a fake gun as immersive videos played on a large screen.

In one scene, a student pulled a gun out of his backpack and began shooting in the cafeteria. In another, the officer ran into a school building to find a staff member being shot in the auditorium. Jackson said officers will train there annually in accordance with state law.

At Thursday’s opening ceremony, MSCS leaders praised the safety center as a guiding example for repurposing vacant school buildings. In the face of rising maintenance costs, the district formed a facilities committee this fall to come up with creative uses for inevitable school closures over the next decade.

Board members are expected to vote in February on Richmond’s proposal to close four schools at the end of this year. District leaders haven’t decided what those buildings will be used for if the closures are approved.

Bri Hatch covers Memphis-Shelby County Schools for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Reach Bri at bhatch@chalkbeat.org.

Immigration raids disrupt a program designed to protect Chicago schoolchildren

2025-12-08T11:00:00+00:00

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Since “Operation Midway Blitz” began in September, federal agents have been surveilling Chicago’s Little Village, a majority Latino neighborhood. Now, when Natalia hears helicopters whirring overhead, she knows U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, is patrolling nearby. The near-constant detainment and deportation of her neighbors is putting her on edge. Natalia, who asked to be referred to by a pseudonym because she fears for her safety, is nervous that as a woman living undocumented in the United States, she may also be taken away from her family, her job, her community.

“On those days, I would go [to work] trembling,” Natalia said in Spanish. “There were some days where I wouldn’t go to work.” For Natalia, work means staffing Chicago Public Schools’ Safe Passage program, which seeks to keep students safe from threats like gun violence while walking to and from school.

In early 2025, the Trump administration revoked the protections schools had from immigration enforcement. Chicagoans like Natalia have witnessed that change in real time on the news: A pre-K teacher dragged out of a day care center; two women detained right outside a school; a man taken into custody while dropping his children off.

This revocation, paired with the increased presence of ICE and Customs and Border Protection officers, has caused multiple Safe Passage workers to call off work — and led more students to miss school. The raids came at an already vulnerable time for the program: CPS recently cut Safe Passage’s budget by nearly $6 million, the Chicago Sun-Times reported. To maintain the safety of students and program workers, the organizations that manage Safe Passage with CPS have trained additional staff to sub in; other community groups have created alternative transportation routes for families who fear encountering ICE.

“Our community has felt very unsafe, whether you’re here legally or not,” said Areli Medina, a human resource generalist at Enlace, the community organization that dispatches Natalia on her Safe Passage route. “I started to make sure that I am supporting our program and our community overall by showing up, and part of that is subbing in for some of our Safe Passage positions.”

Natalia feels that support. When she shared her fears, her managers told her she could use her paid sick days to stay home when there’s a heavy ICE presence, and that someone would fill her spot.

Keeping a vital program alive

In the U.S., an average of 57 shootings occur near a school every day, according to a Trace analysis in 2024. In the past decade, data showed that Chicago had 97 schools with at least 100 shootings in their vicinity.

The Safe Passage program dates back to 2009, when CPS sought to respond to the violence taking place around city schools. That year, a 16-year-old student was beaten to death while leaving his South Side high school. The program launched with just 35 schools, growing to 191 this year. CPS and 18 partner organizations have jointly hired and trained over 1,200 Safe Passage workers in relationship-building skills, deescalation strategies, and safety protocols.

Most of the areas the program covers face high rates of gun violence. In 2024, 115 people were shot in South Lawndale, home to Little Village, 23 of them fatally. And even though shootings there dropped by 57% over this time last year, there have still been 48 shootings in South Lawndale since last November.

“It’s really all about safety,” Medina said. “When it comes to areas where there’s heavy gun violence, it’s just making sure that we are able to see and notice if there is any suspicious activity.”

This method of keeping students safe echoes research by Jens Ludwig, a University of Chicago behavioral economist who has studied crime on Chicago’s South Side. Ludwig found that adding “eyes on the street” creates safer environments by placing people in areas where they can step in and interrupt arguments before they escalate into gunfire.

Throughout the years, organizers have said the Safe Passage program has helped prevent incidents near schools from turning deadly.

Many parents, Natalia said, have to go to work early and can’t walk their children to school. Her role, parents have told her, puts them at ease. “It’s a huge satisfaction to see how people become accustomed to the support Safe Passage provides them, and even more so during this difficult time,” Natalia said.

A new plan

The school district, a CPS spokesperson said, has not heard of any incidents in which federal agents detained a Safe Passage worker on the job. Still, after hearing workers’ concern, CPS and its partners developed a strategy to train additional staff to serve as substitutes. Enlace, one of those partners, has trained about 15 staffers to cover vacant routes.

Parents are on high alert at pickup and dropoff, Medina said. When she subs in for Safe Passage, she also acts as a lookout for ICE activity. Like all Enlace staff, she has been trained on ICE response protocols, like Know Your Rights and how to document any actions taken by federal agents.

Natalia has a plan in place if she sees ICE near school grounds. When that happens, she and other Safe Passage workers stay closer together and near the school, ready to quickly take cover inside and alert school staff to lock the doors. The option to stay home on days where there is a stronger ICE presence in the area, she said, makes her feel that her schools, community, and peers are protecting her.

“It is a privilege that I have to know that if something were to happen, I would be OK and it’s not the same feeling for everybody,” Medina said. “I want to make sure that, in that privilege that I have, I am able to help others that might be feeling insecure.”

A community looking out for one another

Throughout his patrols of Little Village, Baltazar Enriquez, the Little Village Community Council president, has seen how ICE has spread fear. In response, Enriquez created a volunteer patrol that drives around spotting federal agents and blowing a whistle to alert community members of their presence.

“They’re not coming for criminals,” Enriquez said. “They’re coming for the lady selling tamales, the gentleman taking his kids to school, the person waiting for a bus.” In one incident, Enriquez said, a father dropped off his child at an elementary school. ICE followed him, and he was detained a few blocks away.

“We gotta take care of each other right now,” he said. “Because no one’s taking care of us.”

Before ICE descended on Chicago, Enriquez said he and other community members warned CPS that it would affect student attendance because many would stay home to avoid federal agents. “They’re so afraid to leave their parents because they’re scared when they get back home, they might not be there,” he said. “They go to school all worried; they can’t even think or study.”

During a Chicago School Board meeting in October, many called for the schools to offer virtual learning, but leadership said they couldn’t do so without an emergency declaration from Gov. JB Pritzker. So, Enriquez said his group created its own “magic school bus.” About a dozen volunteers signed up to informally pick up and drop off kids at school. At the start of the raids, he said, they were picking up around 68 kids.

Now, even as ICE raids become less frequent, students — and their protectors — are still scared of the chaos a confrontation with a single agent might unleash. Despite her fears, Natalia tries to go to work as often as she can. Parents often text her and ask if she has seen any federal agents; she’ll tell them if the coast is clear. They thank her for taking the risk and being their trusted eyes on the ground. Many kids, she said, also ask her if everything will be OK that day; even as she worries, she often reassures them that it will be.

Philadelphia’s program to shield students from violence was clicking. Then it hit a snag.

2025-11-26T16:16:45+00:00

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The noise outside Marc Rentas’s Kensington home was typical for 2:30 p.m.

It always gets loud during dismissal time at nearby Jules E. Mastbaum High School, Rentas said. But one afternoon this fall, the energy was different.

“There was a group of kids on the sidewalk, they were throwing trash,” he said. “A huge fight broke out. … People were scared.”

He said one student threw a flower pot at another student, and a different student bumped Rentas’s elderly father. That’s when he called the school district. Meanwhile, nearby neighbors called the police. It took 30 minutes for officers to break up the fight, Rentas said.

Prior to the start of this school year, Mastbaum High was one of 24 campuses that had the Safe Path program. Safe Path aims to both quell schoolyard fights and protect children from shootings by hiring attentive adults from the community, known as “monitors.” These adults — recognizable by their blue vests — patrol campus perimeters and stand watch on school property, regularly greeting students and sometimes walking them home or to a transit stop.

But this fall, the school district ended a partnership with the largest provider of Safe Path services. The district hired new contractors, but those organizations haven’t gotten underway at the majority of schools that used to have the program. And a few other schools didn’t see Safe Path return — or saw it return late — due to dwindling funds and holdups with training and recruitment.

That means for the last three months, the cadre of watchful neighborhood monitors has been missing from some of the schoolyards and street corners that need the most protection.

The week of the big fight at Mastbaum, Principal David Lon said the Safe Path monitors haven’t come back so far this year. He said he appreciated the service when it was in place.

Since piloting the program in 2022 and expanding it in 2023, the district has touted Safe Path as crucial to its wider gun violence prevention plan. Data from the program’s first year suggests it successfully reduced incidents of violence in the schools where it operated. And studies indicate similar programs in other U.S. cities have improved student safety.

“It’s unfortunate there was this gap in safety for our youth because the city took so long to make decisions,” said Jackie Bonner of the Institute for the Development of African American Youth, Inc., or IDAAY, a former contractor for Safe Path.

IDAAY got an email from the district at the end of September — roughly a month after the first day of school — notifying the group its contract wouldn’t be renewed.

Two other nonprofit organizations, Eddie’s House and Educators 4 Education, will provide Safe Path services for the district. But the school district has not said when Safe Path will return to the 17 schools where IDAAY used to provide monitors.

“There’s still a lot of stuff being worked out,” said Marion Campbell, executive director of Eddie’s House, in late November. “I know everyone is trying to get it done as soon as possible.”

Educators 4 Education recently put up a job posting for Safe Path monitors. President Anthony Singleton said his organization has already received 400 applications, including from monitors formerly employed by IDAAY, and are working to onboard those people.

“Of course we would have liked to start at the beginning of the school year, but it’s not always a perfect fit,” Singleton said. “We are hoping to get everyone up and running.”

Safe Path works with schools on student safety

Not all Safe Path schools were missing their monitors this fall. At Dr. Tanner G. Duckrey Public School in North Philly, the adults in blue vests are hired by Eddie’s House, which has provided the service there since 2023.

At the end of each school day, Safe Path monitor Saleem Gilliard takes his place near the schoolyard. He stands between the back doors of the K-8 school and the corner of 16th Street and Susquehanna Avenue and waits for the students to pour out.

“I’m looking for crowds or groups of kids,” he said. “When it’s rowdy, we break it up and send them home.”

Saleem Gilliard stands at the light with a student and a crossing guard as they help kids cross during dismissal on Nov. 20, 2025.

Gilliard is 74. He applied because he wanted a part-time job that would allow him to steer children toward brighter futures, he said. The program employs and trains adults, with an emphasis on hiring from the nearby community.

Like many young people in major cities, Philadelphia students risk getting involved in fights on campus and on nearby streets, and being shot on their commutes to school.

The likelihood of a child being injured by firearms increases 45% between 2 p.m. and 6 p.m., according to a new Boston University study comparing shooting data in New York City to public school calendars. The study notes that most of these shootings are committed by adults in the surrounding community, and that Safe Path programs are a key solution.

Dismissal time is also a prime window for large fights — such as one in early November at Frankford High School that went viral on social media and prompted a school assembly. Frankford has never had the Safe Path program.

And back-to-school season is an especially chaotic time because some kids haven’t seen each other all summer, according to Reuben Jones with the violence prevention group Frontline Dads, also a former Safe Path contractor.

“If there’s no presence there, it sets the tone for the rest of the year,” he said. It leads students to believe that “‘Nobody’s around to hold me accountable.’ It becomes a free for all. It’s dangerous actually.”

Until this fall, Frontline Dads provided Safe Path services through the Penn Injury Science Center at the University of Pennsylvania. In a partnership with the district that began in 2023, the center began overseeing Safe Path in nine schools, including two of the 17 schools where IDAAY was operating.

But Bernadette Hohl, a senior research investigator at the Penn center, said they ended their partnership with both IDAAY and Frontline Dads due to funding changes and only brought the program back to seven schools.

Not all of the Penn-contracted monitors started on the first day of school due to recruitment and training, but they are all staffed now, according to Hohl.

The lapse in Safe Path coverage could undermine a program that was working, school district data indicates. In the year before Safe Path launched, the district recorded 166 “serious incidents” at the selected schools between 2 p.m. and 5 p.m., according to school board documents.

In the first year of Safe Path implementation there were 125, reflecting a 26% decrease.

The decline occurred while Philadelphia on the whole experienced a significant drop in fatal and nonfatal shootings.

Philly’s program replicates a more-established model in Chicago, which reduced violent crime around selected schools by 14%, according to a study of 15 years of data across 140 schools. That study did not look specifically at fights as a metric. The Safe Passage program in Pittsburgh that began in 2021 achieved similar results.

Safe Path monitors can pick up on patterns of bullying, or hear about conflicts between students, and report those to school administrators so they can take preventive action, Bonner said.

And in rare cases, they can respond to serious threats.

When an adult showed up with a gun during a dismissal hour fight near Overbrook High School this May, Safe Path monitors kept students away while officers confronted the gunman, Bonner said.

And last June, when a group of students from one high school said they were taking guns over to a middle school, Safe Path monitors overheard and told Bonner. She contacted the police and warned the middle school principal.

“We’re the eyes and ears outside,” Bonner said. “So to not have that layer in place, it can have some very negative consequences.”

A contract change for Safe Path worries observers

The school district confirmed it is no longer partnering with IDAAY, and said the delay in restarting the program was due to changes in its “procurement process.” The district paid IDAAY about $2.1 million for Safe Path services last year, the group said.

The district declined to provide more details about the months-long lag at many schools, but said the program “is currently ramping back up to full capacity.”

Bonner said she’s more frustrated about the district’s lack of communication at the start of the school year than she is about its choice to use another vendor: “I don’t like how quiet it is.”

Jones, of Frontline Dads, echoed Bonner’s concerns.

“It speaks to the lack of 100% commitment to preserving the safety of those students,” he said. “If that were the goal, you’d make sure those things were in place before school started.”

Saleem Gilliard in the blue vest worn by Safe Path monitors in North Philadelphia on Nov. 20, 2025.

And by next summer, there could be more changes to Safe Path because a grant the Penn Injury Science Center used to support the program is ending.

Hohl, of the center, said staff there will continue to look for funding.

“Students want to feel like they can go home and get there safely,” Hohl said. “Most of those kids aren’t looking for trouble. And when trouble happens, they want to know where the adult will be.”

Bonner said in addition to keeping schools and surrounding communities calm, the Safe Path program also improved economic stability in neighborhoods by hiring residents. Safe Path is also designed to provide assurance to businesses around a school.

Once the kids have left the Tanner Duckrey school, Gilliard patrols the neighborhood and touches base with electronics stores, Chinese take-out restaurants, bookshops, and other businesses. If everything has been peaceful, they give him a thumbs-up.

If there was any ruckus involving Duckrey kids, Gilliard reports it to the school.

And the next day, he has a talk with the kids, the same way a parent would, said Gilliard, who is a great-grandfather himself.

“Not a bad parent, a parent that’s concerned about their welfare and their well being. I don’t get hostile or nothing,” Gilliard said. “At the end of the day, you just try to give them another direction.”

This story was also produced in collaboration with Kensington Voice.

Sammy Caiola covers solutions to gun violence in and around Philadelphia schools. Have ideas for her? Get in touch at scaiola@chalkbeat.org.

These teachers survived school shootings. Now they’re offering support to others.

2025-11-12T12:00:00+00:00

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Gathered in a circle in a Philadelphia hotel conference room, 11 teachers brought out a “grounding” item — something that calms them when they feel frightened or sad.

Robin Walker brought a hand-sewn tissue pouch that another Sandy Hook Elementary School teacher made for her and their colleagues after they all survived a mass shooting there in 2012.

Amy Taylor, also a former Sandy Hook teacher, brought a rock a student had painted for her.

Ivy Schamis, who taught in a Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School classroom that was ambushed by a gunman in 2018, brought a picture of the desk in the school office where she works now. It’s protected by bulletproof glass and by her service dog, Waffles.

These are three of the nine teachers who’ve survived school shootings and are now using those experiences to support other educators. A national crisis intervention team they launched this week plans to visit campuses after mass shootings and provide one-on-one phone and email support to teachers in need.

“They don’t have to be alone with those thoughts or those fears in the aftermath of gun violence,” said Kiki Leyba, who ushered his students to safety during the 1999 Columbine High School shooting, at the team’s training on Saturday. “There are others out there who they can connect with.”

The crisis team is a project of a larger gun violence advocacy organization called Teachers Unify to End Gun Violence.

Kiki Leyba, left, and Amy Taylor pose for a portrait during a meeting for teachers who have survived school shootings on Saturday, Nov. 8, 2025 at the Homewood Suites hotel in Philadelphia.

School shootings often physically injure dozens, and leave many more grappling with the events of that day. Yet the needs of educators can go overlooked by school administrations, members of the group said, and teachers often don’t know where to seek help.

Close to 400,000 students have been exposed to gun violence during school hours, according to a data analysis from The Washington Post. There is no similar count for teachers who have witnessed or been injured by a school shooting.

Leyba said he went right back to the classroom after the tragedy.

“I was not equipped to deal with the trauma,” he said. “I was just really blindsided.”

But after years of working on his own healing and speaking with fellow survivors, he feels he is ready to support others.

The inaugural cohort of teachers has been meeting with a trauma-focused psychologist and another clinician since June to learn how to offer peer support, and handle their own feelings and responses that may arise while helping others. They also received training on a five-step approach to group facilitation around difficult topics.

Educators who call the crisis line can sign up for conversations with members of the new intervention team as well as sessions with mental health professionals.

Teachers’ needs often fall by the wayside after these incidents, said Abbey Clements, cofounder of Teachers Unify to End Gun Violence and a Sandy Hook survivor.

“Often teachers don’t feel like they have what they need,” she said. “Not enough days given for grieving, not enough support to come in and help you in the classroom … You can’t concentrate. You’re not sleeping, you’re not eating. So all these things are very common.”

Following a shooting, administrators are primarily focused on student well-being, the logistics of how to get kids back to class, and incoming lawsuits from victims’ families, said Jaclyn Schildkraut, who studies mass shootings at the Rockefeller Institute of Government’s Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium at the State University of New York.

“With all of the balls that are being juggled in the aftermath, supporting teachers might be one of the lowest things on that priority list,” she said.

Peer support can help fill that gap.

“It’s the people that you don’t have to explain ‘this is why I feel the way I do’ … they just get it,” she said. “And so sometimes you can just sit there with these folks and not have to say a word, and still feel more supported than going to therapy.”

Teachers who have survived school shootings meet on Saturday, Nov. 8, 2025 at the Homewood Suites hotel in Philadelphia.

Schildkraut isn’t aware of any other existing support networks specifically for teachers after school shootings, though there is one in place for principals.

Members of the crisis team hope to work with school administrators to help them better support teachers after these kinds of tragedies. They also hope to train more teachers in the future, pending funding. The group says they’re open to helping teachers at schools where neighborhood gun violence is common, as well as those who experience shootings inside the building.

Clements said teachers especially need help with how to answer questions from students who’ve lost their classmates.

“What do you say when they say the things that they say?” she said. “Why did this happen? … Why is there a desk removed? Why aren’t we stopping at somebody’s bus stop on a bus route?”

Amy Taylor, who protected her second grade class during the Sandy Hook shooting, said going back to teach was a difficult decision.

“It was messy. I did not want to teach anymore,” she said. “I had a really hard time for a few years. It took me a while to love my job again.”

She relied on exercise and meditation to get through the anxiety and fear she felt. Now she wants to counsel others on self-care strategies.

“If it doesn’t work for you, that’s OK, but we’ll find something,” she said.

She is looking forward to the opportunity “just to listen and be there.”

Correction: Nov. 11, 2025: A previous version of this story misspelled the first name of Abbey Clements.

Any teacher or school, public or private, can reach a member of the crisis intervention team by calling 203-296-3689 or emailing response@teachersunify.org.

The National Center for School Mental Health has also created a resource list for teachers, students, and parents impacted by violence.

Sammy Caiola covers solutions to gun violence in and around Philadelphia schools. Have ideas for her? Get in touch at scaiola@chalkbeat.org.

Colorado to offer a new training for teachers on using the state’s ‘red flag’ gun law

2025-09-29T18:01:55+00:00

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In 2023, Colorado added teachers to the list of people who can request that someone’s guns be temporarily confiscated under the state’s “red flag” law. But so far, not many teachers have used it, state officials and experts said.

“Teachers don’t know about it,” said Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, who pushed for the law.

A new training course being offered by Weiser’s office aims to change that, at a time when school safety is on the minds of many educators. On Sept. 10, a 16-year-old student at Evergreen High School shot and wounded two classmates before taking his own life.

“Obviously the events of Evergreen are top of mind today,” Weiser said. “But it’s sadly one painful story after another that schools and schoolkids have seen too much gun violence.

“When young people are struggling [or] contemplating suicide and make statements like, ‘I know where my dad keeps the gun’ or ‘I have access to a gun and I’m going to take my life,’ that’s a call to action. It’s important we use all the tools we can to prevent gun violence.”

Gun violence is the leading cause of death among youth. In 2023, 21% of Colorado middle school students reported that they could get a loaded gun in less than an hour without adult permission, according to the results of the statewide Healthy Kids Colorado survey.

The training, called the ERPO Curriculum for Educators, consists of two 30-minute virtual sessions. The first session goes over the basics of Extreme Risk Protection Orders, or ERPOs.

ERPOs allow law enforcement to confiscate a person’s firearms for up to a year if a judge determines that the person poses a danger to themselves or others. The second training session provides step-by-step instructions on how to petition the court for such an order. In addition to educators, a person’s family or household members, law enforcement officers, medical and mental health providers, and district attorneys can petition for an ERPO.

There is one version of the training for K-12 educators and another for college educators. In more than two years, college educators have filed just two petitions, according to the attorney general’s office. It’s not clear how many K-12 educators have used the law because petitions involving minors under age 18 are sealed by the courts, the office said.

Chris Knoepke, the director of strategy for the Firearm Injury Prevention Initiative at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, has tracked the use of the state’s red flag law. Anecdotally, he said it’s not used much with teenagers because educators, police officers, and parents often intervene in other ways, such as ensuring that guns in the home are locked up or by criminally charging a teenager with illegal possession.

But Knoepke still sees value in training educators on how to petition for an ERPO.

“The message for them is, ‘If you become worried about a student, there’s lots of things you can do, including this red flag law,’” he said. “The logic, as it stands, is that more nets catch more fish.”

In the first five years of Colorado’s law, which went into effect in 2020, a little more than 700 petitions were filed and nearly 500 were granted, at least on an emergency basis, Knoepke said. However, not all of those petitions resulted in guns being confiscated for a full year.

It’s against the law for anyone under the age of 18 to own a gun in Colorado, and state lawmakers recently raised the age to buy one from 18 to 21. But Weiser said there’s a difference between legally owning a gun and practically owning one. And an ERPO can move quicker than a criminal case, he said; the court must hold an initial hearing on a petition within a day.

“Lots of people end up in possession of a firearm for a range of reasons: It was given to them. They bought it illegally,” Weiser said. “All of those situations can be addressed by a red flag order.”

The ERPO training is free for educators and counts for continuing education credit.

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Parents can’t opt out of Tennessee student gun safety training, Memphis official says

2025-09-19T21:10:33+00:00

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Memphis-Shelby County Schools physical education and health teachers began leading one-day gun safety classes this week under a new state law requiring firearm safety curriculum in all Tennessee public schools.

District leaders said the training should be finished by fall break. According to the 2024 state law, the curriculum needs to be “viewpoint neutral on political topics,” including gun rights and the Second Amendment.

The safety lessons are necessary to prevent accidental shootings, district leaders said, but some parents are skeptical that the program will make an impact, and others asked during a virtual town hall Thursday if they could opt their children out of the classes.

Jim Harbin, special projects coordinator for MSCS’ health services office, said that isn’t allowed. He compared the lessons to fire and lockdown drills.

At a presentation Friday at Dexter Middle School, Interim Superintendent Roderick Richmond called the new curriculum “something positive.”

“Even before the state started to talk about it,” he said, “I wanted to do something around gun violence because of the impact it’s having on our community.”

Since 2020, firearms have remained the leading cause of death for children and teens nationwide. Tennessee ranks third in the country for the highest number of unintentional shootings done by children.

Lanetra Wiley, a nurse practitioner for Memphis-Shelby County Schools, said she remembers the day she found out one of her students had been killed by his friend in an accidental shooting.

“I saw him in the clinic one Friday, and on Monday he was dead,” she said. “I know you all play Black Ops, Call of Duty, all of those games. But they are not reality.”

Curriculum guidelines from the Tennessee Department of Education outline four firearm safety rules for children: Stop, don’t touch, leave the area, and tell an adult. The lessons change based on grade level, starting with emphasis on recognizing the difference between toy and real guns and progressing to instructions for proper gun storage by middle school.

“As superintendent, I want to see all of you all grow up to be the people that you were meant to be,” Richmond said Friday. “There’s never going to be a positive outcome when it comes to you all, particularly young people, dealing with guns.”

Harbin said the district will share more resources with parents in the coming weeks.

Bri Hatch covers Memphis-Shelby County Schools for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Reach Bri at bhatch@chalkbeat.org.

Colorado Evergreen High School shooting: Live updates

2025-09-11T22:51:54+00:00

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At least seven vigils for the victims of the Evergreen High School shooting will take place Thursday evening, according to the Jefferson County government Facebook page. Locations include:

Aspen Ridge Church, 5 p.m., 27154 N Turkey Creek Road, Evergreen

United Methodist Church, 5:30 p.m., 3757 Ponderosa Dr., Evergreen

Community Gathering, 6 p.m., Buchanan Park, 32003 Ellingwood Trail, Evergreen

Grace Hills Church, 6:30 p.m., 23338 Isoleta Road, Indian Hills

Ascent Church, 7 p.m., 29823 Troutdale Scenic Dr., Evergreen

Bergen Park Church, 7 p.m., 31919 Rocky Village Dr., Evergreen

Flatirons Community Church, west campus, 7 p.m., 24887 Genesee Trail Road, Golden

The Jeffco school board announced it would cancel its Thursday evening meeting so board members and district employees could attend a vigil. The board will hold a short virtual meeting Friday at 1 p.m. to review time-sensitive contracts and administrative approvals, according to a letter sent to Jeffco families.

One of two shooting victims identified

One victim of the Evergreen High School shooting has been identified as Matthew Silverstone, 18, according to the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office.

Silverstone’s name and photo, along with a statement from his family, were posted on X by the sheriff’s office Thursday afternoon.

Silverstone’s family said: “The family appreciates the community’s concern and support, but as we remain focused on our loved one’s recovery, we respectfully request privacy as we continue to heal and navigate the road ahead”

Matthew Silverstone, 18, has been identified as one of the Evergreen High shooting victims.

A spokesperson for the sheriff’s office said the family of the second victim has declined to release the student’s name or photo or issue a statement.

Wednesday’s shooting left many Colorado students and community members on edge. Law enforcement officials in at least two districts — Boulder Valley and Douglas County — were alerted to potential threats on Thursday morning. In both cases, no credible threats were found.

In Boulder Valley, someone called police about a man they suspected of having a gun near Fairview High School. That school and Southern Hills Middle School were placed on lockdown and four other schools were placed on “secure” status.

The Boulder Police Department said on X, “The individual seen by the person who called to report the possible threat was confirmed to be wearing a weighted vest and holding his cell phone after going for a run.”

“Detectives interviewed him and he understood that this and the shooting in Jefferson County yesterday likely led to the report today.”

Fairview High School students were dismissed midday and after school sports and activities were cancelled, according to a district spokesperson. Southern Hills Middle resumed classes after the lockdown and students were dismissed at the regular time.

The potential threat in Douglas County was related to numerous tips to Colorado’s Safe2Tell tipline and a “concerning photo,” according to a post on X by the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office. It’s not clear what was pictured in the photo, but the sheriff’s office said it didn’t appear to be taken locally.

“Additionally, a Douglas County school was mistakenly identified as the impacted school,” the sheriff’s office X post said.

Shooting suspect may have been ‘radicalized’

The 16-year-old student who shot two students at Evergreen High School on Wednesday may have been radicalized by an extremist network, a spokesperson for the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office said Thursday morning.

The shooter, who was identified by the sheriff’s office as Desmond Holly, rode the bus to school on Wednesday and opened fire around 12:30 p.m., reloading his revolver many times.

Jacki Kelley, a spokesperson for the sheriff’s office, said, “He would fire and reload, fire and reload, fire and reload. This went on and on.”

She said some students fled to the nearby rec center and library and others into neighborhoods. One of the victims was shot on a street behind the school.

Many students and staff hid in locked classrooms.

“Lots of kids and teachers locked down in those rooms, did what they were supposed to do, and we know that it saved lives,” she said. “They’re heroes.”

Kelley said investigators don’t know what the shooter’s motive was and didn’t have additional information about the network that radicalized the teen. Investigators have search warrants for his home, locker, and phone and have been in contact with the shooter’s family, who are cooperating with law enforcement, she said.

Kelley said the full-time school resource officer normally assigned to Evergreen High is currently on medical leave and other resource officers have been rotating to the school on a part-time basis. One of those officers was on duty at the high school until about 10:45 a.m. on Wednesday, but then was called to deal with a nearby accident, she said. Kelley called it “horrible timing,” but said that officer did nothing wrong and is free to leave the school to attend to other duties.

The families of the two victims are expected to release photos of their children on Thursday along with statements about the shooting, Kelley said. The sheriff’s office released a photo of the shooter from his driver’s license on X Thursday morning.

Evergreen shooting victims in critical condition

One of the two students shot at Evergreen High School on Wednesday remains in critical condition at CommonSpirit St. Anthony Hospital in Lakewood and the other is in critical condition at Children’s Hospital Colorado in Aurora, according to spokespersons from each hospital.

The shooter, a male student, died Wednesday evening of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office.

The shooting, which took place around noon Wednesday, terrified the mountain community of Evergreen, located 29 miles southwest of Denver, and the state at large. Colorado has experienced several high-profile mass shootings in recent years, including at a Boulder grocery store, a Colorado Springs night club, and a Highlands Ranch charter school.

The shooter’s identity and motive are still unclear, as is the identity of the two shooting victims.

It’s also unclear why Evergreen High School’s school resource officer was not on campus during the shooting. Jeffco Public Schools officials said Wednesday the district has an officer assigned to the high school, but the sheriff’s office said the officer was not at the school at the time of the shooting.

On Thursday, the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office set up a resource and information center at Bergen Meadows Elementary School and asked that witnesses who have not yet spoken to investigators come to the center to do so. The center, which is at a Jeffco school that closed permanently in 2024, will also have mental health professionals, victims advocates, victims compensation representatives, and school personnel on hand.

Evergreen High School students and staff can get information about retrieving personal items and vehicles from the school at the center. The center is at 1928 S Hiwan Dr. in Evergreen and will be open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Thursday and 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Friday.

Evergreen High School, which has about 900 students, will be closed Thursday and Friday. In addition, nine other Jeffco schools in or near the town of Evergreen and the community of Conifer are closed on Thursday. They include Evergreen Middle, Conifer High, West Jefferson Middle, and Bergen, Wilmot, Parmalee, Elk Creek, Marshdale and West Jefferson Elementaries.

This story will be updated throughout the day.

Ann Schimke is a senior reporter at Chalkbeat, covering early childhood issues and early literacy. Contact Ann at aschimke@chalkbeat.org.

Students shot at Evergreen High School in Jefferson County: What we know so far

2025-09-11T02:12:24+00:00

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We are continuing to cover this developing situation. Read the latest news on the school shooting at Evergreen High School in Jefferson County, Colorado, at this link.

A Jefferson County community is reeling after a shooting at Evergreen High School Wednesday left two students seriously injured and the suspected shooter, also a student, dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Evergreen shooter radicalized by 'extremist network,' investigators say

“No child should ever face this kind of danger,” Jeffco Public Schools Superintendent Tracy Dorland said Wednesday evening. “And no community should be asked to absorb this kind of pain. As Jeffco superintendent, I am angry, and I am heartbroken.”

The first 911 call came from Evergreen High at 12:24 p.m., Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Jacki Kelley said. Law enforcement was on site within two minutes and made contact with the suspected shooter, a teen boy, within five minutes, she said.

All three students were transported to CommonSpirit St. Anthony Hospital in Lakewood. Late Wednesday evening, the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office said on X that the suspected shooter had died of his injuries.

Dr. Brian Blackwood, the head of trauma at St. Anthony hospital, had said earlier on Wednesday that one student had non-life threatening injuries and was in stable condition and two others were in critical condition.

Kelley said there was no school resource officer at the school. A school district spokesperson said Evergreen High does have an SRO.

Kelley described multiple crime scenes inside and outside the school building, and said it will take time to piece together what happened.

A large number of students saw or heard the shooting, and some students said they were shot at, she said. Law enforcement will be interviewing witnesses for some time.

“This is the scariest thing you could ever think that could happen,” Kelley said. “I know we always say ‘not again,’ and here we are.”

About 900 students attend Evergreen High, located 29 miles southwest of Denver. A reunification center to connect Evergreen High students with their parents was set up about 6 miles away at Bergen Meadow Elementary School.

The school district canceled all after-school activities Wednesday.

“In Jeffco, we will continue to advocate for every single tool available to keep our students safe,” Dorland said. “The nation is tired of statements filled with platitudes of thoughts and prayers. What we need is courage. What we need is the collective will of our entire community.

“Violence involving our young people should never be normalized and we must face the difficult truth that too often it is,” she said.

Gov. Jared Polis said in a statement that he was closely monitoring the situation.

“Students should be able to attend school safely and without fear across our state and nation,” Polis said. “We are all praying for the victims and the entire community.”

Colorado Senate Assistant Majority Leader Lisa Cutter, a Jefferson County Democrat, said in a statement that she’s heartbroken and angered.

“Schools need to be safe places, and this tragedy is yet another reminder that we must do better to protect our kids,” she said.

Jeffco Public Schools is also home to Columbine High School. The 1999 shooting there was one of the deadliest school attacks in U.S. history, though it has since been eclipsed by Uvalde, Sandy Hook, and Parkland. The district has taken on a national leadership role in school safety initiatives. Dorland said Wednesday’s shooting at Evergreen High “reopens old wounds.”

Colorado does not have more mass shootings than other states, but it has seen a large share of high-profile events, including the Aurora theater shooting and the Club Q massacre.

Colorado lawmakers adopted the Claire Davis Act in 2015, named after a student who was murdered at Arapahoe High School in Littleton. The law gives school officials a responsibility to respond to credible threats and exposes them to legal liability for failure to act.

In 2023, lawmakers expanded the state’s “red flag” law to include educators among those people who could ask a judge to temporarily remove someone’s guns because they presented a danger to themselves or others. However, the law has not resulted in a large increase in what are known as extreme risk protection orders.

That same year, the state created the Office of School Safety to consolidate grants and training and share information about best practices.

A study by the Colorado School of Health found that one in four Colorado teens have easy access to firearms, and of those, half said they could get a gun within 10 minutes.

This story has been updated throughout with additional information.

Chalkbeat National Editor Erica Meltzer and Higher Education Reporter Jason Gonzales contributed to this report.

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

How social media fuels youth gun violence in Indianapolis

2025-09-08T10:20:00+00:00

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This article was co-reported by Chalkbeat Indiana and Axios Indianapolis as part of a reporting partnership about youth gun violence in Indianapolis.

As teenager Oswin Ortiz Jr. lay shot outside his home in 2019, his father approached him and asked who had shot him.

“All he could say was ‘Snapchat’ and pointed to his phone,” police wrote in a probable cause affidavit for the arrest of Joshua Grow.

After Ortiz’s death, police officers went through his and Grow’s Snapchat accounts. There, they found videos Ortiz took of THC he was trying to sell, according to the affidavit. And hours before Ortiz’s death, Grow was trying to find someone he could rob.

“Where a lick,” read a message from Grow’s Snapchat account to another acquaintance, using slang for a robbery target. “I need money.” Grow, who was 18 at the time, eventually pleaded guilty to a charge in connection with Ortiz’s shooting and was sentenced to several decades in prison.

Since 2018, over one-third of the gun homicides involving Indianapolis youth for which prosecutors have brought murder charges have featured social media in some form, according to a Chalkbeat and Axios analysis of 72 probable-cause affidavits. Teenagers use Facebook to set up drug deals that turn into robberies gone wrong. Trash talking that starts on Snapchat ends in gunfire. Police search Instagram messages and videos for clues.

Social media’s complex role in the city’s youth gun homicides makes for a daunting obstacle in curbing youth violence. Already, 21 people ages 19 and under have been killed by gunfire in 2025, more than all of last year. Since 2020, nearly 200 people in that age range have been killed by gunfire.

The algorithm of platforms like Instagram can feed vulnerable youth a fake reality in which violence is the norm, students and experts say. It can also amplify pre-existing drama between students before an audience of their peers both during and outside of school hours. And it can make communication between teenagers — whether to meet up to trade a gun or buy marijuana — instantaneous and discreet.

Each of these pieces contributes to a youth violence problem that’s difficult to solve, but not impossible, researchers say. And calls for the city to do more have reached a fever pitch after a mass shooting involving at least four teens in the heart of downtown during the Fourth of July weekend.

Paul Boxer, a professor of psychology at Rutgers and author of “The Future of Youth Violence Prevention: A Mixtape for Practice, Policy, and Research,” said there are effective strategies to combat youth violence that social media is exacerbating, such as cognitive-behavioral therapy. But they often come with a fairly significant upfront investment that communities don’t always want to make — despite cost effectiveness studies that show a positive return.

“We can prevent youth violence,” Boxer said. “We can prevent gun violence. Where there’s a will there’s a way.”

Social media aids meetups, makes private fights public

Ania Raines remembers her brother, 16-year-old Xavier Weir, arguing with people over Instagram live in the months leading up to his death in 2019.

Isaiha Funez, one of the two people charged with his murder, told police that Weir posted a $1,200 bounty on his head on Snapchat weeks before.

Weir, in turn, was being accused of giving information to authorities about car thefts in Carmel, Raines said.

“‘He’s calling you a snitch,’” one girl said to Weir in a video, according to Raines. He sent emojis of laughing faces back in response.

Michelle and Ania Raines, Xavier Weir's mother and sister, sit below a framed portrait of Xavier at their home in Indianapolis. They remember him as a loving, protective older brother.

All that time, Weir’s peers at Scecina Memorial High School watched the drama from their phone screens. After his death that April, a classmate showed Weir’s mother, Michelle Raines, the arguments that unfolded over social media — which the classmate had recorded. (Funez eventually pleaded guilty to a lesser charge.)

Since 2018, many of the gun homicides involving school-aged children that have reached the Marion County prosecutor’s office have involved social media in some form.

In at least 25 out of 72 of those homicides, police documented the use of Instagram, Snapchat, Discord, or Facebook in the moments leading up to or after the homicide, according to a Chalkbeat Indiana and Axios Indianapolis analysis of affidavits for those arrested for the deaths.

The analysis examined cases filed from 2018 through late January 2025, and includes all cases in which a defendant or a victim of gun homicides were ages 6 to 18. (Not all defendants arrested for these homicides were convicted of murder — some had their cases dropped, for example, while others pleaded guilty to a lesser charge.)

Data: Marion County Prosecutor’s Office, Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department, and probable cause affidavits.

Note: Not all defendants were found guilty as charges may have changed or cases may still be pending.

Chart: Kavya Beheraj/Axios

To teenagers, social media is a form of both entertainment and communication, students told Chalkbeat. Instagram trends can flood a school community. One account might be dedicated to publicizing school fights. Another account might post photos of students asleep in class.

Teens use social media apps in place of a classmate’s direct phone number, which can feel too personal. But that also means that communication between students is highly publicized.

Vague notes left on Instagram stories might be a “sneak diss” — an insult that does not directly name the target. Students fight through posts on their Instagram stories by screenshotting their aggressor’s post and writing their reply over it so that everyone can see.

“It’s one thing for someone to be rude to you,” said Noa Kaufman-Nichols, a recent graduate of Shortridge High School who was active in the school’s Key Club and student government. “But for someone to be rude to you in front of hundreds of people and possibly more if you have a public account, I think that adds a level of anger that [wasn’t] there before.”

Michelle Raines still keeps photos of her son, Xavier Weir, throughout childhood neatly packed in his room. He played football and was recruited by Xavier University before his death, she said.

The Chalkbeat and Axios analysis found that students also used social media often to meet in person and buy or trade guns or marijuana.

Hours before his fatal shooting in 2019, Weir advertised THC cartridges and marijuana for sale on Snapchat, one witness told police, according to the affidavit for Funez’s arrest. (Raines said that a detective later told her the cartridges contained nicotine, not THC). After Ortiz Jr. was shot the same year at age 17, police also found videos of THC he wanted to sell in his Snapchat account, according to an affidavit.

After Weir sold cartridges to girls at a westside gas station, a car followed him to a residential area in Beech Grove, where Weir was fatally shot.

Even after his death, Weir’s younger sister, Ania, faced bullying online, Raines said. One student at her private school sent a screenshot of Weir’s tombstone to her, asking her how her brother was.

“I told them, ‘This has got to stop, she’s going to end up retaliating,’” Raines recalled telling school officials before she pulled her from the school. “It’s not going to be good.”

Social media presents alternate reality to teens

Hours before his death in October 2021,17-year-old Abdulla Mubarak posted two videos to his Snapchat, according to police records. He was standing in a field, talking and laughing with 22-year-old Michael James, who is recorded shooting a handgun with a switch on it and emptying the gun’s magazine. Their bodies — along with the body of 18-year-old Joseph Thomas — were later found in the same field.

Social media can present an echo chamber for teens — one in which having guns, money, and marijuana is normalized, students and experts said.

“It’s one thing for someone to be rude to you,” said Noa Kaufman-Nichols, a recent graduate of Shortridge High School. “But for someone to be rude to you in front of hundreds of people and possibly more if you have a public account, I think that adds a level of anger that [wasn’t] there before.”

“It turns into something you see every day, basically. It influences you to be like these people,” said Ariyah Mitchell, a recent Southport High School graduate who previously served on the Mayor’s Youth Leadership Council.

Social media algorithms can also preference controversial, emotional, and violent content to drive activity and engagement, Boxer said.

“It’s making them believe the world is a violent place,” Boxer said, “and suspect guns are a good way to solve problems.”

These kinds of posts and references on social media can help police make an arrest.

In the early morning hours of Jan. 4, 2020, a Snapchat user police believed to be Treshawn Davidson, 17, was looking for 15-year-old Peter Lambermont.

“He took my gun I need u to find him,” lilbandz1219 said to another user, according to an affidavit filed in Davidson’s arrest. Davidson later pleaded guilty to theft of a firearm and assisting a criminal, charges connected with Lambermont’s death.

Later that afternoon, Snapchat messages show that Lambermont met with Treshawn and 18-year-old Jakeb Wells, who was later found guilty of Lambermont’s murder. After Lambermont was found dead on the city’s east side, Wells posted a video of himself singing on Snapchat.

“That little kid got murk’d, I had to put him on a shirt,” Wells sang, referencing slang for murder, according to the affidavit. “I shot his body, made him twerk.”

Indiana seeks solutions in and out of school

User guidelines for several social media companies technically prohibit content containing violence or threats. To avoid spreading harmful content, Snapchat moderates content in Spotlight and Discover feeds before it is recommended for distribution to a larger audience, according to Snap, the company that operates Snapchat.

Meta, which operates Instagram and Facebook, says that it hides certain content from teenagers, including offers from legitimate businesses to sell firearms.

But those policies alone can’t fix the problem.

Government officials have tried both in-school and out-of-school solutions to limit screen time or reduce the potential for youth violence.

"It influences you to be like these people," Ariyah Mitchell, a recent graduate of Southport High School, said of social media's algorithms.

Northwest Middle School Principal Nichole Morrow-Weaver told Chalkbeat last November that Indiana’s cell phone ban in schools, which took effect last year, had a positive effect.

“A lot of the issues that we have stem from social media outside of school,” Morrow-Weaver said. “Without having the cell phones in schools this year, we’ve seen a big decrease in that.”

Yet other potentially useful in-school approaches aren’t getting the same support from policymakers.

Social-emotional learning can be effective in improving student well-being and reducing violence, research has shown. But Republican lawmakers removed teacher training requirements related to social-emotional learning, cultural competency and restorative justice this past legislative session as part of a larger school deregulation effort.

“Teachers should focus on academic rigor, math, science, reading, and writing, technical skills, instead of this emotional regulation, empathy, and et cetera,” said Sen. Gary Byrne, a Republican.

Studies conducted in school settings have also found that cognitive behavioral therapy-based anger management interventions are effective. But Indiana had just one counselor for every 351 students last school year, higher than the recommended ratio of 1-to-250.

Ratios for other school-based mental health care providers are even worse, with 2,700 students per school psychologist and 1,829 students per social worker, according to Indiana University.

Outside of school, Indianapolis officials recently implemented a stricter curfew for youth — but even city leaders disagree on the effectiveness of such policies.

Weir’s bedroom is filled with childhood mementos — certificates of accomplishment from the private Catholic school he attended, a collection of Nike shoes stacked in boxes, and photos of him on the school basketball and football team.

Michelle Raines keeps Xavier Weir's room filled of childhood memorabilia, including multiple teddy bears. One of the bears the family has is programmed to play the sound of his heart beat. After his death, Weir's organs were donated to others in need.

His mother leaves it all packed up in remembrance of the life he lived. Her son played football and was recruited by Xavier University before his death. Last month, he would have turned 23.

Growing up, Raines said, she was outside playing with friends. Now, kids are texting each other from neighboring rooms.

“I wish we could just not have a phone,” she said.

Read the Axios Indianapolis story here.

Amelia Pak-Harvey covers Indianapolis and Lawrence Township schools for Chalkbeat Indiana. Contact Amelia at apak-harvey@chalkbeat.org.

Arika Herron is a reporter for Axios Indianapolis. You can reach her atArika.Herron@axios.com.

Judge finds DPS not liable for shooting death of student Luis Garcia outside East High School

2025-07-31T23:37:43+00:00

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A judge has found that Denver Public Schools is not liable for the death of Luis Garcia, a 16-year-old student who was shot outside East High School in 2023 and died of his injuries.

Denver District Court Judge Kandace C. Gerdes ruled earlier this month that Luis was shot while inside his car on a public street and not on DPS property. Luis’ family sued DPS for wrongful death, but Gerdes dismissed the claims against the school district.

Luis’ family filed a notice Wednesday that it plans to appeal the ruling. Attorney Matthew Barringer, who is representing the family, said they respect the judge’s decision but disagree with it. More importantly, Barringer said, “the real story” is that Luis “still hasn’t received any justice” because no one has been charged with his murder.

The family, Barringer said, “has provided anything and everything they can to help bring justice to their son and to their family. And up to this point, all they have ever received is hollow promises, hollow platitudes.”

Both the Denver Police Department and the Denver District Attorney’s Office said Thursday that there are no updates in the case and that the investigation is ongoing.

Luis Garcia, on the right in the red jersey, played soccer for East High School.

A junior at East High, Luis was a talented soccer player who wore #11 on his jersey. On Feb. 13, 2023, Luis was shot in his car after dropping off his cousin at the school. Luis died of his injuries about two weeks later. His family sued DPS, East High, and the Denver school board in 2024.

Luis “was shot where City Park Esplanade intersects East 17th Avenue, where both roads are used for the purpose of public transportation,” Gerdes wrote in a July 18 order. “The Court is not persuaded that these roads are ‘within the school facilities’ of East’s Property.”

Gerdes noted in her ruling that there is an RTD bus stop “less than 500 feet from where [Luis] was shot,” which she said “corroborates that these two roadways were intended for use by the general public, and not ‘within the school facilities.’”

As such, Gerdes ruled that Luis’ family cannot invoke the Claire Davis School Safety Act, a state law named for a student who died in a school shooting. The law says school districts can be held liable if they fail to exercise “reasonable care” to protect students and staff from “reasonably foreseeable” acts of violence at school, including murder.

In their lawsuit, Luis’ family alleged that East High “subverted and weakened the security and safe environment” of the school after the removal of armed police officers, allowing “potential shooters to believe they would be able to execute an attack.”

The Denver school board had voted to remove school resource officers from DPS schools in 2020. DPS returned school resource officers to schools in 2023 after Luis’ death and a separate shooting inside East High a month later. Two deans injured in that shooting are also suing DPS.

“DPS extends its deepest sympathies to the Garcia-Bobadilla family and all affected by Luis’s loss,” the school district said in a statement responding to Gerdes’ ruling.

In addition to naming DPS, East High School, and the Denver school board in its lawsuit, Luis’ family also sued a juvenile male identified by a pseudonym and his mother. The lawsuit alleged that the juvenile male shot and killed Luis.

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Marion County superintendents support proposal to extend curfew after recent shootings

2025-07-11T18:26:48+00:00

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The leaders of all 11 Marion County school districts are supporting extended curfew hours for youth following two consecutive weekends of violence that has left five teenagers dead, according to multiple news reports.

The superintendents of Indianapolis Public Schools, the eight surrounding township school districts, and Beech Grove and Speedway Schools said in a statement Friday that they support a City-County Council proposal for an extended curfew.

“This proposal is not about punishment—it’s about prevention,” the superintendents said. “It’s about creating the conditions for our youth to thrive, not just survive. It’s about reclaiming our streets, our neighborhoods, and our collective peace of mind.”

The development is the latest in the city’s ongoing struggle with youth gun violence. After reaching a six-year peak in 2023, the number of youth killed by guns dropped in 2024 — but non-fatal shootings still increased.

The proposed change in city ordinance would set the start of curfew hours two hours earlier than the current ordinance. The change would enact a curfew for minors ages 15-17 between 9 p.m. and 5 a.m. Sunday through Thursday, and 11 p.m. to 5 a.m. Friday and Saturday. Those younger than 15 would also have a curfew that starts two hours earlier than the current curfew, but theirs would last from 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. every day of the week.

A City-County Council committee will consider the proposal July 16.

The support for longer curfew hours comes roughly one week after two teenagers were shot and killed downtown after Fourth of July celebrations. Police apprehended three teenagers aged 13, 15, and 16, who face charges in juvenile court that include dangerous possession of a firearm, possession of marijuana, resisting law enforcement, and theft of a firearm.

Another 17-year-old, Vincent Lanking, is charged with dangerous possession of a firearm, resisting law enforcement, and obstruction of justice following the shootings. He has been charged as an adult.

Another three teenagers were also shot and killed in the last weekend of June. Two of the victims were recent Arsenal Technical High School graduates, according to Fox 59. A third had at one point enrolled at Crispus Attucks High School, according to the Indianapolis Star.

Last year, the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department announced they would more strictly enforce curfew following a shooting that injured several young people downtown. The department later said it wasn’t keeping track of how many minors it had picked up for violating curfew.

On Monday, police stressed in a statement that mass enforcement of curfew laws is challenging.

“IMPD cannot carry this burden alone, nor should we,” IMPD said. “We are committed to working with our partners in the family court, city and state government, and community-based organizations to identify long-term solutions. But meaningful change will only happen if every part of the system steps up.”

Amelia Pak-Harvey covers Indianapolis and Lawrence Township schools for Chalkbeat Indiana. Contact Amelia at apak-harvey@chalkbeat.org.

Detroit teens describe safety fears in school, at home, and on the street

2025-07-11T10:00:01+00:00

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This story was published as part of Next City’s Detroit News Hub, a reporting project funded by the Kresge Foundation. The hub includes BridgeDetroit, Planet Detroit, and Chalkbeat Detroit.

Detroit youth say they generally feel safe in school, but they fear the unknown, both within the school building and in their communities. That fear, some say, affects their mental health.

“Sometimes I just overthink it,” Natalina Cawthon, a student at Detroit School of Arts, told Chalkbeat.

Violent crime may be on the decline in Detroit, but youth who must navigate the city and its schools say fears about their safety can often feel overwhelming. Interviews with more than a dozen youth and adults who advocate on their behalf illustrate the challenges young people face — and the ways they cope.

Here’s what Chalkbeat heard from them:

Malaya Ramsey, 15, the School at Marygrove

Malaya Ramsey gets tense in places where teenagers gather in large numbers. Fights tend to break out, and she can’t forget the times she’s heard gunshots at carnivals, or the acquaintance who was killed at one.

“I’m always on edge, basically, watching my surroundings,” said Malaya, 15, a student at the School at Marygrove.

She generally feels comfortable at school. Marygrove, located on the former Marygrove College campus in northwest Detroit, is the newest high school in the district and has a focus on social justice. But safety can be an issue — like the time some teens from another high school came onto the campus with weapons to try to fight a Marygrove student.

“Luckily, my school, they get on top of these things quickly, so they de-escalated the problem,” she said, adding that the police arrived within minutes.

Though she’s concerned about incidents like that, Malaya said she feels supported.

“I talk to my parents and stuff like that a lot, so I tell them what’s on my mind, even my principals and stuff — I’m close with them, so I’ll tell them if I don’t feel comfortable,” she said. “But other people — some people don’t know how to express that.”

Detroit youth say they generally feel safe in school, but they fear the unknown, both within the school building and in their communities.

Tristian Grant, 16, Cody High School

Tristian Grant sometimes worries about violence. He feels unsafe when people start fighting, or in large crowds, where “it’s really unpredictable — anything could happen at any moment.”

Grant said he has been in a few fights but wasn’t seriously injured. “Someone was trying to bully me, so I had to stand up to them,” he said. Over time, the situation resolved. “They stopped bothering me, and we went on with our lives,” he said.

Social media is another safety concern, Grant said. “A lot of people like to threaten others and also start drama through social media.”

Have concerns about safety and fights affected his mental health? “I’d say for a short amount of time, yes, but eventually it goes away.”

Dulce Bravo, 18, Western International High School graduate

One of Dulce Bravo’s biggest fears is the ever-present threat of gun violence at school. She said she feels safe at school only half of the time.

Bravo said she has missed school because of a reported threat every year except her senior year. There’s “always random posts saying that they’re gonna shoot up the school, and specific dates and times, so I would miss school on those specific days and even the next day.”

She’s happy that the schools perform drills, so everyone can prepare in case something happens, Bravo said. But it bothers her when people don’t take the drills seriously. In a recent drill, she said, “People just kind of brushed it off as, like, it’s not a big deal — why are we even doing this? And I don’t like to see that.”

Chalkbeat talked to teens across the city to hear their concerns about safety issues.

Paola Negrete, 16, Cass Technical High School

Paola Negrete is involved in a few community organizations that address youth safety. She’s part of a coalition of organizations, including 482Forward, that has developed a school facilities bill to address unsafe conditions. She said students have reported ceiling tiles falling down, broken windows that make it too hot or too cold in classrooms, and dirty lunchrooms.

These community groups give youth a place to be with others their age who may be going through the same things, but Negrete and her peers also lean on the adults there, she said.

“The adult allies do a really good job with providing that mental health support when we come after school. They’re very understanding. They like to bond with us as well, so that’s where we get the time to just kind of relax, unfold,” and talk about the issues they’re dealing with, she said.

Safety for Negrete isn’t just about being free from violence. “Safety is more of a feeling, like a comfort. It doesn’t really involve police or metal detectors. . . . In community spaces, I feel very safe because I’m able to share my ideas and talk about how I feel, and not being judged or anything.”

Tiarra Hall, 18, WAY Academy West Campus graduate

Tiarra Hall uses public transportation to get to school. “I keep myself safe by not outwardly speaking to strangers and that sort of thing,” she said. “I don’t talk to anyone when I’m out unless I know them.”

When Hall was in elementary school, she walked to school. At the time, adults were volunteering to help students get to school safely. Knowing that someone was looking out for students going to and from school made her feel safer. Her mother was part of the program, helping to document things, she said.

When she sees fights, her thoughts go to how the fight could have been prevented, and how someone might intervene to talk the person down.

Natalina Cawthon, 14, Detroit School of Arts

Natalina Cawthon poses for a portrait on Fri., May 16, 2025 in Detroit, Michigan.

Natalina Cawthon is concerned about gun violence at school and in her neighborhood.

She generally feels safe at her school, where the doors stay locked and there are metal detectors. Teachers often keep their classroom doors locked, too, she said.

But the potential of a school shooting sometimes affects Cawthon’s mental health. “Sometimes I just overthink it,” she said.

In her neighborhood, she would like to see more police officers. She added that it’s good for young people to be aware of their surroundings, including “setting boundaries with strangers and stuff because you never know. A lot of young people have gone missing.”

Ja’Nya Street, 16, the School at Marygrove

Ja’Nya Street feels the least safe at school.

She knows that incidents have happened when kids have been bullied, and schools don’t have enough mental health resources for the kids who need them.

“Anything can happen. Anybody can be feeling different. Anybody can be having a bad day. Some people just get on edge” and then may do something — from getting a gun and killing somebody to harming yourself, she said. “You never know who’s getting bullied,” she added.

Angelica Williams, 22, Detroit Board of Police Commissioners Youth Advisory Panel, Wayne State University student

The possibility of violence makes Angelica Williams feel unsafe, especially when she’s alone.

“Being a young Black girl, there are several different avenues where any situation or interaction could go wrong,” she said.

Angelica Williams, 22, poses for a portrait on Fri., May 16, 2025 in Detroit, Michigan.

She feels anxious when stopping at a gas station at night, for example. “There will be men that come up and make comments, or they’ll try to pump your gas. … And there’s just this level of knowledge — like the wrong word or wrong move or just his bad mood could end up making that situation unsafe.”

Gun violence is a concern of the Youth Advisory Panel — and Williams. “I’ve never watched it happen in real time, but there’s been shootings in my neighborhood that I’ve been home during,” she said. In some areas of Detroit where she’s lived, she’s woken up to shootings. “I think that there’s a culture of nonchalance about guns and firearms.”

Williams sees violence as a perpetual cycle that’s often inherited from parents and authority figures.

“There’s a lack of intentionality ensuring that youth have a safe space to congregate, to exist freely, to entertain themselves,” she said. “I think that a lot of youth conflict in particular comes from a place of not having active spaces and outlets for expressing oneself, for addressing conflict in productive ways.”

Ayme Head, 18, treasurer, Detroit Heals Detroit, Eastern Michigan University student

Ayme Head feels the least safe when she’s surrounded by people she doesn’t know.

“A rivalry could happen in Family Dollar while I’m just trying to grab some tissue, or someone could decide to do a drive-by while I’m at the park with my younger cousins. You don’t know everyone’s intentions, and you don’t know what everyone’s going through or what they came to do,” she said.

Ayme Head, 18, poses for a portrait on Fri., May 16, 2025 in Detroit, Michigan.

Head is treasurer and financial advisor of Detroit Heals Detroit, a youth-led nonprofit that works to combat trauma and foster healing for Detroit youth. Through healing circles and in other ways, DHD has created “a place where people could come and share something that they won’t feel comfortable sharing with their family,” Head said. “If they don’t have that reliance or that safe space with their family, then we could be that second family for them.”

To improve safety, Head would like to see “community events with the police so they can try to better understand the community and the needs” and to build connections between the police and the community, she said.

If community members are connected to each other, they’ll protect each other, she said. “The bond’s so strong that when crime does happen, it’s going to be a real no-go.”

Camille Hollenquest, 24, executive director, Detroit Heals Detroit

To feel safe, youth need “third spaces” where they can be in community with other youth, said Camille Hollenquest. “Sometimes you just need to be in a space with other youth where it’s like, ‘I understand and I hear you, I feel you,’ as well as making sure that the youth who are in that space — they have the tools to further navigate situations when another young person is coming to them with the heaviness of their experiences,” they said.

Camille Hollenquest, 25, poses for a portrait on Fri., May 16, 2025 in Detroit, Michigan.

Hollenquest has seen, from the high school students Detroit Heals Detroit works with, that these students are experiencing a critical point in their development, and “it becomes a point where everything feels like it’s on fire.” If that happens, by the time they’re in high school they may “become less open to talking about it, and they also begin to kind of normalize it. And I think that’s a major problem, because when situations and experiences like that, which are very negative, become kind of like a normal occurrence for folks, it’s hard for them to actually be able to identify when something is unsafe or something is not right,” they said. “It’s kind of like that light bulb isn’t turning on all the way.”

Another safety problem is that, through fear and propaganda, people are “conditioned and socialized” to believe that certain people — like Black boys and unhoused people — are unsafe, Hollenquest said. “When groups of people who are the most vulnerable become villains in the eyes of their community members, it creates this feeling of unsafety that’s not grounded in truth,” they said.

Alexis Escoto, 23, Detroit Board of Police Commissioners Youth Advisory Panel

Alexis Oscoto feels the least safe in his community park, where he goes to jog and ride his bike. “Sometimes I have to be super aware because there’s a big parking lot right next to the park, so sometimes people make donuts or drag racing,” and he’s afraid they might drive onto the park.

Alexis Escoto, 23, poses for a portrait on Fri., May 16, 2025 in Detroit, Michigan.

Another concern is that “there’s a lot of drug needles there. So I’m afraid, not just for me, but also for other people, that they can accidentally stumble upon those needles.”

With the Youth Advisory Panel, an issue that many youth and community members are concerned about is “the usage of facial recognition or AI technology within the police department,” Escoto said. People have experienced cases of mistaken identity, such as going to the gas station and then getting arrested a couple of weeks later because of mistaken facial recognition, he said.

In Escoto’s majority-Hispanic community, people feel unsafe because of ICE. “In today’s climate, they’re afraid of getting out,” he said. He carries “know your rights” cards in his car and gives them out to people. People’s fear of ICE extends to distrust of the police, he said.

“More and more people I noticed are starting to have the mentality of ‘F the police,’ and when something happens, they try not to call the police because they’re afraid the police might make the situation even worse,” Escoto said.

He’d like to see workshops or other events that provide education on policing.

Armani Arnold, 23, Detroit Phoenix Center Youth Action Board

When Armani Arnold was growing up, she was in and out of homelessness, and she went to Detroit Phoenix Center for support. It provides physical resources, like housing assistance, food, and hygiene necessities — but also emotional support. “I feel most emotionally, mentally, physically safe there. I feel like I’m able to speak my mind and not be judged,” she said. Now Arnold is on the organization’s Youth Action Board.

Armani Arnold poses for a portrait on Thurs., May 29, 2025 in Detroit, Michigan.

Some youth act out because they don’t understand their emotions, but they should be able to “feel safe, to share and be vulnerable, and to … understand your emotions and why you feel that way,” Arnold said. “I didn’t know any better growing up, because I didn’t have my parents … I didn’t know how to control my emotions or deal with my emotions, because it was all over the place, because nobody was there to actually try to help me.”

Sometimes, adults can make youth feel stupid because of something they just don’t know and never learned, Arnold said. This could be “making them feel bad for something that happened to them but they didn’t know, or they just made a simple mistake.” So providing safe spaces to help youth with “understanding your emotional intelligence, your emotional patterns, and how that can affect you — that’s a big thing,” she said.

‘Didn’t feel safe anywhere’: How fears of violence shape life for Detroit youth

2025-07-09T17:50:37+00:00

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Armani Arnold was a 16-year-old Detroit high school student walking home from a bus stop when a man in a car pulled up next to her, catcalling and trying to get her to talk to him.

Arnold ignored the stranger and began walking fast to get away from him. He persisted.

“I’m scared because I have a heavy book bag. I have on a dress and I just — I can’t run,” she told Chalkbeat. She started to cross the street, but he cut her off with his car in the crosswalk. So she pleaded with him.

“I’m only 16,” she said, thinking she was about to be kidnapped. “Please leave me alone. Please don’t hurt me.”

The plea worked, and he left.

Safety is a serious issue for young people in Detroit. Chalkbeat talked to teenagers — and the adults who advocate for and with them — to understand how their daily lives are shaped by such concerns. The possibility of getting attacked on the way to or from school is a constant safety issue in Detroit. But youths also worry about bullying, school shootings, and detentions by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.

Some youth say walking to and from school and bus stops can make them afraid. This is a city bus stop photographed May 22, 2025 in the Banglatown area of Detroit, Michigan.

Crime rates in Detroit suggest that the city has become a safer place. Between 2023 and 2024, the number of homicides in Detroit dropped 19% — the lowest number since 1965. Rates of nonfatal shootings and carjackings decreased during the same time period by 25% and 15%, respectively.

Although Detroit’s gun violence has declined, school shootings across the country have increased since 2020 — a persistent fear for many students.

While some measures indicate that Detroit is a safer place, the city’s youth consider many factors — not just violence statistics — when describing what makes them feel safe or unsafe.

Fears of violence have likely seemed valid given recent events: A 4-year-old and an 18-year-old were fatally shot last week at a Detroit park, prompting a citywide effort by community violence prevention groups to reach out to youths and get them connected to activities this summer that will keep them busy and safe. Over the weekend, a 15-year-old was killed and his 13-year-old sister was injured in a home shooting. During the annual Ford Fireworks on June 23, a popular event that attracts lots of youth, a dispute fight led to gunfire. And in May, gun shots rang out near King High School on the night of the senior prom, leaving teens dressed in their fancy attire running for cover.

A sense of uncertainty or fear can affect young people in many ways, from mental health and well-being to school attendance and academic performance.

“Those traumas or those fears — those are barriers to learning,” said John Carlson, professor of school psychology at Michigan State University.

“If you can’t even feel safe — that basic need of safety that we all have — then how can we expect you to do something a little bit more complex,” like reaching your academic potential, or being fully engaged in the learning process, he said.

Nikolai Vitti, superintendent of the Detroit Public Schools Community District, agreed that feeling unsafe or unsupported can cause “stress, anxiety, and reduced confidence.”

In an emailed statement, Vitti said the school district has students complete a mental health screener, offers mental health services, including access to therapists, ensures schools have guidance counselors, and asks students to take an annual survey to “better understand how students perceive their learning environment.”

When students are safe and supported, “they are more resilient and better positioned to succeed,” he said.

Common stressors for youth, like trauma and feeling unsafe, may be more acute in Detroit than they are in some other areas. “The data clearly show that in urban environments, those stressors are much greater than in rural or suburban communities,” Carlson said.

Armani Arnold poses for a portrait on Thurs., May 29, 2025 in Detroit, Michigan.

On the day Arnold was harassed, she was simply trying to get home from a day spent learning at Cass Technical High School.

The Detroit school district doesn’t provide school bus transportation for most high school students (students with disabilities are among the exceptions). Instead, it pays for bus cards to take city buses. Her city bus route was out of service that day, so she took another one home.

When she made it home, she told her guardian what happened.

“She basically blamed me … she said, well, that’s what you get for taking that route home,” Arnold said. She felt like no one cared about her.

That lack of support is part of the reason Arnold, now 23, serves on the Youth Action Board for the Detroit Phoenix Center, an organization that provides programs and services for youths in the city experiencing homelessness, as Arnold once did. She wants them to have the support she lacked.

Students learn to assess unsafe situations

For years, students in Detroit have had to deal with dangerous commutes to school.

Calvin Colbert, executive director of Detroit Impact, started a Safe Routes to School program in 1995 in which community members monitored kids on their way to and from school. The program, which succeeded in reducing violence, became a model for a similar federal program. But its funding eventually dried up, Colbert said.

“Everybody felt like, ‘well, it’s over,’” he said. “No, the intensity of it may be over, but the existence of violence is still there.”

Colbert said sexual predators pose a threat to students trying to get to school.

“What they do in the early mornings — they scour the bus stops. They identify students who catch the bus. They follow them. They become aware of them,” he said.

Although she could walk to the School at Marygrove, Malaya Ramsey gets a ride from her mother to avoid unwanted attention from men.

“I’m a 15-year-old with a more mature body. So when I go into the outside world, it be like men trying to talk to me and stuff like that,” she said.

Some students carry pepper spray and personal alarms to protect themselves on the bus or walk to school. They make a point not to talk to strangers on public transportation.

“There’s a lot of things happening right now in the world. … People go missing, or somebody can just do something to you at any point if you’re alone,” said Dulce Bravo, 18, who graduated from Western International High School this spring. She carries pepper spray and a personal safety alarm.

“I didn’t feel safe anywhere, or I would always have to keep an eye out,” she said.

Having to be so aware of her surroundings used to weigh on her. But, she said, it doesn’t bother her as much anymore. “As time is going on, I think I’m just starting to accept the fact that things do happen.”

Crime rates in Detroit suggest the city has become a safer place. But youths interviewed by Chalkbeat say they routinely worry about safety, at school and in the community.

School security measures don’t make all students feel safe – and the effects of trauma linger

Schools’ security practices vary widely. Some have metal detectors, security guards, and locked doors, but they may not make students feel safer.

Some students said their peers, or even strangers, can get around the metal detector — their security guard isn’t adequately equipped or trained to protect them.

At one school without metal detectors, students reported that teens from a rival school have come in and started fights.

Other students were concerned that their schools’ active shooter drills or fire drills haven’t gone smoothly — and some students don’t take the drills seriously.

When fights and conflicts break out, multiple youth said they’d like to see teachers and administrators get more involved in resolving the problems. Sitting down with the students involved helps sometimes, but “some are more mature than others,” said Ja’Nya Street, 16, a student at the School at Marygrove. Sometimes, the bullying doesn’t stop.

Teachers “tell us to ignore it, ignore it, ignore it until somebody — sometimes people just reach their breaking point,” Street said. “Check up on the incident that happened … don’t just tell them to ignore it and just act like it’s nothing anymore.”

Tiarra Hall, 18, who graduated from WAY Academy West Campus this spring, is a safety ambassador with Detroit Impact. She said fights are the most common safety problem that comes up in her work with the organization.

Detroit Impact helps youth “stay calm in a situation that might disrupt their future,” Hall said. “We’re trying to help them with resolving their issues without beating each other up, and giving them ways to resolve their anger without hurting themselves or people around them.”

When conflicts arise, “they just go to whatever seems the most convenient, and in those cases, it’s physical violence,” she said.

Situations that make youth feel unsafe can cause lasting trauma.

Responses to trauma can be cognitive, psychological, or behavioral — and “our emotional responses can wax and wane,” Carlson, the MSU professor, said. “When we get support, we can have improvement. But it doesn’t mean that we don’t have something arise in our life two months later that brings us right back to that traumatic experience.”

And if someone keeps experiencing the stressor, their responses to it can accumulate, so “it doesn’t make it easier the next time, it actually makes it worse,” Carlson said.

For that reason, continuous monitoring of youth who need support should become a natural part of procedural safety processes, he said.

Some young people in Detroit aren’t safe at home or face homelessness

As a child, Alexis Escoto, 23, a member of the Detroit Board of Police Commissioners Youth Advisory Panel, dealt with violence at home because of a family member’s drug problem. And one of his cousins was killed in a drive-by shooting.

Alexis Escoto, 23, poses for a portrait on Fri., May 16, 2025 in Detroit, Michigan.

Escoto said those traumatic experiences caused him to withdraw. He started skipping school and acting out enough that his teachers would kick him out of class.

“I didn’t want to talk to no one,” he said. “I was paranoid. If I talked to someone, I’m afraid they’d hurt me somehow, or I’d hurt them if they pushed my buttons.”

Children and teenagers who live in unstable home conditions or experience homelessness face extra layers of safety concerns.

Some may live in unsafe situations, such as in homes without running water or heat, said Courtney Smith, CEO of Detroit Phoenix Center, which provides housing and mental health resources and other assistance.

Two children who died in February while living in a van drew widespread attention to the dangers for children living unhoused.

Some families also don’t feel comfortable calling the police for a variety of reasons.

With the Trump administration’s widespread efforts to detain and deport undocumented immigrants, students are concerned about ICE agents coming into schools and communities and taking people away. Escoto said that in his majority-Hispanic community, some people avoid the police because they think they are working with ICE.

When police are around, some youth say they feel more policed than protected, but others want police to be more present in their neighborhoods.

Relationships are key, some advocates say

Even in seemingly safe home situations, youth may feel unsupported.

Many children and teenagers don’t have strong relationships with their parents or guardians, said Camille Hollenquest, 24, executive director of the youth-led organization Detroit Heals Detroit. In those situations, the children “can’t come to you about the things that they’re going through,” they said.

Camille Hollenquest, 25, poses for a portrait on Fri., May 16, 2025 in Detroit, Michigan.

“If you’re not actually curious about what their experiences are, other than just, like, how your day is … actually being invested into who they are as people,” that can cause safety issues, they said.

Many organizations around Detroit have built safe spaces for youth, where they can be who they are and get the support they need. Some of the services they provide respond directly to safety concerns. Others have different functions but also give youth access to trusted adults and peers they can connect with.

Darrell Hall, youth director at Cody Rouge Community Action Alliance, said relationship building is key. “You don’t know anything about what safety issues are present if you don’t know the youth,” he said. “How do you build relationships so youth can say, ‘I’m unsafe at home, or when I’m walking down the street by these abandoned houses,’ or whatever it may be?”

Several of the youth included here go or have gone to these organizations for support, but they also give back themselves, to create safe spaces for others.

One way Escoto moved forward from trauma was by leaning into the community advocacy work he’s been doing since high school. Through various organizations, he has worked “to help the community to be more engaged, get the resources they need, and live in a safe, friendly environment,” he said. “I love seeing the younger kids now having a space in the community center to play soccer or make art or do whatever they want in a safe space.”

Sirrita Darby, co-founder of Detroit Heals Detroit, turned over her executive director role to Hollenquest, so the organization is fully youth led. Hollenquest said they appreciate the opportunity “to be able to show up as a young person in these spaces that aren’t traditionally familiar with catering to the voices and the wants and needs of youth.”

“Sometimes you just need to be in a space with other youth to where it’s like, I understand and I hear you, I feel you, as well as making sure that the youth who are in that space — they have the tools to further navigate situations when another young person is coming to them with the heaviness of their experiences,” Hollenquest said. “Until we have that, I don’t know if youth will be able to actually feel safe.

Youth are coming up with solutions to the safety challenges they’ve faced, Smith said. “They’re building food pantries inside of schools, they’re advocating for policy changes. They’re talking with their state legislators,” and in addressing safety issues, “we need to center solutions that are rooted in youth voice and youth power,” she said.

Secure vestibule at Denver’s East High criticized as ‘illusion of safety’ has been put on hold

2025-03-26T21:49:30+00:00

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Keegan Hoelscher was at an assembly in the auditorium of East High School two years ago when a fellow student shot and injured two deans, a tragic incident that reignited a debate about school safety in Denver and led to big changes, including the reintroduction of school police.

But Hoelscher doesn’t necessarily think East High is unsafe. And he definitely doesn’t think that a proposal to install a secure vestibule will make the school safer. The proposal calls for building an enclosed entryway with a desk and a transaction window where visitors — and possibly some students who’ve been flagged as a safety risk — could be screened.

“It’s mainly just security theater,” said Hoelscher, a junior at the school.

The plan has sparked significant pushback from students, staff, and alumni at the city’s largest and most storied high school. They question the effectiveness of a secure vestibule and balk at its $800,000 price tag. Some are also concerned that the installation will do irreversible damage to East High’s “great hall,” the nickname for the expansive foyer whose walls are lined with gray marble that dates back to the school’s construction in 1925.

“It’ll deface the building,” said Marcia Goldstein, a 1969 graduate who helped found the school’s alumni association and nominated East to become a historic Denver landmark in 1991, around the time her daughters were students there. “It will just be a disaster. It’s okay if it’s a disaster if it serves a good purpose, but it’s not going to serve the purpose that is intended.”

Staff members exit through the front doors of East High School on a March afternoon.

Construction was supposed to start this week, when Denver Public Schools is on spring break, with the bulk of the installation occurring over the summer. But opposition to the project grew so loud that the district is now putting it on hold.

“We understand that the community wishes to provide additional feedback,” said Greg Cazzell, chief of the district’s climate and safety department. “And we’re going to give them an opportunity to hear from them and show them the plans and give more understanding of what the intent of the secure vestibule is and what it looks like.”

As for whether it’s possible that plans for the secure vestibule will be scrapped altogether, Cazzell said, “I would not say that.”

Secure vestibules aren’t controversial at other schools

Secure vestibules are a common safety feature in newer school buildings, and many school districts nationwide are retrofitting older buildings with them as well, school safety experts said. While the vestibules may be best practice, experts acknowledged they’re not a cure-all.

“Should every school have a secure vestibule? Yes,” said Ben Crum, a security specialist who serves on the advisory council for an organization called the Partner Alliance for Safer Schools. But, Crum said, “that’s not going to prevent everything.”

Secure vestibules are most effective at stopping outsiders — visitors, strangers, parents in the midst of child custody disputes — from coming into schools without being screened, experts said. They are less effective at stopping students and staff who are supposed to be there. But experts said vestibules can delay even a student or staff member from doing harm.

“In the security world, we’re trying to buy time to respond to the threat,” Crum said.

A rendering of the proposed secure vestibule at Denver's East High School.

Some Denver school buildings already have secure vestibules, though district officials did not provide a number. Seventeen more schools are set to get them over the next few years, funded by about $10 million from a $975 million bond measure passed by Denver voters in November.

East High is not among the 17 schools. East’s secure vestibule would be funded by a different pot of money: extra dollars, known as bond premium, from an earlier bond measure approved by Denver voters in 2020. Secure vestibules weren’t initially part of the 2020 bond. But both the district’s bond oversight committee and the Denver school board agreed in early 2024 to spend bond premium dollars on a secure vestibule at East High.

Vernon Jones, who serves on the bond oversight committee, said gun violence in and around East High was “front of mind” when the committee made that decision.

Several shootings had occurred the previous school year. In September 2022, a student was shot and injured outside a recreation center next to the school. In February 2023, another student was shot and killed while sitting in his car outside the school. And a month later, yet another student shot and injured two deans inside the school and later took his own life.

The shootings led to student protests, the formation of a parent advocacy group, calls for the school board to resign, the reintroduction of school police, and the development of a long-term safety plan for the entire district.

“We have heard a lot … during my time on the board — and prior to that — about ensuring greater physical safety in our schools,” said Denver school board member Scott Esserman, who was elected in 2021 and also serves on the bond oversight committee. But, he said, he’s heard no pushback on secure vestibules at any other schools that are set to get one.

“There are layers to safety and security, and this is one of those,” Esserman said of secure vestibules. “And it’s going to look different at different buildings.”

Denver’s Thomas Jefferson High School has had a secure vestibule for the past five years. Principal Mike Christoff said the idea came from the school community.

“It felt like we could do better,” Christoff said. “It’s unfortunately the reality of our society.”

The secure vestibule at Thomas Jefferson looks like a long and skinny foyer just inside the front doors. A staff member sits behind a glass bank teller-style window, monitoring who goes in and out. Building a secure vestibule onto the utilitarian 1960s-era school building was expensive but not complicated, Christoff said, and it hasn’t been controversial.

A staff member sits behind a glass window in the secure vestibule at Denver's Thomas Jefferson High School.

But everyone agrees that East — with its historic building, famous alumni, and more than its fair share of children of the city’s powerbrokers — is different, both logistically and politically.

“There’s no more important building in Denver for me than East High School,” said James Mejia, a former school board member and one-time mayoral candidate who has held a string of high-profile jobs in the city and is now chief strategy officer at Metropolitan State University. Mejia graduated from East in 1985 and one of his daughters is currently a sophomore.

He opposes the vestibule, both because he doubts its effectiveness and because the East High community wasn’t asked what they think.

“This is a school that takes community input and stakeholder input more seriously than any other place I’ve been associated with,” Mejia said. “Not having a process like that at East High School is falling well short of expectations and good planning.”

‘It’s the people that make us feel safe’

Abigail Forsberg first heard about the secure vestibule during a student council meeting last school year. She thought it was a bad idea, but it seemed like a far-off proposal. Then, two months ago, she heard that “it was almost 100%” going to happen.

Forsberg, a sophomore, sprung into action. She and other student council members began circulating a petition asking the district to stop the vestibule. They passed it around in their classes, posted about it on Instagram, and walked up and down the City Park Esplanade in front of East, asking parents idling in their cars at school pickup time to sign it. Forsberg estimates they already have collected close to 1,000 signatures.

Forsberg also signed up for public comment at a Denver school board meeting this month, where she called the proposed secure vestibule an “illusion of safety.”

East has more than a dozen other entrances, Forsberg and others said. While locked from the outside, the doors are often propped open by students who let their friends in or hold the door for strangers walking behind them. When Forsberg is outside at soccer practice, she said she sees ground-floor windows big enough to jump through hanging wide open.

East also already has cameras and a buzzer at the front doors, as well as a manned security desk that runs visitors’ driver’s licenses through a digital system to check for red flags. It has several unarmed campus security officers and two armed city police officers stationed in the building.

“I don’t think it’s the things that we build that make us feel safe,” Forsberg said. “It’s the people that make us feel safe.”

A secure vestibule, she said, is “not going to make anyone feel safer. It’s going to make it look like the district tried.”

East High School has added a manned security desk, at left, to its front foyer, which some alumni call the great hall.

It could also alter a space that many students and alumni hold dear. The wide-open foyer has served as a meeting spot for generations of students, alumni said. The school choir hosts performances there, and it’s the site of a winter dance known as the Snow Ball. Student clubs put on a yearly fashion show featuring outfits made of recyclable materials and use the foyer as a runway, students said.

“It’s lazy on behalf of the district to just do a cookie-cutter approach, and for every school in every neighborhood to do a vestibule, because that’s the easiest thing to do,” said Sheila MacDonald, a 1983 East graduate. MacDonald said she heard about the vestibule because she was at the school making arrangements for an alumni association scholarship event when district staff came in and began talking to each other about which walls to “blow out.”

District officials now insist no walls will be blown out — not now, and maybe not ever if they can install the secure vestibule in a way that doesn’t damage the historic marble. A community meeting about the plan was scheduled for mid-March but then canceled when school board members couldn’t make it. Then, last week, district Superintendent Alex Marrero sent a letter to East families and staff saying that the project would be put “on hold for now.”

“Doing so will allow valuable time to better engage with your community, provide for the refinement of the school’s comprehensive safety strategy, all with the goal of project implementation in the summer of 2026 as part of our comprehensive plan,” Marrero wrote.

The district is working to reschedule the community meeting, officials said.

When she heard of the project’s postponement, Forsberg was in a meeting with Denver school board President Carrie Olson and fellow student council members.

“We’re really glad that we got enough community members to be invested in it and postpone it,” Forsberg said. “We have more time to tell the district that East doesn’t want this.”

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Victim of shooting outside Denver’s West High School was an 18-year-old student, district says

2025-03-05T23:30:40+00:00

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The victim of a shooting on Tuesday outside Denver’s West High School was an 18-year-old student at the school in his senior year, Denver Public Schools confirmed Wednesday.

The Denver Police Department initially said Tuesday that the victim was not a DPS student. The police department described the shooting victim as “an adult male” in a post on X. The department said “his injuries do not appear life-threatening.”

“There was some confusion at the scene yesterday causing DPD to identify the victim as not being connected to the school,” Denver Public Schools spokesman Scott Pribble said by email. “They are aware of the connection now.”

Denver police responded to a shooting in the 800 block of Elati Street around 2:42 p.m., a police department spokesperson said. West High School is located in the 900 block of Elati Street.

After a shot was heard outside, West High went on a secure perimeter, which means no one is allowed in or out of the building, Pribble said. The secure perimeter lasted just over an hour and ended at 3:55 p.m., about 30 minutes after the usual end of the school day, Pribble said.

The Denver Police Department said Wednesday that the case is still under investigation and no arrests have been made. It did not release the name of the victim.

A February 2023 shooting outside another Denver high school, East High, proved fatal. Sixteen-year-old Luis Garcia was sitting in his car when he was shot in that incident. Garcia died two and a half weeks later. His family is suing Denver Public Schools.

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Another fatal Tennessee school shooting puts spotlight on security and gun control

2025-01-23T00:59:53+00:00

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Two more Tennessee students have died by gunfire at school in a state that has invested hundreds of millions of dollars to fortify campuses — and done little to restrict gun access.

Police said a 16-year-old female student at Nashville’s Antioch High School died after being shot Wednesday in the cafeteria by a 17-year-old male student with a handgun, who then shot himself in the head and died. A third student was grazed in the arm during the shooting.

The shooting comes less than two years after a mass shooting at a private Christian school in Nashville prompted the state’s Republican supermajority to invest in more school-based safety officers, security upgrades, and allowing some public school teachers to carry guns.

This year’s legislative agenda, headlined by a special session called by Republican Gov. Bill Lee, is dominated by private school vouchers and enforcement of President Donald Trump’s immigration policies.

While some Democrats on Wednesday signaled a desire to take up school safety and gun reforms, it was unclear from the initial reaction whether Republicans who have firm control of state government will respond.

The latest shooting happened at approximately 11:09 a.m., prompting a lockdown at the 2,100-student public school in the southeast Nashville neighborhood of Antioch. Students later were transported by bus to a nearby hospital to reunite with their families.

“It is impossibly difficult to be here, once again, dealing with the devastation of gun violence in one of our school communities,” Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell said at a news conference outside the school campus.

Tennessee has invested heavily in school security

Lee’s administration mostly sought to fortify school campuses in response to the 2023 shooting by a former student that killed three children and three adults at Nashville’s Covenant School.

The GOP-controlled legislature has rejected efforts by Democrats to tighten the state’s lax gun laws.

In 2023, lawmakers added $144 million annually to the state budget to pay for at least one school-based officer for every public school. Tens of millions of more dollars were invested to help public and private schools make security upgrades and bolster collaboration between schools and state homeland security agents.

Lawmakers in 2024 approved new school fire alarm protocols to take into account active-shooter situations; a pilot program to give teachers wearable alarms; and increased safety training for school bus drivers, among other things.

Their most contentious debate was over a bill to let some public school teachers and staff carry guns under certain circumstances. Ultimately, the measure passed easily despite dramatic protests at the state Capitol by citizens wanting fewer guns in schools, not more. So far, few Tennessee school systems, if any, have sought to pursue that option.

Meanwhile, another 2024 law — to severely punish threats of mass school violence — has resulted in children being kicked out of school and arrested on felony charges, sometimes because of rumors and misunderstandings. The law is being challenged in court by several families who have filed lawsuits questioning its use.

This year, the governor has called the legislature into a special session beginning Jan. 27 to take up “public safety” measures aimed at curbing illegal immigration, a statewide private school voucher proposal, and emergency aid for flood-damaged parts of northeast Tennessee.

But Democrats said Wednesday that immigration and vouchers are distractions from the toll of gun violence on Tennesseans, especially its youngest citizens.

In 2022, firearms were the leading cause of death among the state’s children and teens ages 1-17.

“While we do not yet know all the circumstances of the shooting, we do know that a minor somehow accessed a handgun, walked into his school with that handgun and committed an unspeakable act of violence, ending his own life and the life of an innocent child,” said Rep. John Ray Clemmons, of Nashville, who chairs the House Democratic Caucus.

Antioch is the same neighborhood where Shaundelle Brooks’ son Akilah was killed during a 2018 shooting at a Waffle House restaurant. Brooks, who has become an outspoken advocate for gun control, was elected last fall to represent the area in the state House of Representatives. She was sworn in last week as the legislature convened a new two-year session.

“We are only one week into the start of our legislative session and already our state has been ravaged by another school shooting,” Brooks said Wednesday. “We must do better.”

The governor said on social media that he had been briefed about the shooting and was joining Tennesseans “in praying for the victims, their families & the school community.” Several GOP leaders in the legislature said they were waiting for more details from law enforcement.

States look for ways to protect America’s schools

Other states have taken a variety of approaches to respond to school shootings, often colored by which political party is in power.

Last month in Michigan, lawmakers approved a package of bills aimed at preventing violence in schools in the wake of the 2021 Oxford school shooting that killed four students.

Some of the legislation had bipartisan support, including bills putting more mental health support in place for students and creating standardized terminology for first responders and school staff to use during school emergencies. Others, such as a bill requiring districts to send home information about safe firearm storage, were pushed through by Democrats.

In Georgia, legislators are floating ideas to protect students in response to a mass shooting at high school last September, including revisiting a tax credit for gun safety devices that stalled last year. Other measures are expected to address student mental health and, as in Michigan, better communication between school districts and other government agencies.

The Georgia shooting, in Apalachee, raised major questions about how school systems and law enforcement share information, as well as the poor state of mental health safety nets. The alleged shooter had been investigated previously on suspicion of making online threats. His mother reportedly called the school warning of an “extreme emergency” that morning, but school officials were not able to find the student before the shooting started.

Lawmakers in Texas, another Republican-controlled state, mandated armed guards at every public school, panic buttons in classrooms, more staff training, and additional mental health support for students after the 2022 Uvalde shooting.

Recent school shootings also have focused more attention on how shooters obtain their weapons — studies find that most of them get them at home. Parents faced charges after shootings in Oxford, Michigan, and Apalachee, Georgia.

Nearly all public schools control access to their doors when kids are in the building with measures like locks and monitoring. Many now use a single point of entry. Around 60% of public schools also control access to their grounds when school is in session with barriers like a locked gate.

Around 45% of public schools had an armed police officer or other sworn law enforcement officer present at least once a week during the 2021-22 school year, the most recent federal data shows.

Two armed school resource officers were patrolling Antioch High School in Nashville when Wednesday’s shooting occurred, authorities said. Police said that by the time the two officers arrived at the cafeteria, the shooting was over and the shooter was dead.

The school will be closed for the rest of the week as Metro Nashville Public Schools arranges for grief counseling and other support for students and staff.

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

How Biden wants to make active shooter drills less traumatic and more effective for students

2024-10-28T19:57:19+00:00

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Soon after Robert Murtfeld’s child started attending kindergarten, the school had an unannounced lockdown drill.

His child was only five years old and, as Murtfeld remembers, didn’t really understand that it was just a drill, not an actual school shooting. Murtfeld himself was also shocked.

“I joined another parent who, like me, was also raised abroad, and we had an issue with this system at work here,” said Murtfield, who grew up in Germany. “We noticed that many American parents didn’t have that issue necessarily or didn’t think about it.”

So Murtfeld decided to advocate for reforming how schools conduct these exercises. His efforts led to changes at his school, which started letting parents know in advance when the drills would happen and giving them the opportunity to opt their child out of them. His work also affected New York state legislation that now requires schools to notify parents about lockdown drills beforehand, and to conduct them in “a trauma-informed, developmentally and age-appropriate manner.”

Murtfeld has company. As drills and simulations have become increasingly common in American schools and universities, organizations representing school psychologists, law enforcement, and others have lobbied to improve them and reduce their negative effects on students.

Now the federal government’s paying attention too. Last month, President Joe Biden signed an executive order creating a multi-agency effort to develop guidelines and share resources on making active shooter drills safer and more effective.

The initiative resulted from the work of the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, which the Biden administration created in 2023 and is supervised by Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee for president.

“As Vice President Harris traveled to meet young leaders around the country, she asked them who had gone through these drills, and every hand in the room was raised, showing that it is a big concern for students,” said Rob Wilcox, the office’s deputy director.

One of the key facets of Biden’s executive order is for the federal government to provide information on “how to prevent or limit trauma or psychological distress associated with active-shooter drills.”

A few groups already have some ideas to share. Organizations like the National Association of School Psychologists (NASP) and the National Association of School Responding Officers (NASRO) have worked together to collect evidence and create guidelines on the best practices. Their cooperation could bear fruit through invigorated federal interest.

Kelly Vaillancourt Strobach, NASP’s director of policy and advocacy, said that the two groups are already reaching out to the agencies responsible for fulfilling the executive order.

“We are very much hoping that whatever the federal government puts out is very much aligned with the guidance that we have been continuing to refine over the last ten years,” said Strobach. “We also certainly hope it is rooted in evidence. Even though there’s still a lack of empirical research on this topic, there is some research that can be referenced.”

How opinions about school lockdown drills changed

Lockdown drills are meant to prepare students for various situations in which a threat is inside the school building — such as active shooter situations.

The likelihood of a student experiencing an active shooter situation remains statistically very low. The opposite is true of lockdown drills: 95.5% of American schools conducted them in the 2021-2022 school year, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

But as drills became more common, reports about their nightmarish depictions of violence in schools emerged as well. Such instances featured the use of gunshot noises, students posing with fake blood as victims, and adults playing the role of assailants.

These dramatic — and potentially traumatic — devices represent an inability to understand the differences between drills, which are supposed to build trust and lower students’ anxiety among students, and simulations, which are high-stress scenarios aimed at preparing law enforcement for situations like those involving active shooters, said Mo Canady, NASRO’s executive director.

Agencies and districts “began to do full-scale situational training in a school environment with students,” said Canady. “As that played out, we began to take a hard look at that and ask ourselves if we were doing the right things, especially with adolescents in the building.”

Despite stories from students and educators, there is not a great deal of evidence about the impacts of procedures like lockdown drills and simulations on the mental health of students. And what research there is does not differentiate between the various drills that can be used or isolate the factors that could contribute to increase anxiety among students, according to Jaclyn Schildkraut, executive director of the Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium at the State University of New York’s Rockefeller Institute of Government.

There are several studies showing the positive outcomes of performing lockdown drills and discussion-based exercises, like “making students feel more prepared, lowering their anxiety, helping them have lower fear of harm, or be less likely to perceive that a school shooting could happen at their school,” Schildkraut said.

One of these studies found that nearly 87% of junior high and high school students reported feeling more prepared to respond to a violent incident after discussion-based training.

Other research indicates that whatever benefit they may provide to schools to prepare for violent incidents, many students feel lockdown drills themselves are harmful.

The Georgia Institute of Technology’s Social Dynamics and Wellbeing Lab, partnering with the Everytown for Gun Safety Support Fund, analyzed social media conversations related to American schools before and after drills. The latter group is affiliated with Everytown for Gun Safety, which supports an assault weapons ban and other measures to prevent gun violence.

They saw “a 42% increase in anxiety and stress (as evidenced by an increase in such words as afraid, struggling, and nervous) and a 39% increase in depression (evidenced by words such as therapy, cope, irritability, suicidal) following drills,” according to their report, which they originally published in 2020.

Before Biden issued his executive order, U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona commissioned the National Academy of Sciences to conduct a study about how active shooter drills affect student health and well-being. The study is not done but it could help fulfill the executive order.

Curbing student trauma caused by active shooter drills

Guidance from NASP, NASRO, Sandy Hook Promise, and other organizations gives hints about what may be included in the guidelines Biden’s executive order is seeking.

Those three groups recommend that the drills should be part of a larger strategy for preventing multiple threats.

“It’s important to practice emergency procedures so that in the event of an emergency, it reduces chaos,” said Strobach of the school psychologists group. “But, to do a fire drill, you don’t necessarily start a fire. So, there are ways for schools to prepare for any type of crisis without actually simulating it.”

Specialists interviewed by Chalkbeat agreed that full-scale simulations should not be part of students' routines and that approaches should consider different methods of preparing them for emergency situations.

For example, the guidelines from NASP and NASRO suggest schools use strategies like “discussion-based exercises,” such as workshops and orientations, so students can talk about the drills before experiencing them.

The guidance does not recommend excluding “action-based” exercises but does make some recommendations about them.

One is to conduct walk-throughs, where kids can go through the instructions step-by-step and ask questions as the exercise happens. After kids are prepared for this, the more common lockdown drills would be the next step.

Biden also stressed that he wants to see resources about communicating with students, families, and others “both about the drills and when the drills are happening,” said Wilcox of the White House’s Office of Gun Violence Prevention.

The president also wants to ensure the executive order focuses on civil rights laws and special populations, such as students with disabilities, Wilcox noted. Reports have highlighted situations in which drills have failed to consider the needs of children with physical disabilities, for example.

Researchers also point out that drills can have a stronger effect on the emotional health of children that have gone through previous traumas.

But ultimately, what the White House executive order produces will not be mandatory, so it will depend on local leaders to decide to follow the guidelines and use the resources.

“We hope that the information will help leaders from all levels to prevent and eliminate extra trauma and harm on our students,” Wilcox said.

Correction: This article has been updated to correct the spelling of Robert Murtfeld‘s name.

Wellington Soares is Chalkbeat’s national education reporting intern based in New York City. Contact Wellington at wsoares@chalkbeat.org.

To cut youth violence in northeast Denver, local students helped create a tip line app

2024-10-02T22:42:29+00:00

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A new app for young people in three northeast Denver neighborhoods aims to reduce violence by connecting youth to the help they need before things reach a breaking point.

Launched in July, “The Power of One” app is a bit like the statewide tip line Safe2Tell, but with two key differences. It addresses a broader array of problems than threats, violence, or self-harm and aims to minimize police involvement unless absolutely necessary.

Youth can use the free Power of One app or accompanying hotline to submit anonymous tips or request help with issues such as finding a counselor, preventing home utilities from being shut off, or heading off an imminent fight at school. Four trained peer mediators will field many of the submissions, but true emergencies will be referred to law enforcement. The program is aimed at students in Montbello, Green Valley Ranch, and Park Hill, but submissions from other neighborhoods will also be addressed.

Although the app has received only one submission so far — a student request for volunteer opportunities — leaders of the effort hope it will eventually expand citywide and help derail youth violence by providing holistic help to young people.

“When youth are struggling, whatever those struggles can be, if they’re not addressed, they can kind of cascade … into eventual involvement in violence,” said Dave Bechhoefer, project director for the Youth Violence Prevention Center-Denver, which spearheaded the app.

Arrests for violent crime, homicide, and aggravated assault in the neighborhoods targeted by the app exceed rates in Denver and the nation, according to the data from the University of Colorado Boulder, where the center is housed.

Kaliah Yizar, one of about a dozen youth advisers who helped shape The Power of One app, said one of the ways the app can help is by connecting youth to positive outlets.

“What we’ve seen is that when youth are given opportunities … such as playing sports, such as joining clubs, getting involved in school, those students are much less likely to get involved in youth violence,” she said.

The app, which is monitored around the clock, is also meant to interrupt violence that may be brewing.

Yizar, now a junior at Howard University in Washington, D.C., said she would have appreciated the app when she was in high school at Martin Luther King Jr. Early College in the Green Valley Ranch neighborhood.

It would have helped “if I knew about something and I was afraid of going to someone at school, if I was afraid of calling the police and being labeled a snitch,” she said.

When Yizar’s aunt was principal at her school, students often let her aunt know if, for example, a classmate posted a photo of a gun on Snapchat or was planning a fight.

The Power of One app “is great for youth who don’t have those connections in school and still want to let people know about what they know, but do it in a way that’s anonymous and safe to them,” she said.

The app began taking shape in 2022 with help from a $6 million federal grant focused on finding innovative ways to reduce youth violence. Bechhoefer said the basic idea was to connect youth in the target neighborhoods to community resources, but the project’s youth advisers homed in on the best way to do that.

“When we talked about the strategy with our youth council, the first thing they said was, ‘Well, you need an app,’” he said.

The Power of One uses the same software and architecture as the 20-year-old Safe2Tell service, but includes other features, such as links to local organizations and event calendars. Several suggestions from the youth council were incorporated into the app, including the phrase “make a connection” instead of “make a tip,” which Yizar said can have negative connotations to teens.

One of the app’s main selling points is that it’s a community-based service, she said.

“Down the road the youth would like to link to job opportunities, internships, anything that can also support youth,” Bechhoefer said.

Right now, the biggest challenge for Bechhoefer, Yizar, and other champions of the effort is getting the word out to local teens. The app has been downloaded 163 times, has received one direct submission, and a couple referrals from other reporting services. In contrast, Safe2Tell received more than 28,000 tips during the 2023-24 school year.

Yizar said she and other students involved in the project tabled at block parties over the summer to tell youth and parents about the app. Some downloaded it on the spot. Although Yizar is now away at college, other teens are working to get the word out at their Denver schools.

The federal grant that funds the app project expires in 2026.

“We have basically two years to really show that this is an effective youth violence intervention,” Bechhoefer said.

Ann Schimke is a senior reporter at Chalkbeat, covering early childhood issues and early literacy. Contact Ann at aschimke@chalkbeat.org.

VP debate tackles school shootings: Vance backs more police, Walz supports gun-control measures

2024-10-02T04:34:51+00:00

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To make schools safer, should America invest more in school security measures and police officers? Or do more to limit access to guns?

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio agreed at Tuesday’s vice presidential debate that gun violence is a scourge on American youth. But they laid out different visions of how to address the problem.

Vance, the Republican running mate of former President Donald Trump, echoed comments he made in the wake of a recent school shooting in Georgia that cast school resource officers and so-called school hardening as the most realistic solution to gun violence. Walz, the Democratic vice presidential candidate, said that red flag laws and better background checks could help keep guns out of the hands of people who would use them to do harm.

Both invoked their perspectives as fathers who send their children into the world each day and hope they return. Walz said that his 17-year-old son recently witnessed a shooting at a community center.

The exchange came during a wide-ranging and largely polite debate that focused heavily on immigration and the economy and included big promises about child care. The nearly two-hour debate was hosted by CBS and moderated by CBS Evening News anchor Norah O’Donnell and Margaret Brennan, a Face the Nation moderator.

This could be the last debate before the election. When Vice President Kamala Harris and Trump debated on Sept. 10, there was a brief mention of the child tax credit but no discussion of K-12 education. Harris has said she would debate Trump again, but so far Trump has not agreed.

Vance favors more school security, Walz does not

The exchange about gun violence opened with a question to Vance about whether he agreed with the idea of charging parents when their children commit acts of violence, as happened after shootings in Oxford, Michigan, and Apalachee, Georgia. Studies find that most school shooters obtain their guns at home.

Vance said he would defer to local law enforcement on those decisions. Then — as he did throughout the debate — he linked the problem to immigration, in this case by talking about cartels trafficking in guns. He reiterated his belief that keeping guns out of the hands of “bad guys” is not realistic but that schools can be made safer.

“I don’t want my kids to go to school in a school that feels unsafe or where there are visible signs of security,” Vance said. “But I, unfortunately, think that we have to increase security in our schools. We have to make the doors lock better, we have to make the doors stronger. We’ve got to make the windows stronger. And, of course, we’ve got to increase school resource officers,” referring to police in schools.

Walz countered that he had visited schools in Finland and not seen those same kinds of hardening measures, despite high rates of gun ownership. Finland tightened gun regulations in the wake of two school shootings in 2007 and 2008, including requiring a license and gun registration.

“Do you want your schools hardened to look like a fort?” Walz said. “When we know there’s countries around the world that their children aren’t practicing these types of drills. They’re being kids. … You can still keep your firearms and we can make a difference.”

In the wake of high-profile school shootings, U.S. schools have already added many of the “hardening” measures that Vance called for.

And while some school districts have reduced the presence of police on school campuses in recent years, others have brought back school police or added more security. Around 45% of public schools had an armed police officer or other sworn law enforcement officer present at least once a week during the 2021-22 school year, the most recent federal data shows.

Most schools plan for the possibility of an active shooter and conduct lockdown drills, though there’s debate over the right way to do that so that kids aren’t traumatized by the drills.

Last year, an NPR/Ipsos poll found that 88% of K-12 parents supported teaching kids basic lockdown procedures, and 63% agreed that kids should be required to do at least one drill a year starting in kindergarten. There was much less support for using realistic measures like banging on classroom doors or playing the sound of gunshots.

Despite their terrifying frequency and randomness, mass shootings at schools represent a very small share of gun deaths. Vance said law enforcement needs to be empowered to address gun violence in cities, and the country needs to do more to get to the root causes of mental health problems that he said many gun deaths stem from.

Walz noted that many gun deaths, especially in rural areas, are suicides and that children die by suicide when they obtain access to their parents’ guns. Around a third of deaths by gunfire among children and teens in 2021 were suicides, federal data shows. Walz said he would not want to stigmatize people with mental health problems as being more likely to commit violence.

“We start looking for a scapegoat — sometimes it just is the guns,” Walz said.

Walz is a gun owner and describes himself as a supporter of the Second Amendment. As governor, Walz has enacted enhanced background checks and red-flag laws that allow authorities to remove firearms from someone found by a judge to be a threat to themselves or others.

VP candidates discuss paid leave, strengthening child care

The high cost and limited availability of child care is widely viewed as reaching crisis levels, with parents and especially mothers forgoing job opportunities because they can’t find safe people to care for their children.

Meanwhile, child care workers often earn poverty wages, and child care providers aren’t offering as many seats as they could because they can’t find workers. The United States is also the only developed nation to not have a national paid leave policy.

As governor, Walz signed a bill that will provide 12 weeks of paid family leave and 12 weeks of paid medical leave, with the cost covered by a payroll tax, starting in 2026.

Asked how long employers should have to pay for employees to stay home after the birth of a child, Walz didn’t provide a direct answer but said that paid leave policies are good for families and can co-exist with pro-business policies. He also said child care workers need to be paid better.

Both vice presidential candidates highlighted the high cost of child care and lack of options for families. Cities like Detroit have tried to invest in their child care systems with the help of private philanthropy.

Vance said he believes there are bipartisan solutions on child care. He said current federal programs don’t provide enough flexibility for families to choose options like church-based child care and family co-ops. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services website and other sources say faith-based and home child care options are eligible for federal funding. Vance had previously suggested grandparents could help out more with child care.

Trump has said that he would fix child care, and that it would be “not very expensive” compared to the trillions the federal government would collect until his tariff proposal. But he has not offered details.

Both campaigns have expressed support for an expanded child tax credit, though they differ on the amount of money families should receive. It’s also unclear if Vance and Trump would support giving the full payment to parents who earn little or no income, as the pandemic-era policy Harris supports reviving would.

Erica Meltzer is Chalkbeat’s national editor based in Colorado. Contact Erica at emeltzer@chalkbeat.org.

Kalyn Belsha is a senior national education reporter based in Chicago. Contact her at kbelsha@chalkbeat.org.

Family of Luis Garcia, teen shot outside Denver’s East High, sues DPS for wrongful death

2024-10-01T20:06:22+00:00

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The family of Luis Garcia, a 16-year-old who was shot outside Denver’s East High School last year and died of his injuries, has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Denver Public Schools.

The lawsuit, filed Monday, alleges that East High “subverted and weakened the security and safe environment” of the school when armed police officers were removed, allowing “potential shooters to believe they would be able to execute an attack.” The Denver school board had voted to remove all school resource officers from DPS schools in 2020.

The lawsuit accuses DPS of violating the Claire Davis School Safety Act, a state law named for a Colorado student who died in a school shooting. The law allows school districts to be held liable if they fail to exercise “reasonable care” to protect students and staff from “reasonably foreseeable” acts of violence at school, including murder.

In addition to DPS, the lawsuit names past and present members of the Denver school board as defendants. The board reversed its decision to remove armed police from schools in 2023 after Luis’ death and a shooting inside East High a month later. East High now has two SROs.

A Denver Public Schools spokesperson said the district does not comment on pending litigation. Board President Carrie Olson, who has served on the board since 2017, said the same.

Luis Garcia, in the red shorts and #11 jersey, played soccer for East High School.

Jose Luis Garcia-Bobadilla, known at school as Luis Garcia, was shot while sitting in his car outside East High on Feb. 13, 2023, after dropping his cousin off at the school. Luis was himself a junior at East High and a talented soccer player who wore #11 on his jersey.

Luis was shot in the head. He died of his injuries more than two weeks later on Feb. 28, 2023.

Using pseudonyms, the 16-page lawsuit also names as defendants a juvenile male and his mother. The lawsuit alleges the juvenile male shot and killed Luis.

The lawsuit says the juvenile male stole a white Kia Sportage, then ran a red light outside East High, drove the Kia “on a direct path straight to Luis,” and opened fire on Luis as he sat in his black Honda Accord on school property.

The lawsuit says the juvenile male’s mother “knew or should have known that her son was in possession of firearms, ammunition, and other illegal weapons” because of his social media and because of “items found in her home by law enforcement.”

The lawsuit says the Denver Police Department investigated Luis’ death but that “no charges have even been filed by the Denver District Attorney’s Office.”

Neither the Denver Police Department nor the Denver District Attorney’s Office responded to requests for comment on the status of the case.

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Why do parents oppose cell phone bans? They want to reach their kids if ‘the worst happens.’

2024-09-13T16:15:49+00:00

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Jenn Silverstein’s two children have lived through an active shooter situation at their school. Both attended East High School in Denver last year, when a student shot two administrators at the beginning of the school day.

As the school went on lockdown, her children sat in the auditorium, waiting for guidance and hoping the shooter wouldn’t come in. The only thing they could do was text their mom, looking for comfort and a sense of security.

Having lived through that, Silverstein was profoundly touched when she read the message exchange between sophomore Abby Turner and her mother during the shooting at Apalachee High School in Georgia earlier this month. As she read through the texts, Silverstein immediately thought about the new cell phone bans schools have adopted; at East High, students don’t have to surrender their phones but can’t use them in class.

“It made me realize that the idea of schools going phone-free just doesn’t work for me,” she said.

Silverstein is far from alone. As more states and school districts put cell phone bans in place due to concerns that they distract students from learning and put a strain on children’s mental health, not all parents are on board. Those who are skeptical about the bans express concerns about their ability to communicate about important everyday issues as well as emergencies. Others indicate officials have prohibited cell phones without adequately consulting parents first.

A recent poll of roughly 1,500 parents commissioned by the National Parents Union — or NPU, an advocacy group — found that, among parents whose children take their phones to school, 78% said the reason for doing that is so they can use the device during emergencies.

In addition, 48% cited coordinating transportation, and 45% cited mental health and other needs as reasons they want their children to take their phones to school with them. (The poll did not ask whether parents supported or opposed cell phone bans.)

School cell phone bans take a variety of forms. Some schools require students to put their phones in signal-blocking pouches at the beginning of the day. Some schools require phones to be placed in cases in the front of the classroom. Others just require that students turn them off and keep them inside backpacks. Some schools ban the use of phones just in the classroom. Others ban them during most of the school day.

In fact, 88% of parents in the survey reported that their schools already have policies that limit the use of cell phones, at least partially. Backers of cell phone bans say qualified restrictions can put teachers in a tough spot by making them enforcers and leave significant room for distractions.

These policies have been influenced in part by U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy’s 2023 advisory on the effects of social media on youth mental health. There’s evidence many teachers are concerned about cell phones: 72% claim that the distraction caused by mobile devices is a major problem in the classroom, according to the Pew Research Center. And recent media coverage of cell phones in schools has often been quite critical of their impact on children.

But on the other side are parents with a very fundamental desire: They would like to be able to stay in touch with their kids.

While any one child’s chances of being involved in a mass shooting at school are small, such events have increased in recent decades and can happen anywhere, driving parent fears.

“We have to accept as a fact of life that we have mass murders of children in the nation’s classrooms on a regular basis,” said Keri Rodrigues, president of the National Parents Union.

News stories about mass shootings often feature text messages between parents and children.

Kenneth Trump, the president of National School Safety and Security Services, a consulting firm, said it’s understandable that parents see cell phones as an “emotional security blanket.”

But he said that cell phone use during an emergency can actually increase safety risks. It’s common for parents to drive to schools after receiving a text message from their children. Such an influx of parents during events like school shootings make it harder for authorities to arrive at the site or evacuate students.

“In a critical incident, if you have 20 kids texting, receiving calls, livestreaming, they are not being able to pay attention to the safety guidance fully or to stay alert,” Trump said.

Then there are worries about the public process that’s gone into the bans. According to the NPU survey, 70% of parents say they were not asked for input or feedback on cell phone policies.

But beyond such concerns, communicating with their children plays an important and fundamental emotional role for parents.

“The phone creates a sense of connection. I want them to know that I am there and to be able to say that I love them if God forbid the worst happens,” Silverstein said.

Parents seek compromises about cell phones at school

Despite the safety concerns that divide parents and educators, families do worry about social media’s effects on their children’s academic performance and mental health.

Among the parents surveyed by the NPU, 76% said schools’ current cell phone policies successfully prevent the devices “from distracting students during instruction time.”

There are approaches that might address both parents’ and educators’ concerns. One way is for parents to work around the policies established by schools by using other types of devices.

When Issac Soto, a father of two in Victorville, Calif., learned that cell phones weren’t allowed during school hours, he invested in smartwatches so that his children could communicate directly with the family in an emergency.

“We also don’t want them to text their friends or watch videos in class,” said Soto.

Rodrigues of the National Parents Union said she uses an app called Aura that lets her manage things like what apps and websites her kids can go to on their phones.

Schools’ policies about phones are still evolving. Different schools and districts are still discussing bans, and some parents have said they will simply defy the policies if they don’t consider families’ needs.

But more than focusing on bans, it’s important to think broadly about cell phones’ role in children’s lives, said Michelle Ciulla Lipkin, executive director of the National Association for Media Literacy Education.

“They must build skills to make a healthy use of their phones, even when they are out of school or when they graduate,” she said. “We must create interventions that allow for an open debate about when and how they use their phones and access social media.”

Soto’s children, who are 8 and 5 years old, are just starting to develop these skills. Still, he hopes that by the time they reach high school, they will have developed skills to use their devices more responsibly and render a cell phone ban unnecessary, but also experience less violence at school.

“This world is a lot different than what we grew up in, and we need their help to help them be better than us, and not to go through the problems that we do,” Soto said.

Wellington Soares is Chalkbeat’s national education reporting intern based in New York City. Contact Wellington at wsoares@chalkbeat.org.

For some NYC students, a summer job means helping combat local gun violence

2024-08-29T20:21:20+00:00

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Jahsani Peters, a rising senior at Forest Hills High School in Queens, said that two years ago, he didn’t think about community violence at all.

At the time, he’d been looking for work as a barista, eager to earn extra income over the summer. But after striking out, he applied to the city’s longstanding Summer Youth Employment Program and got placed through LaGuardia Community College with Community Capacity Development, a Queens-based nonprofit that works to support marginalized communities and prevent gun violence by fostering neighborhood healing and growth.

Peters said he was thrilled to find paid work and eager to impress his managers. In the time since, though, he’s begun to think more deeply about community violence and seen firsthand how organizations like CCD are making a difference.

“We don’t have to leave it up to the police to make sure our people are all right,” he said.

This year, Peters spent his second summer working with CCD through the Summer Youth Employment Program, or SYEP. He said he’s spent days canvassing residents of Woodside Houses and helping connect community members with critical resources. It’s been rewarding work, and he feels the organization has made a difference in the community, Peters said.

“We just try to help people see the good in life,” he said. “That there are other ways to handle problems without violence or having to raise your voice and get crazy with somebody.”

For decades, SYEP has provided the city’s young people with paid opportunities to explore possible career pathways. It’s also expanded in recent years, with Mayor Eric Adams adding 25,000 seats in 2022, bringing it to 100,000 spots in total. Last year, the program made an additional commitment to matching LGBTQ+ youth with “supportive work opportunities.”

City officials say the program can improve school attendance, reduce incarceration rates, and help keep young people safe over the summer.

The Department of Youth and Community Development, which oversees SYEP, noted that young people are increasingly working with violence interruption organizations and other groups seeking to reduce local gun violence. This year, more than 650 young people worked with 12 “Cure Violence” partners that use violence interruption strategies, while more than 1,000 were placed across 36 organizations through the city’s Anti-Gun Violence Employment Program, according to DYCD officials.

“These programs are transformative for young people,” DYCD Commissioner Keith Howard said in a statement. “DYCD is proud of Jahsani and his peers for contributing to the city’s economy, and helping to keep New Yorkers safe.”

Community-based violence intervention groups like CCD take a public health approach to stopping gun violence, with outreach workers who build personal relationships in neighborhoods, help to mediate local conflicts, and prevent retaliation before it occurs. Often, such groups also connect individuals with social services and counseling, as well as employment and educational opportunities.

“They’re able to stop the violence, and have conversations, and mediate conflicts,” said Judy Fears, a community coordinator at CCD. “We don’t carry weapons. We don’t have bulletproof vests. It’s all words, and language, and talking to the community.”

It’s a model that has seen some measurable success around the country. In Baltimore, for example, a report on the city’s violence interruption program found neighborhoods saw homicides and nonfatal shootings decrease by 16 to 23% on average.

The city’s partnerships with CCD and other groups through SYEP are one part of its broader effort to address community violence, particularly its impact on young people.

In 2022, the city launched Project Pivot, partnering hundreds of schools with a range of community groups that provide mentorship, counseling, and violence interruption programs. This year, the city also kept some summer youth programs open later to offer kids more time in supervised settings and to help reduce the risk of crime.

Though violent crime has trended down over time, particularly in New York City, some surges did occur around the country as the COVID pandemic upended life and disrupted efforts to reduce violence. Nationwide, firearm injuries were the leading cause of death among children and teenagers in 2020 and 2021, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

For Peters, employment through SYEP has meant an opportunity for personal growth. Before, he said he didn’t know the basics of the workplace, like what a resume was or how to successfully apply for a job. At CCD, his coworkers have taken him under their wing and taught him how to thrive in the workplace.

With a laugh, Peters said the extra income from the program has helped fuel his “spending problem.” He’s hoping to upgrade his phone soon, with additional storage he can devote to editing videos and music.

“Being realistic and serious, though,” he added, “the money has helped me learn independence and money management.”

Canvassing in the Woodside community has also helped him step out of his shell, learn to be more social and overcome his nerves when interacting with others. It’s taught him to better resolve conflicts in his own life, too, Peters added.

“It’s changed me for the better,” he said. “Now, I’m more open minded. I think, ‘You know what, that person might have had a bad day. They might have lost somebody today.’ You never know.

“So I’m just like, ‘All right, I’ll give you space. I’ll let you say what you’ve got to say,” Peters added. “And when you feel better, I’ll try to uplift you.”

Nate, a human justice ambassador who works with Peters at CCD, described him as “one of a kind.” Over the past two years, he’s seen Peters become more confident and outgoing, he said.

“At the Woodside office, 70 to 80% of the kids are from Woodside, so he didn’t know them at first,” he said. “But now, he’s like a leader to them.”

Julian Shen-Berro is a reporter covering New York City. Contact him at jshen-berro@chalkbeat.org.

Denver Public Schools releases new discipline matrix

2024-08-15T20:33:17+00:00

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Nearly a year and a half after a shooting inside Denver’s East High School ignited a community conversation about student discipline, Denver Public Schools publicly released new guidance Thursday on when students can be suspended or expelled.

The district’s new discipline matrix is a flowchart of sorts that spells out potential consequences for student behaviors ranging from horseplay to bringing a gun to school. District leaders have said the new matrix is less subjective and more specific than the last one, which was adopted in 2021 with an eye toward reducing student contact with police.

Moira Coogan, the principal of the North Engagement Center and president of the Denver School Leaders Association, said members of the principals union appreciate that the new matrix is more clear.

“There’s more specificity of the behaviors,” she said. “The definition at my school is the same as the definition down the street.”

Any lingering concerns, Coogan said, are about whether schools will get the resources and support to put the new matrix into practice. She said principals are “cautiously optimistic.”

The new matrix will go into effect this school year. Monday is the first day of school for most DPS students, though some charter and innovation schools started earlier.

The discipline matrix came under scrutiny after a March 2023 shooting at East because the 17-year-old gunman had been previously expelled from a neighboring school district. Although the matrix doesn’t address whether previously expelled students can enroll at a new school, some parents and community members called for the district to enact stricter discipline.

The new matrix is not necessarily more punitive. Even students who commit the most serious offenses — including bringing a gun to school, attempted homicide, and homicide — won’t be automatically expelled under the new matrix. Instead, such offenses will result in a mandatory request to expel the student, which could result in an expulsion or could not.

The new discipline matrix has seven levels of offenses instead of six. DPS Deputy Chief of Staff Deborah Staten told Chalkbeat earlier this year that the district added the seventh level, which includes homicide and attempted homicide, because “those are behaviors that happen in schools, so when we talked about this, we said, ‘Let’s call the thing the thing.’”

Level one offenses include behaviors such as horseplay, refusing to follow the directions of a staff member, or disturbing the learning environment, among others. Students can’t be suspended or expelled for a level one offense. Instead, the discipline matrix recommends the school put in place interventions and use restorative practices when possible.

Ike Ogbuike, a discipline program manager for DPS, said a restorative practice may look like a facilitated conversation between two students who are in conflict with each other. Such practices can be used instead of suspension for most offenses on the matrix, he said, but they can’t be used if a student commits a level six or seven offense, which are the most egregious.

Level two offenses include behavior such as bringing nicotine products to school, stealing or destroying property worth less than $499, or making “heat of the moment” threats. A student could receive a one-day in-school suspension for a level two offense.

Level three offenses include behavior such as possessing alcohol or marijuana at school, or verbally bullying or harassing someone. Younger students — those in preschool through third grade — could receive a two-day in-school suspension for a level three offense. Older students in fourth through 12th grade could be suspended out of school for one day.

Level four offenses include behavior such as physically bullying or harassing someone, indecent exposure, or agreeing to fight another student. Younger students could be suspended out of school for one day, while older students could be suspended for two days.

Level five offenses include behavior such as bringing a dangerous weapon to school, threatening to commit a school shooting, selling drugs, stealing a vehicle, or committing arson. Younger students could be suspended out of school for a day, but likely not expelled as the matrix notes that “expulsion is not best practice.” Older students could be suspended for up to three days. Older students could also be recommended for expulsion.

Level six offenses include displaying a dangerous weapon at school or threatening to use it, or committing serious physical assault or sexual assault. Younger students could be suspended out of school for up to three days but likely not expelled. Older students could be suspended for up to five days. The matrix requires that older students also undergo an expulsion review.

Level seven offenses include bringing a gun to school, attempted homicide, and homicide. All students, regardless of age, who commit a level seven offense will undergo an expulsion review. The matrix notes that bringing a fake gun to school does not count as a level seven offense.

This story has been updated with quotes from district officials.

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org .

Tennessee law to let teachers carry guns in schools caused a ruckus, but has drawn little interest

2024-08-14T19:36:28+00:00

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Josh Arrowood carries his .22-caliber handgun most everywhere he goes in his rural Tennessee community — to church at Freewill Baptist, at the Food City store where he shops for groceries, and in the Greene County Courthouse, where he serves as a commissioner.

A new state law that passed this spring would let him, under certain conditions, carry the gun at his workplace, too — South Greene Middle School in Greeneville, where he teaches world history to sixth graders. And Arrowood, who’s had a handgun permit for 15 years, is open to doing so if it can provide an extra layer of security against a school shooting.

“I was in high school when Columbine happened,” he said, recalling the 1999 massacre at a Colorado high school. “And I remember kids putting things like a bat or a baseball in their backpacks so they could try to protect themselves if a shooting happened in their school.”

A gun, at least, “gives a teacher a chance if there’s an armed intruder,” he said.

But between concerns about his personal liability and ambivalence about the new law from local school leaders, he won’t be carrying his pocket-size gun to class this school year.

And because of the way Tennessee’s new law was written, he said, “I don’t expect anybody to take advantage of it.”

Indeed, for all the protests and discord over the legislation before it passed, there’s little talk among school districts or educators about using the option to arm teachers or staff as the new academic year begins. Not a single school system has indicated that it’s planning or working to train employees to carry a gun voluntarily under the new law, according to dozens of school and law enforcement officials contacted by Chalkbeat.

Then again, no one can be sure, since the law doesn’t require local officials to report whether they are deploying the option in any of their schools. And any documents that kickstart the program at the local level aren’t open to the public.

Josh Arrowood, a sixth grade teacher at South Greene Middle School in Greeneville, Tennessee, has had a handgun permit for 15 years. He is open to carrying his gun at school.

But the law does lay down a set of conditions for a teacher to be able to carry a gun in school, including a training requirement, a mental health evaluation, and a signed agreement between the superintendent and principal, plus written authorization from local law enforcement.

And there’s another big hurdle: a provision that assigns teachers sole liability for anything that might go wrong with their gun, including an accidental shooting, or their failure to prevent a tragedy.

The tepid response to the law signals a disconnect between educators and lawmakers on whether more guns in schools make them safer, or could accidentally cause more harm. There’s concern about shifting even more responsibilities to teachers, turning schools into prison-like environments, and unwittingly disrupting an educational climate that should be welcoming and supportive. Tennessee’s urban communities are especially desperate to get guns and gun violence out of their schools.

School shootings spur efforts to arm teachers

After the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School attack in Newtown, Connecticut, where a shooter slaughtered 26 people, including 20 children, dozens of states introduced legislation to arm teachers and staff. More than 30 states now allow it under certain conditions, according to the Giffords Law Center, which tracks gun laws.

In Tennessee, which has some of the nation’s most permissive gun laws, the legislature passed a 2016 law to let some school employees carry a gun in certain rural counties to try to bolster security at remotely located schools without an armed school resource officer. But efforts by local law enforcement to obtain liability insurance to train school staff proved to be a stumbling block.

Former Rep. David Byrd, a Waynesboro Republican and retired school principal who sponsored the measure for Wayne and Pickett counties, said he still supports the strategy, but is not aware of any school employee who has carried a gun under that law.

In 2018, after another mass school shooting killed 17 people and injured 17 others in Parkland, Florida, Rep. Ryan Williams began his annual quest to revise and expand the law across Tennessee.

A Republican from Cookeville, about 80 miles east of Nashville, Williams said he was motivated, in part, by concern about his own two children who, at the time, attended a 2,400-student public high school with one school resource officer and dozens of potential points of entry. He argued that teachers need “more than a stapler” to protect their students and themselves if locked in a classroom with a shooter in the building.

But each year, Williams faced resistance from top law enforcement organizations such as the Tennessee Sheriffs’ Association, the Tennessee Association of Chiefs of Police, and the Tennessee Highway Patrol. They worried that teachers carrying guns could lead to even more gun-related deaths or injuries in a state that already has a higher-than-normal rate of accidental shootings.

Then came the deadly 2023 shooting at Nashville’s church-run Covenant School, where a shooter murdered three children and three adults before being killed by police.

Mass protests erupted, with thousands of students, parents, and educators flooding Tennessee’s Capitol to demand tighter gun laws and reduced access to guns.

Among other things, they wanted to roll back a 2021 law that lets the majority of Tennesseans carry a loaded handgun in most public places without first clearing a background check, obtaining a permit, or getting trained on firearms safety. And they sought laws that would keep guns away from people who may be experiencing a mental health crisis.

The Republican-controlled legislature, however, went a different way, rushing to adjourn after prioritizing measures to further fortify the state’s K-12 campuses. A $230 million investment in school safety paid for security upgrades at public and private schools alike, and most significantly, included funding to place a full-time SRO in every public school across Tennessee.

Against that backdrop, Williams resurrected his bill to let Tennessee school employees voluntarily carry guns under certain conditions.

His co-sponsor, Sen. Paul Bailey, argued the law was needed to provide an armed presence on every campus, especially in rural areas that serve a third of the state’s students. On the Senate floor in April, the Sparta Republican said nearly a third of the state’s 1,800-plus public schools still didn’t have an armed SRO, partly due to a shortage in the profession.

It’s hard to know whether those numbers were accurate, or still are. Under Gov. Bill Lee’s administration, the state stopped sharing school security data publicly.

Williams revised their bill to tighten the standards for who could carry and under what conditions — satisfying the state’s law enforcement groups which, for the first time, took a neutral position on the bill this year.

Carrying a gun would be allowed only if the local school superintendent, principal, and law enforcement official agree. A school employee who volunteers to carry must hold an enhanced permit, complete 40 hours of certified training in school policing at their own expense, and pass a mental health evaluation and FBI background check.

Gun control advocates sit in the balcony of the Tennessee House of Representatives on April 23, 2024, to protest legislation to let school employees carry handguns if they meet certain requirements. The bill passed, and Gov. Bill Lee signed it soon after.

Liability provision for armed employees could be a barrier

However, even for school employees who can meet those conditions, taking a gun to school became significantly less attractive under one more provision.

The law makes the armed employees solely liable for how they use, or fail to use, a handgun in school. Meanwhile, if a civil lawsuit is filed, the statute shields the school district and local law enforcement agency from having to pay monetary damages.

Liability is now part of the discussion for anyone dealing with the prospect, or the aftermath, of a school shooting. In addition to the pursuit of stricter gun laws, litigation and even criminal charges have become part of the healing and recovery process for survivors, family members, and community leaders seeking to hold people beyond the shooter accountable for anything that may have contributed to the bloodshed.

After the 2022 rampage at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, for instance, families of the 19 victims sued police over the botched response, and also reached a $2 million settlement with the city, including the promise of higher standards and better training for local officers. In Oxford, Michigan, families of four high school students killed in a 2021 shooting there accused the school district of negligence in a lawsuit, and prosecutors charged the parents of the young shooter for failing to keep a gun away from him.

Liddy Ballard, state policy director at Brady, the nation’s oldest gun violence prevention organization, said Tennessee’s liability provision should be a red flag for any school employee interested in carrying a gun. Her group opposed the law and lobbies instead for gun safety legislation that is proven to reduce gun violence, such as extreme risk protection orders and expanded background checks, both of which Tennessee lawmakers have rejected.

“This bill is outright dangerous,” Ballard said, “but state lawmakers knew that from the beginning. Why else would they include an immunity clause for local education agencies that dissolves accountability when a teacher’s firearm is misused or falls into the wrong hands?”

The state’s two largest teacher organizations, which also opposed the legislation, agree that placing the liability burden solely on individual educators is a non-starter — or at least should be.

“As teachers consider the risks of carrying a firearm on school grounds, they need to know that it is unlikely they could obtain insurance coverage that would offer them any sort of protection should a claim be made against them,” said Tanya T. Coats, president of the Tennessee Education Association.

Secrecy is another pillar of the law.

In an effort to deter potential intruders who wouldn’t know which adults at school might have a gun, the law is built, in part, on the idea of confidentiality. Its provisions provide a veil of secrecy if a school superintendent and principal sign a written agreement to implement the policy — and anonymity for the person they authorize to carry or possess a firearm on school grounds.

Parents don’t have to be notified if their child’s teacher is carrying a concealed handgun, nor do educators if someone in their building is armed besides a law enforcement officer.

A district’s required notification to local law enforcement officials is not open for public inspection, nor are any other documents, files, or records related to carrying a weapon on school grounds under the law.

“The way it’s set up, there’s really no way to know” how many faculty or school staff members are carrying a gun, said Jeff Bledsoe, executive director of the Tennessee Sheriffs’ Association. “It’s up to the local level to decide.”

Rep. Ryan Williams (center) speaks with law enforcement, security, and teacher group representatives after his original bill to arm teachers advanced out of a House education subcommittee in 2019.

Memphis school district says no. Some others aren’t saying.

Before and after the law was enacted, numerous local officials, particularly in the state’s largest cities and towns, announced they would not seek to arm school employees. Most said they already have a trained law enforcement officer in each of their schools.

“Schools are for learning, and emergency situations should be handled by trained officers,” said Shelby County Sheriff Floyd Bonner Jr., in a joint video announcement with Memphis-Shelby County Schools Superintendent Marie Feagins and interim Police Chief C.J. Davis in May. Memphis has long struggled with the presence of guns around its schools and neighborhoods.

Feagins said it more bluntly in their announcement: “We will not allow teachers to carry guns in our schools.”

But some school leaders, especially in the state’s rural areas, have been less vocal in recent months about their plans.

“Most districts don’t want anything to do with this policy,” said Gary Lilly, executive director of the state superintendent organization.

“A few have said maybe, just to keep their options open,” he added. “You can make the case that not announcing your plan is a way to keep bad guys from knowing either way, so there’s a bit of a deterrent.”

For some that are holding off, it may just take time for local officials and school employees to evaluate whether to take advantage of the law.

“This is all new, so some folks may be waiting and watching,” said Bledsoe, who leads the sheriffs’ organization.

Williams, the House sponsor, said he’s not surprised at the cool early reception, including in his own district, given that Tennessee is a diverse state with unique local needs and cultures that take time to sort through.

“Unfortunately, if we do have another active shooter in our state and something happens close to home, I think people would reevaluate their stance and consider doing it,” he said.

JC Bowman, who leads Professional Educators of Tennessee, has a different concern.

“My fear is that we’re opening up a Pandora’s box,” Bowman said. “What happens if our state budget gets tight? Will we starve our school safety money for SROs and turn to this?”

South Greene Middle School in Greeneville, where Josh Arrowood teaches. Once, at a school basketball game, he said, a parent came out of the stands and pulled a knife on a coach. No one was injured, and the parent left before the school’s SRO arrived on the scene, but “in situations like that, you never know,” he said. He is open to carrying his handgun at school.

For Arrowood, who also has three school-age children, the issue is keeping kids safe at school in his rural corner of northeastern Tennessee.

Two years ago at a basketball game at his school, for instance, a parent came out of the stands and pulled a knife on a coach. No one was injured, and the parent left before the school’s SRO arrived on the scene, but “in situations like that, you never know,” he said.

Arrowood said he’s never had to use the gun he usually carries when he’s out in his community. “The goal is to never have to draw it,” he said.

He wouldn’t hesitate to use it at school, though, if he were allowed to carry it there and an armed intruder got inside, especially if something happened to the school’s SRO.

“Around here, people are used to guns. They’ve grown up with them. They’re hunters,” Arrowood continued. “But some people also fear guns, and a healthy fear of guns is a good thing. I guess it’s a balance.”

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org

Indianapolis police haven’t tracked curfew violations since announcing a crackdown in April

2024-08-06T10:20:00+00:00

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This article was co-reported by Chalkbeat Indiana and Axios Indianapolis as part of a reporting partnership about youth gun violence in Indianapolis.

In the four months that the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department started more strictly enforcing the city’s curfew for minors, officers have picked up just three kids for violating it — or at least that’s all the department’s communications team could track down.

The department isn’t tracking data about its use of the curfew law.

IMPD held a press conference in April to announce it would start enforcing the city’s curfew law in response to a late-night weekend shooting that injured seven kids between the ages of 12 and 16.

“We were trying to get parents and guardians to step it up so we didn’t have to enforce it,” said IMPD spokesperson Alexa Boylan, “and that’s what we’re seeing.”

Boylan said she’s only aware of three minors — ages 10, 16, and 17 — who have been picked up by police and were later released to their parents.

But the department wasn’t tracking curfew violations before it said it was stepping up enforcement in April and hasn’t been tracking them since, she said.

A record number of Indianapolis young people were killed by gunfire last year, despite overall homicides trending down. City violence reverberates through school communities, as students can experience trauma and stress, and studies show they perform worse academically.

Enforcing the curfew was supposed to be another tool in the city’s ongoing effort to curb the skyrocketing youth gun violence problem, but it’s hard to evaluate how well that effort is working if the department isn’t keeping track of the number of minors being impacted by the stricter enforcement strategy.

For example, instances when police warn minors about the curfew and they disperse without being picked up, such as during the July Fourth weekend when IMPD broke up a “large gathering of juveniles” downtown, are not being tracked or recorded.

This approach isn’t uncommon in public policy, said Thomas Stuckey, a professor of criminal justice at IU Indianapolis. Policymakers trying to address problems in real time often rely on anecdotal evidence rather than scientific data collection and analysis, he said.

But when evaluating the effect of a policy change, he said, “the answer is very often we don’t know.”

Under the curfew law, children younger than 15 cannot be in public without an adult between 11 p.m. and 5 a.m. every day. The curfew is the same for teens between 15 and 17 during weekdays, but extended until 1 a.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. There are several exceptions, including minors traveling for work, a school activity, religious event, or emergency.

IMPD officers use the public address systems on their patrol cars to make announcements about the curfew 30 and 15 minutes before, followed by another at curfew time. Kids found breaking curfew can be picked up by officers who will then attempt to alert parents or guardians.

Parents have “a reasonable amount of time” to pick up their child before they’re taken to the juvenile detention center. Violating the curfew is a noncriminal offense.

Enforcing the curfew may not be an effective strategy to curb youth violence anyway, said Dena Carson, associate professor and director of criminal justice and public safety management programs at Indiana University Indianapolis.

Curfews are a method of intervention rather than prevention, she said, and they disproportionately affect youth of color in the city.

“We might be causing more harm in the long run in terms of the negative consequences of police contact,” Carson said.

Read the Axios Indianapolis story here.

Arika Herron is a reporter for Axios Indianapolis. You can reach her at Arika.Herron@axios.com.

Haley Miller is a summer reporting intern covering education in the Indianapolis area. Contact Haley at hmiller@chalkbeat.org.

Some NYC summer youth programs will stay open later in coming weeks

2024-08-02T20:06:12+00:00

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Some New York City summer youth programs will stay open extra hours in the coming weeks to give kids more time in supervised settings and to help reduce the risk of crime, Mayor Eric Adams announced Friday.

The extended hours will apply at 18 programs across the five boroughs in areas city officials identified as “historically underserved,” and in police precincts with high levels of violence, officials said.

The city is pledging $2 million to keep some of the programs open later into the night on weekdays, and to extend other programs’ weekend hours.

“When we invest in summer programming, we give our young people not just a space to enjoy themselves but prevent crime from happening in our communities,” Adams said in a statement.

Seven Beacon programs, which are located in public schools and operate as community centers for kids of all ages, will push back their weekday closing time from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m.. And for the first time, they’ll operate on weekends, staying open from 10am to 11pm, according to a spokesperson from the Youth and Community Development Department.

An additional 11 Cornerstone programs, which are based in New York City Housing Authority developments and are also open to kids of all ages, will extend their weekend hours by opening at 8 a.m. instead of 3 p.m., the spokesperson added.

Those 18 programs will also partner with “Cure Violence” programs that seek to prevent gun violence by deploying trusted community members in areas with high levels of violence to identify and de-escalate possible conflicts, according to a presentation obtained by Chalkbeat.

Despite the expanded hours, there will still be several weeks between the end of the city’s summer youth programming and the start of school. Beacon programs will end on Saturday, Aug. 17, while Cornerstone programs wrap up on Saturday, Aug. 24. The first day of school is Thursday, Sept. 5.

Adams has prioritized investments in summer programs during his two-and-a-half years in office, pointing to their potential to help reduce youth crime. He expanded the city’s Summer Youth Employment Program, which offers young people ages 14-24 paid summer internships to 100,000 spots last summer.

Past research found that teens who participated in the program were less likely to be involved in a crime than others who applied but didn’t get in.

Adams also preserved and expanded Summer Rising, a sprawling free summer camp and school program created by former Mayor Bill de Blasio to help kids recover from the effects of the pandemic. The program has attracted significant interest from families, but continues to struggle with attendance.

Michael Elsen-Rooney is a reporter for Chalkbeat New York, covering NYC public schools. Contact Michael at melsen-rooney@chalkbeat.org.

I’m a teen who has lived through two terrifying school lockdowns. Enough.

2024-07-16T12:00:00+00:00

“Teachers, the school is currently in lockdown,” our assistant principal said over the loud speaker. “Please lock your doors and close your windows. This is not a drill. I repeat, this is not a drill.”

It was early in the day, first period. My AP Biology teacher turned off the lights and locked the classroom doors and windows. What I remember most about that day, back in 10th grade, was not the swift actions of the teachers, but the behavior of my fellow students. All of the roughly 1,400 students at Reseda High School in Los Angeles feared what this meant: a school shooter.

Neel J. Thakkar

We spent the first 10 minutes of lockdown in complete silence, stealing glances at the classmates who might have been the last people we would ever talk to. We spent the next two hours playing video games on our phones and computers and searching for updates on the situation with the gunman.

Turns out, the threat was in the neighborhood, not the school, but we were all terrified.

About a year later, we were in lockdown again. I was a junior now, sitting on the bleachers. I am on the varsity soccer team and was waiting for our game to start when people around me started screaming and running. As I rushed to alert some younger kids who were sitting near me, I heard the coach yelling — not with the tone of someone trying to make an athlete better. He sounded more like a parent, urging their child to run from danger.

Being outside, we all sprinted to the nearest building. Once inside, we spent the next two hours listening to the police radio, hoping for an update. I never found out the school was placed on lockdown that December day. But once more, we were forced to wonder if we were taking our last breaths.

We all were well within our right to assume the worst, having lived through mass shooting after mass shooting, including deadly school massacres like those in Parkland, Florida, and Uvalde, Texas. As of this past weekend, when we witnessed a horrific display of deadly political violence aimed at former President Trump, there had been nearly 300 mass shootings in America this year.

About seven children in the U.S. lose their lives at the end of a gun barrel per day, making guns the nation’s No. 1 cause of death for children and teens.

My two experiences with lockdown are memorable, but I’ve also had four or five other conversations with my best friend about whether we were going to school the next day because someone had threatened to bring a gun. In addition, there have been repeated school shooter threats written on the bathroom walls. That means there are often security guards in front of the bathrooms, and those same bathrooms are locked as soon as the school day ends.

American students live in constant fear of gun violence, in schools and neighborhoods. The threat affects everyone, but especially still-developing young people like my classmates and me.

So many people — from teens who have survived school shootings to parents who have lost children to gun violence — have advocated tirelessly for common-sense gun control, like stricter regulations on buying and storing weapons. But the politics of it all means that little ever seems to change.

Somehow, we’re just supposed to accept that getting to and from school means risking gun violence, that sitting in class or on the bleachers means that at any moment, we could be in lockdown, quietly wondering if we’ve spoken our last words. We shouldn’t have to live in fear like this.

Neel J. Thakkar is a rising senior at Reseda Charter High School in Los Angeles.

Just outside the school gate, America’s gun violence epidemic surrounds its students

2024-06-18T19:50:35+00:00

This story was published in partnership with The Trace, a nonprofit newsroom covering gun violence in America. Sign up for its newsletters here.

On Nov. 7, as school was getting out for the day, one teenager shot another across from Morristown-Hamblen West High School in Morristown, Tennessee, an Appalachian town of 31,000 people. As a precaution, the school was placed on lockdown, as were other schools and childcare facilities in the area.

Police said the 17-year-old suspected in the shooting allegedly stole a gun out of a parked car the day before. Both suspect and victim, also 17, were students in the county school system. But “the shooting did not take place on school property,” a local news report emphasized.

The high school, and another high school across town, saw a combined half a dozen school-adjacent shootings between 2014 and 2023, according to a Trace analysis of a decade of data from the Gun Violence Archive. That means lockdowns, crime scene tape, pockmarked walls, and a pervasive sense of dread.

Morristown is not unique. In thousands of communities across America, children are traumatized in their classrooms — not from bullets fired within, but from violence happening outside school walls.

Shootings like the one in Tennessee have become disturbingly common for American K-12 students. Between 2014 and 2023, there were at least 188,080 shootings within 500 yards of a school.

That averages to 57 shootings a day occurring near a school in the United States.

The Trace looked specifically at GVA data for shootings that took place within 500 yards of all public and private K-12 schools identified by the National Center for Education Statistics — more than 148,000 public and private schools.

Last year alone, more than 6 million children attended a school that had at least one shooting in this vicinity.

National attention is understandably focused on shootings that happen on school grounds during school hours. Less attention is paid to shootings around schools, which can also instill trauma. Schools are part of a community, and when a community is plagued by violence, students bring that burden with them to class.

Research has shown that childhood exposure to violence can have lasting effects on psychological and academic development. Early exposure to community gun violence can disrupt academic engagement, and hinder development of areas of the brain instrumental in decision-making, reasoning, and self-regulation.

But the trauma doesn’t have to be experienced firsthand in order to have a detrimental impact: In one study, neighborhood violence — measured in blood spatter and shell casings, police tape, memorials, and people fighting in the street — was associated with decreased reading proficiency on standardized tests for elementary schoolchildren.

Debra Furr-Holden, an epidemiology professor and dean of New York University’s School of Global Public Health, has studied the effect of gun violence on learning among children in high-crime communities in Baltimore for nearly two decades. On the walk to and from school, Baltimore city kids “are constantly exposed to the evidence of violence in their community,” she said. “You will see memorials on stop signs and light posts where somebody was killed. It’ll be like 20 teddy bears, a candle, a picture of the person.”

This exposure to violence takes a toll on concentration and emotional processing, and the deficits can follow kids through their academic careers and into adulthood, Furr-Holden said. “Their bodies may be in the room, but their minds are elsewhere,” she said. “All of this erodes attention and has an impact on learning, and it erodes a feeling of safety and security.”

Some schools are under siege

Our analysis identified 266 schools that had more than 100 shootings nearby, and they were largely concentrated in cities like Chicago, Philadelphia, and Baltimore that have well-documented gun violence struggles.

A radius of 500 yards around a school — about four blocks in a typical city — is also the range in which a child would be able to clearly hear a gunshot. At 500 yards, a gunshot can be in the 140-decibel range, the same loudness as a firework or a jet engine taking off, and louder than a chainsaw.

In Philadelphia’s Kensington neighborhood, Russell Conwell Middle School and Frances E. Willard Elementary sit side by side. Nearly 500 shootings occurred in the area over 10 years.

Russell Conwell Middle School, a magnet school that draws students from across Philadelphia, has endured the most shootings near its building of any school nationwide during the last ten years.

On average, that is almost a shooting a week.

In 2022, three people were shot on Willard’s school grounds. Police found dozens of shell casings outside the school building. Last year, school staffers put bulletproof blankets in the windows, after an incident in which someone fired into the building during school hours.

Katoura Jones, 12, a sixth grader at Conwell, said that she often hears shots fired during the school day, and that it triggers her anxiety. “Sometimes when I’m in my tutoring class I hear gunshots going off, and I’m the closest one to the window because that’s where I sit,” she said. “They tell us to get down, but that’s when all we hear is screaming and yelling. That happens pretty often.”

Related: This Philly school had more shootings near it in the last decade than any other nationwide

The walk to school in neighborhoods that see high levels of gun violence overtakes children through blighted and disinvested areas, sending another harmful message. “They’re just being inundated with all these signs and signals that no one cares,” said Furr-Holden, the NYU professor. “It’s just like ‘I gotta be on my toes, I gotta make sure I’m tough enough that nobody tries to mess with me.’”

Children exposed to violence in their communities, Furr-Holden said, often develop coping mechanisms and then are unfairly stigmatized. Living amid violence “increases people’s vigilance, and we label them as ‘aggressive,’” she said, when in reality, they’re having a natural response to intense stressors.

“They don’t even realize that the majority of the world isn’t living under the same circumstances that they’re living under because it’s all they know,” she said.

A girl rides her scooter near Chicago’s Helen M. Hefferan Public School, which had 277 nearby shootings between 2014 and 2023.

Schools in Philadelphia do their best to keep kids safe. At Conwell, no parents are allowed in the building, for example. Instead, staffers bring kids outside when classes are over. But schools can only do so much.

The City of Philadelphia, which is home to 46 schools that had more than 100 nearby shootings over the last decade, offers a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of suspects in shootings near schools and recreation centers.

In June, the Philadelphia Police Department announced that it was deploying 75 additional officers to Kensington and surrounding areas. The move is part of the city’s larger public safety initiative, and according to Deputy Police Commissioner Pedro Rosario, the department sought input from community stakeholders before the deployment. “We don’t take this process lightly,” said Rosario, a 29-year department veteran who was promoted in January specifically to focus on the area. “We really have to bring a sense of normalcy back.”

Related: Schools make a difference for students exposed to violence, new report shows

In Chicago, our analysis found, there were 97 schools with at least 100 shootings over the last decade.

In January 2024, Mayor Brandon Johnson held a press conference after three teenagers were shot outside Nicholas Senn High School just as classes were letting out. It was the second fatal shooting outside a local high school that week.

When asked how parents should feel about children’s safety at school, he focused on the city’s efforts to apprehend the shooters.

“My children will be in school tomorrow,” Johnson said. “And children across the city will be in schools tomorrow. Then we’re gonna do everything in our power to make sure that our young people are safe. But we’re also going to make sure that we bring these individuals to justice. We’re also going to make sure that we get at the root cause.”

Shootings near schools not just a city problem

Although schools in cities have more than their share of nearby shootings, nowhere is immune.

There were 44,812 school-adjacent shootings in cities with populations under 250,000: 30,913 in suburbs, 8,939 in small towns, and 4,131 in rural areas, according to a classification of school locations developed by the National Center for Education Statistics.

In October of 2023, a football game at Oxon Hill High School in Alexandria, Virginia, was postponed and the school was locked down after multiple shots were fired. The lockdown ended when police found a man shot to death in his car.

Even in the tiny, remote village of Chevak, Alaska, a man shot a village police officer and then himself in 2016, all within sight and earshot of a school playground.

Race is a factor in school-adjacent shootings

While students of all races experience the harmful effects of gun violence near their schools, the burden falls disproportionately on students of color, who are already more vulnerable and have fewer resources than their white counterparts.

During the 2022-2023 school year, one in 20 white students experienced at least one shooting near school, but one in four African American students did, as did one in seven Hispanic students, one in 11 Asian students and one in 12 Native American students.

In many communities, the pattern of exposure also mirrors residential segregation: Shootings are clustered around schools in the parts of town where Black and brown people live.

Safe Passage employee Etta McShane at Genevieve Melody Public School in Chicago. The program helps children get to and from school safely.

There is a clear racial divide running through Washington, D.C. The vast majority of the population living west of busy 16th Street NW is white. East of the same street, the population is majority African American.

Nearly all of the school-adjacent shootings identified by The Trace were on the eastern side of the district.

In May, a bullet came through a window at D.C.’s Dunbar High School, according to police, and grazed a 17-year-old student’s head. The school was placed on lockdown while police investigated. Over the last decade, there have been 132 shootings adjacent to the school.

Sari Beth Rosenberg has taught history at the High School for Environmental Studies in Manhattan for the last 20 years and, in 2021, co-founded Teachers Unify to End Gun Violence.

The following year, a shooting on the New York City subway left 10 people wounded. A few weeks later, there was a shooting at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, that left 10 people dead. Both incidents rattled her students because of their proximity, Rosenberg said. “I remember one kid saying, ‘This is starting to feel more close to home.’”

Schools need more federal funding for mental health professionals in schools, Rosenberg said: “We need to admit to the fact that kids are strapped with so much to process, and whether we want it to be or not, it’s happening at school.”

New discipline guidelines to be rolled out by Denver Public Schools this fall

2024-06-14T00:54:03+00:00

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Denver Public Schools will soon debut a new discipline matrix — a flowchart of sorts that gives school staff guidance on when students can be suspended or expelled for behavior ranging from bringing a gun to school to bullying.

The new matrix will be more detailed than the current one, according to a presentation given by district officials to the school board Thursday. It is meant to be less subjective, more specific, and more realistic. It will include greater differentiation between offenses and provide real-world examples.

The presentation includes a few of those examples. For instance, it defines “extortion/sextortion,” an offense for which a student could be suspended, as: “Student A (willingly or unknowingly) shares a nude photo with Student B. Student B tells Student A they must pay them $1000 to keep it off Instagram.”

The current matrix was last updated in 2021 with an eye toward racial equity and reducing student contact with police. But it came under scrutiny after a shooting inside East High School in March 2023.

The shooter was a 17-year-old student who had previous weapons charges and had been expelled from a neighboring school district. That he was allowed to enroll in a traditional DPS high school caused some parents to question the district’s discipline policies. Neither the new matrix nor the old one addresses whether a formerly expelled student can enroll at a school.

The district was already planning to revise the discipline matrix before the East shooting, but the incident increased the urgency and deepened the scope of the changes, said DPS Deputy Chief of Staff Deborah Staten. The goal of the revisions is to help school staff “get very clear about what behaviors are, and what consequences for behaviors are, and not have to guess,” she said.

The new matrix is not necessarily more punitive. It emphasizes the use of restorative justice and encourages school staff to find alternatives to suspension if possible, Staten said.

“Our goal is not to have kids out of school,” she said. “Our goal is to have kids in school.”

The board does not need to vote on the new matrix, which will take effect this fall.

The new matrix has more levels

DPS hasn’t yet released the full matrix. But the presentation notes some of the changes.

The new matrix will include seven levels of behavioral offenses instead of six. Bringing a firearm to school is now a level seven offense — the most serious — and makes a student of any age eligible for expulsion. In other categories, younger students face lesser consequences.

Homicide and attempted homicide were also added as level seven offenses. Staten said that decision was “met with mixed emotions” but reflects the reality of urban school districts.

“Those are behaviors that happen in schools, so when we talked about this, we said, ‘Let’s call the thing the thing,’” Staten said.

Level four encompasses behaviors including disorderly conduct, defined as when two students “engage in mutual fisticuffs” that “does not result in major injury.” Level four offenses are punishable by an in-school or out-of-school suspension.

Level two includes nicotine offenses, such as vaping at school. Students could get an in-school suspension, but not an out-of-school suspension, for a level two offense.

Unlike in past revisions, a committee of DPS staff and community members met eight times over six months and made more than 75 recommendations for how to rewrite the matrix.

Black students are disproportionately disciplined

While the East shooting was a main driver of changing the matrix, Superintendent Alex Marrero acknowledged at an April school board meeting that there was another factor: DPS has been flagged by the state twice in four years for disproportionate discipline of Black students with disabilities under a federal regulation that requires states to monitor it.

In the 2023-24 school year, the out-of-school suspension rate for Black students with disabilities was nearly 20%, according to district data. The suspension rate for all students with disabilities was 10.6%, and the suspension rate for white students with disabilities was 5.5%.

Black students without disabilities are also disproportionately suspended, the data shows.

The district was first flagged by the state for discipline disparities in November 2020 based on data from the 2017-18, 2018-19, and 2019-20 school years, according to documents obtained by Chalkbeat in an open records request.

DPS had to submit a corrective action plan to the Colorado Department of Education and allocate a portion of its federal special education funding to address the problem. In its action plan adopted in 2021, DPS pledged to conduct a districtwide awareness campaign and provide targeted support to schools that had suspended the most Black students with disabilities.

DPS was not flagged by the state in the 2020-21 school year, which was largely remote due to the pandemic, or the 2021-22 school year, according to state records. But in November 2023, the district got a warning letter from the state that its schools had once again disproportionately suspended Black students with disabilities in 2022-23.

“We had no choice but to revise the previous version of the matrix,” Marrero said in April. “The way it was being used was incredibly disproportionate.”

The district will roll out the new discipline matrix to school leaders in July and begin training teachers and other school staff in August, officials said. The district plans to offer training to parents as well, and post the matrix on a website accessible on mobile devices.

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Schools make a difference for students exposed to violence, new report shows

2024-06-04T18:34:41+00:00

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Some Chicago schools excel at curbing the academic and social-emotional fallout experienced by students who live near where homicides happen, a new University of Chicago study found.

The report released Tuesday by the university’s Consortium on School Research found that students living in proximity to killings tend to lose ground academically in the aftermath. Between 2011 and 2019, 1 in 5 Chicago Public Schools students lived within roughly two city blocks from the location of a homicide in any given year, with Black students more likely to have this experience. Six percent of students had the experience multiple times in a year.

But well-organized schools with positive climates and trusting relationships between students and adults consistently rein in this effect, the report found.

In most of the high schools they studied, the researchers saw a dip in test scores, GPAs, and attendance for students who lived close to a recent homicide. But on some campuses these metrics held steady on average, or in some cases even improved. That campus effect on how students dealt with exposure to violence in their communities was fairly small on average. But researchers believe that the benefits are greater for the students most affected by closeness to homicides — eyewitnesses, for example — who likely would see academic outcomes plummet more without those school supports.

“There is every reason to believe that for some young people, the effect might be larger,” said David Johnson, one of the study’s authors. “School is something that for the most vulnerable students might be making a big difference.”

The campuses that curbed the effects of violence on students were scattered across the city, Johnson said. They tended to embrace a range of practices shown to improve school climate, from offering engaging instruction to forming teams of educators and staff to respond to behavioral issues more proactively. No single initiative or strategy accounted for that positive effect.

“In these schools, you have educators, administrators and staff members across the campus working together in a very intentional way,” Johnson said.

The study held up principals, who tend to play an outsize role in shaping a school’s culture, as a key factor. It also emphasized tiered systems for supporting students, in which educators and staff flag those needing the most help and steer intensive support to them.

The authors chose to focus on proximity to homicides because they are generally not underreported and don’t reflect uneven patterns of policing as other crime statistics tend to do.

The findings affirm previous Consortium research on the important role school culture and climate play in student achievement and well-being, including a recent study that examined test scores, social-emotional support, and behaviors in the ninth grade as factors in longer-term student outcomes, such as the odds of graduating from high school and going to college. Social-emotional development proved to be the most powerful factor.

But this latest study also stressed that supporting students who have been exposed to violence is challenging work that takes a toll on educators. It’s important that they get help and resources they can use, such as those available through the Learning and Resource Hub at Lurie Children’s Hospital’s Center for Childhood Resilience, where Johnson now works. The consortium is also releasing this week a family playbook on school suspensions and discipline, which offers parents and caregivers guidance on ways they can help strengthen their school’s climate — part of a new initiative to engage community members to harness consortium research in promoting changes on local campuses.

“Schools matter,” Johnson said. “The efforts of adults matter.”

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Denver mayor, schools superintendent announce youth summer programs meant to help curb gun violence

2024-05-21T00:02:08+00:00

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The city of Denver is aiming to connect 1,000 more teenagers with jobs this summer, help families find summer camps, and fund pop-up events like BBQs and basketball tournaments in some neighborhoods, Denver Mayor Mike Johnston announced Monday.

The efforts are meant to “prevent the risks of summer violence,” Johnston said, which tends to flare among youth once school is out. They come after several years of increased gun violence in and around Denver schools and community conversations about how to tamp it down.

“We all know it’s a shared responsibility to ensure our scholars are engaged over the summer,” Denver Public Schools Superintendent Alex Marrero said at a press conference with Johnston.

The last day for most public schools in Denver is June 5.

Marrero has been raising the alarm about increasing gun violence and pushing the city to take action since the fall of 2022, when an East High School student was shot in the face outside a city recreation center next to the school. The student was a bystander in a fight.

A few months later, in February 2023, 16-year-old East High student Luis Garcia was shot and killed as he sat in his car outside the school. Then, in March 2023, a 17-year-old East High student shot and injured two deans inside the school before taking his own life.

Johnston recently set a goal to reduce gun violence in the city by 20% by Dec. 31.

“Summer is a great opportunity to get young people engaged in positive activities,” Johnston said. “It can also be an at-risk time for young people who are not engaged in positive activities to be exposed to violence.

“So we are thinking about this as a multi-pronged approach to how we can engage young people into positive summer activities.”

The initiatives include:

The Mayor’s YouthWorks Initiative, which aims to connect 1,000 young people ages 14 to 21 with summer jobs. Young people who work 100 hours between May 1 and Aug. 16 and complete financial literacy training can get a $1,000 bonus. Priority will be given to young people who qualify for free or reduced-price school meals or other public benefits.
A new website that Johnston called a “one-stop shop” for finding summer camps and other programming. The website — at denvergov.org/youthsummer — allows families to enter a school name or home address and see all the summer programming within a certain mile radius. Many of the listed programs are free or offer financial assistance.
$500,000 in grant funding for local organizations to host pop-up neighborhood events for children and families that Johnston said “will bring life, and joy, and opportunity to communities where we know we have a real chance to drive down community violence.” Five hot spots around the city will be prioritized for the grant-funded pop-up events, a city spokesperson said.

Johnston encouraged employers in the city to sign up to be part of the YouthWorks effort, and he promoted two city-led youth job fairs, one virtual and one in-person:

Virtual job fair: Friday, May 24 from 4 to 6 p.m.
In-person job fair: Saturday, June 1 from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

All of the new programming is being funded by a state grant known as GEER, which stands for Governor’s Emergency Education Relief and is funded by federal pandemic relief dollars. The city’s Office of Children’s Affairs won $1.7 million in GEER funds, according to a city spokesperson.

Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Amid record-high youth homicides, New B.O.Y. tries to give Indianapolis teens something to live for

2024-05-15T10:00:00+00:00

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This article was co-reported by Chalkbeat Indiana and Axios Indianapolis as part of a reporting partnership about youth gun violence in Indianapolis.

How do you save the lives of teenage boys who act like they aren’t afraid to die?

City officials are looking into it. Police are asking for help. Kareem Hines and his mentors keep trying.

“We, unfortunately, lose kids a lot,” said Hines. “The positive stories, the successes that we see with the kids, keep us going.”

Hines’ New B.O.Y. program — short for New Breed of Youth — is one of several in Indianapolis trying to reverse an alarming statistic: the highest number of youth homicides in at least six years, the majority of which involve guns. Some young men he works with are saved. Others are not, and Hines sees them on the news. Last year, the program lost six participants who ended up dead or in prison.

Either way, week after week, Hines and his team of mentors try to give their young men something to live for.

New B.O.Y., which began in 2009 and works with about 125 boys, is based on the mantra of “connection before correction.” It’s built on consistency.

Kareem Hines practices boxing with a young participant during the New B.O.Y. Guns Down, Gloves UP Boxing Program meetup on April 27, 2024 at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Park in Indianapolis.

Youth martial arts classes are on Tuesdays. Boxing classes are on Saturdays. There are field trips to go skiing or visit college campuses. And nearly every Wednesday, there are group talking sessions called “leaders circle” that bring children and parents together to review the week’s good and bad events.

Hines knows himself the power of a mentor and constant engagement from growing up in Harlem with a single dad. He met his own mentor at the YMCA, where he got his first job at 15. That mentor was the reason he moved to Indianapolis at age 20 in 1995, when he got a job at the Fall Creek YMCA that has since closed.

Since then, Hines worked in various mentoring and community outreach programs until launching New B.O.Y. in 2009.

But understanding just how challenging New B.O.Y.’s mission is means understanding the world in which the program operates.

It’s one in which teenagers pose smiling with guns on Instagram. Students “go 30″ — fight each other — in the school bathroom just to see who wins. Flyers circulating online promote parties that combine social media fights and guns in a confined space. “Drill” rap music describing shootouts with enemies is popular.

And embedded in all of this is the trauma of living in poverty, growing up in high-crime, under-resourced neighborhoods, or nursing broken relationships with adults.

Hines emphasizes that his program isn’t a cure-all.

“We’re just a piece of the puzzle,” he said. “We understand the plight of these young men, so we try to stand in the gap in every area, but we can’t be with them 24 hours a day.”

The program draws strength from youth like Patrick Collier who succeed.

As he’s grown in New B.O.Y. from a jaded pre-teen in foster care to a budding entrepreneur, Collier, now 18, has closely known four fellow participants who’ve been killed and two who’ve been locked up.

Losing them, he said, is more like losing a brother — and at times he did not want to come to New B.O.Y. activities for fear of learning of another person was dead or arrested.

“Ultimately, I realized that if I’m losing people this much, that just means that I have to do something,” said Collier, who hopes to study social work at Indiana University Bloomington next year. “I have to wrap my hands around the people that are in the program.”

Kareem Hines grew up in Harlem, where he spent many hours at the YMCA right across from his home. That's where he said he learned about the power of a mentor.

Talk sessions offer teens tough love, understanding

Hines is both a fiery preacher and understanding therapist. When he talks, these teenagers listen.

It’s a method of engagement with youth that he’s honed over decades of working with them.

In the leaders circle sessions that last for hours, he invites participants to describe the environment in which they live. He asks them to explain their poor decisions but celebrates their wins. And he tries to wrap it all up in a message of love and understanding.

The program’s participants are typically referred through the state’s Department of Child Services or the local probation department, but some can come from community-based referrals as well. The majority of the participants, like the majority of the city’s homicide victims ages 19 and under, are Black.

There’s the young man with a penchant for yo-yos who has lacked a strong female presence in his life and struggles with anger issues. But he celebrates his weekly wins at circle sessions — in January, he reported, he’d “been thinking about what I do before I do it.”

There’s the teenager in and out of juvenile court system who, under New B.O.Y.’s guidance, wrote a memoir sharing his family trauma.

During a leaders circle session in October, when Hines asks how easy it is for him to obtain a gun, he doesn’t hesitate: “It’s easy as 1, 2, 3.”

“I’m tired of that life” on the streets, he said. “I’ve been in that since I was nine. I’m 15.”

Hines frequently acknowledges the lack of fathers in the boys’ lives. He nods to the fact that adults have let them down. And he often asks the group questions that everyone knows the answer to. In this way, he and other mentors signal that they understand where these boys are coming from.

“Should you feel uncomfortable at a teenage party in this city?” he asks during one session in January. Yes, the boys nod, because you might get shot.

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“What’s ‘catching a face?’” he asks after playing a drill rap song through a loudspeaker at an April session.

It means killing somebody, they answer.

But these sessions also feature important life lessons.

Hines frequently passes out the latest articles of teenagers arrested for murder or killed in shootings, asking the boys to read it aloud and assess what the subjects should have done differently. In one session, he encouraged the boys to play chess, not checkers — in other words, to think critically about their decisions.

And during another session in January, the boys heard from JaMarcus Fields, who served 26 years in prison for murder.

“The system is not playing while we out here trying to play tough,” Fields said. He described his first night in prison as a scared 18-year-old.

“I literally went to sleep a little kid and had to wake up the next morning a grown man,” he said as the boys sat listening quietly. “I didn’t have a choice.”

Some boys still end up in prison — or worse

Still, not everyone makes it through New B.O.Y. alive or living life as a free man.

Hines uses every loss as a teachable moment.

In February, the boys stared at a text message about a former New B.O.Y. participant, now in his twenties.

“[He] has me reaching out to you to see if ur available to come to his sentencing Monday,” the message read. “He was fighting a murder charge but he’s pleading out.”

But Hines laments the fact that he hasn’t seen the young man come back to the program in a long time.

Kareem Hines speaks with students during a New B.O.Y. leaders circle session in February.

“He needs a few character references — can I give him a character reference?” Hines asks the group.

The boys shake their heads.

“Hell no. Hell no,” Hines said. “Hell no, I can’t.”

Still, Hines and the mentors keep going, even when participants stray from the flock. Stopping is not an option.

“I got about another 10 to 12 other young men who are still pushing, who made a different decision,” he said. “So we got to be there for them.”

Celebrating wins and giving boys ‘an incentive’

Collier was a frustrated middle school student when he met Hines at around 12 years old.

Years of being in and out of multiple foster homes left him standoffish, lacking trust in adults, and acting out in school. But the night that Hines showed up at his foster family’s house, wearing clothes that someone his age would wear, Collier was taken aback.

“He’s real,” Collier said on why young men respond positively to Hines. “There’s no facade he puts up. There’s nothing he tries to do that isn’t him. There isn’t an agenda oriented around profit that he works on.”

New B.O.Y.’s constant programming is what drew Collier out of his shell and ultimately earned his trust. He joined the program’s Young Entrepreneurs Program and launched a nonprofit with a fellow New B.O.Y. participant to bring food, clothing, and other services to those in need.

And like Hines, the programming felt authentic.

“It was never like, ‘Hey, let’s get this photo and then we’re going to drop him off,’” he said. “It was really genuine. I mean, there were rarely any cameras around. There were rarely people that weren’t always locked into the program.”

New B.O.Y. has played an annual flag football tournament against Evolve, another mentoring group, for the past few years. "None of y'all gonna be in the news," Hines said in a speech before the start of last year's tournament, referring to the news stories of murdered youth. "We gonna pour life into you today, like we try to do today and every day."

Outside of the tough love that New B.O.Y. participants get in the leaders circle, Hines and his team of adults are there year-around to provide the positive life experiences Collier had.

On a sunny Saturday in November, uplifting music is bumping on the field next to what used to be Indianapolis Public School 11. The young men huddle in excitement with mentors as they review their plays in the annual flag-football tournament against Evolve, another mentoring group.

“I keep an incentive in front of them,” Hines told Chalkbeat. “No matter what, I want to keep them with some kind of hope.”

New B.O.Y.’s programming aligns with Hines’ philosophy of correcting poor behavior while still actively celebrating life and its successes. He dislikes grandiose celebrations of life that occur only after a child has been killed. And he laments when news crews come to him for interviews only after someone dies.

He frequently calls on parents to be more involved with their children, not only through the bad, but the good.

“If you don’t love yours, and wrap your arms around yours, the streets will,” Hines told families at New B.O.Y.’s annual awards ceremony in December.

“I need you to focus on the discipline," Hines told families who watched a martial arts performance at New B.O.Y.'s annual awards ceremony in December. "Forget the technique, because you’ve got young people up here at varied levels of experience. But just look at how together they try to be.”

At the ceremony, boys in the martial arts program came up to the stage. Like a drill sergeant, Hines made the students answer him back, repeatedly:

“Who do you believe in?” he shouts. “Myself,” they answer.

“Who do you love?”

“Myself.”

Read the Axios Indianapolis story here.

Amelia Pak-Harvey covers Indianapolis and Lawrence Township schools for Chalkbeat Indiana. Contact Amelia at apak-harvey@chalkbeat.org.

Arika Herron is a reporter for Axios Indianapolis. You can reach her at Arika.Herron@axios.com.

Where Tennessee lawmakers landed on vouchers, guns, AI, and other education issues in 2024

2024-04-29T10:00:00+00:00

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Tennessee’s legislature is done for the year after a session marked by political infighting over private school vouchers and emotional debates about whether teachers and staff should be able to carry a gun in public schools.

The statewide voucher proposal fizzled after the Senate and House couldn’t agree on the specifics. Gov. Bill Lee quickly pledged to come back next year with another plan.

The bill to arm some school employees easily passed, defying dramatic protests at the state Capitol, a year after a Nashville school shooting in which three children, three adults, and the intruder were killed.

“This was a session of good, bad, and ugly,” Senate Minority Leader Raumesh Akbari said after the legislature adjourned on Thursday.

“Unfortunately, some really really bad bills ended up passing,” the Memphis Democrat added.

Republican leaders hailed the four-month session as a success.

“We accomplished things that will benefit the people of this state,” the governor told reporters minutes after the gavel fell.

Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee speaks with reporters at the close of the 2024 legislative session on April 25. He's flanked by the General Assembly's Republican leaders.

He cited the passage of a “historically important budget” that includes a consolation prize of $144 million for his Education Freedom Scholarship Act, in case it passes in future years. The failed voucher proposal seeks to give taxpayer money to any family who wants to send their children to private schools, regardless of their income.

“That shows a clear intent that we believe in this concept and that we expect that to get done next year,” Lee said.

By the end of the week, the governor had signed the bill to let some school employees carry guns, which took effect immediately.

The new law marks the biggest expansion of gun access in Tennessee since the killings at The Covenant School. Last year, the legislature appropriated $140 million to help place an armed officer in every public school, but many districts, especially in rural areas, haven’t been able to hire an officer for every campus.

“Districts have the option to choose,” Lee said earlier, arguing that some school systems need to let some employees carry a concealed handgun.

Protesters stage a "die-in" on the rotunda floor at the Tennessee State Capitol outside of the House chambers on April 23, 2024, after state lawmakers passed a bill to let certain teachers and school staff carry handguns in schools.

Legislation at the intersection of schools and guns

Lawmakers sorted through some 230-plus education bills filed in time for this year’s session — about 300 if you count those left over from last year in the two-year General Assembly. They ultimately passed about 70 that directly affect K-12 education.

For the second straight year, they made tweaks to a 2021 reading and retention law to address what many called unintended effects for students in grades three and four. Under a compromise approved on the last day of session, parents and educators of fourth graders will now have input on whether their students get held back because of low reading scores on state tests.

The legislature rejected tighter gun laws sought by Democrats and gun control advocates, and continued instead to pass legislation aimed at fortifying campuses. Among the initiatives: new school fire alarm protocols to take into account active-shooter situations; a pilot program to give teachers wearable alarms; increased safety training for school bus drivers; and guidelines to digitize school maps so first responders can access school layouts quickly in an emergency.

A rare bipartisan bill increases the penalty for anyone who threatens to commit an act of mass violence on school property or at a school-related activity.

Another measure, which Lee has signed into law, requires public schools to teach children age-appropriate firearms safety concepts as early as pre-kindergarten. The video-based training is to begin in the 2025-26 school year and, among other things, will instruct students who find a firearm that they shouldn’t touch it and should notify an adult immediately. The bill bars parents from opting their children out of the training.

So-called culture war issues played prominently again

One new law requires public school students to watch a video on fetal development produced by an anti-abortion group, or something comparable. Another measure will require public school employees to out transgender students to their parents. But a bill designed to ban LGBTQ+ flags in schools failed in the Senate amid concerns of a legal challenge based on First Amendment rights.

Tennessee’s age-appropriate materials law, championed by Lee in 2022 to cull certain titles from school libraries, now includes a definition of “suitable” materials for certain ages and maturity levels. And if a local school board doesn’t address a book complaint within 60 days, the complainant can now take the issue straight to the state textbook commission.

Another GOP bill that passed seeks to make sure that material related to “sexual activity” is excluded from the state’s mandatory family life curriculum for students in kindergarten through the fifth grade.

Meanwhile, legislation sponsored by Democrats directs the state education department to develop a program that public schools can use to teach students the skills of nonviolent conflict resolution.

Lawmakers exit the House of Representatives at the Tennessee State Capitol in Nashville on April 25 after adjourning their two-year session.

Social media and technology also were on the minds of lawmakers.

They signed off on legislation requiring minors to have parental consent to create social media accounts.

In addition, school districts, charter schools, and higher-education institutions must develop and implement their own policies on the use of artificial intelligence in the classroom, if they haven’t already done so. Those policies could include restricting or outright prohibiting the use of AI.

Amid that discussion, one bill requires that Tennessee history be taught in fifth grade. Having that issue codified in state law settles, for now, a debate that erupts whenever the state revises its academic standards for social studies.

Memphis was the focus of more legislation

Rep. Mark White and Sen. Brent Taylor, both Memphis Republicans, drafted several proposals aimed at education in their community.

The legislature passed one bill allowing the University of Memphis to create its own K-12 school district and expand its innovative University Schools model beyond campus borders. University officials said they’ll launch the district this fall, even as they’re still in talks with Memphis-Shelby County Schools about their contract that runs through fall 2026.

Another proposal — giving the governor the power to appoint up to six new members to the board of Memphis-Shelby County Schools — was never heard in committees after White agreed to hold off and work with the existing board and the district’s new superintendent, Marie Feagins, on an improvement plan.

Rep. Antonio Parkinson D-Memphis, has sought for years to shut down the Achievement School District.

A Democratic-sponsored proposal to end the Tennessee Achievement School District, the state’s sputtering takeover and turnaround initiative, passed out of the Senate but not the House. Rep. Antonio Parkinson, the sponsor there, pulled the legislation on the last day of session when White sought to amend the bill. Still, the ASD continues to shrink on its own as its 10-year contracts with charter operators end.

An effort to expand a separate pilot school turnaround project — which started in 2021 in Memphis, Nashville, and Chattanooga — failed to clear budget committees.

Lawmakers passed House Speaker Cameron Sexton’s charter school proposal to create new alternative education options for Tennessee’s at-risk youth. The plan opens the door to residential charter schools, a concern of disability advocates who warned against any measure that could lead to the institutionalization of youth or commingling distinct student populations facing varying issues such as substance abuse, juvenile crime, chronic absenteeism, and teen pregnancy.

Sexton trumpeted his and other charter school legislation headed to the governor’s desk. One bill rewrites state law governing vacant and underutilized public school properties to give charter operators the “right of first refusal” to purchase those public assets.

“This session did more than it’s ever done in our history to continue to put (charter schools) on a path to give parents the choice and alternative to traditional schools,” Sexton said.

A tighter budget meant fewer education initiatives

Passing a budget for state government is the legislature’s only required constitutional duty, and the task was more challenging this year as tax revenues flattened and federal COVID relief funding ended.

Still, Republican lawmakers approved a $1.9 billion package of tax cuts and refunds to corporations and businesses.

Representatives on the floor of the Tennessee House in 2022

They ultimately approved a nearly $53 billion spending plan that allocates an additional $126 million to raise the annual minimum salary for public school teachers from $42,000 to $44,500. The goal is to get to $50,000 by the 2026-27 school year.

Also included is $8 million to hire more school-based behavioral health specialists amid record reports of students experiencing stress, depression, anxiety, and other mental health challenges exacerbated by the pandemic. Another $15 million in non-recurring funds will help charter school operators pay for school facilities and maintenance.

But the legislature killed efforts to hire more school-based nurses and counselors, reimburse teachers for some of their child care expenses, and provide free feminine hygiene products in high schools, as well as separate proposals by a Democrat and a Republican to make school meals free for all students. It also said no to a bill to use tax revenue from Tennessee’s growing sports betting industry to offer child care scholarships to low- and middle-income families.

When the 114th General Assembly convenes next year, it will look somewhat different after this year’s elections. All seats of the 99-member House of Representatives and half of the Senate’s 33 seats will be on the ballot.

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Gov. Bill Lee says he’ll sign bill to let some Tennessee teachers and staff carry guns in schools

2024-04-26T01:34:18+00:00

Gov. Bill Lee said Thursday he will sign legislation to let some teachers and staff go armed in Tennessee public schools.

“Districts have the option to choose,” Lee told reporters after the legislature adjourned for the year. Some school systems, he added, need that option.

His decision comes despite calls from teacher and gun control groups for the governor to veto the bill, as well as concern that parents won’t be notified if their child’s teacher is armed. In nearly six years as governor, Lee has advocated for parental rights on education matters such as curriculum and library materials.

The impending law becomes one of the most significant public safety actions in Tennessee since an intruder shot and killed three students and three staff members a year ago at a private Christian school in Nashville.

Partisan votes in the GOP-controlled legislature advanced the bill this month despite mass protests at the state Capitol seeking stricter gun laws in the wake of the massacre at The Covenant School.

Since Tuesday’s dramatic House vote sent the bill to the governor’s desk, many of the state’s largest districts, including in its four urban counties, have announced they will not use the option if the bill becomes law. They say their campuses generally have a trained law enforcement officer on duty.

“I think meeting … general threats to an environment with another threat to an environment is not something that we want to participate in,” said Marie Feagins, the new superintendent of Memphis-Shelby County Schools.

Rural districts, where it’s more difficult to hire school resource officers for every school, are more likely to use the option, according to Rep. Ryan Williams of Cookeville and Sen. Paul Bailey of Sparta, the bill’s sponsors.

Under the legislation, carrying a gun would be voluntary, and allowed only if the local school district and law enforcement agencies agree to the policy. The school employee carrying the gun would have to possess an enhanced permit, complete 40 hours of certified training in school policing at their own expense, and pass a mental health evaluation and FBI background check.

Meanwhile, the bill’s passage has put Tennessee in the national spotlight, drawing criticism from gun control groups such as Brady, the nation’s oldest gun violence prevention organization, and Sandy Hook Promise, founded by family members of the 20 children and six adults killed in a 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.

“The Tennessee legislature has just dishonored all who were killed at the Covenant School shooting last year by choosing to promote the proliferation of firearms in classrooms,” said Kris Brown, the president of Brady, after the House vote. “There is no evidence to suggest that arming teachers will keep children safe from gun violence. Multiple teachers were armed at Covenant Day School, yet that was not enough to stop six children and school employees from being murdered.”

Tennessee Democrats, who voted against the bill, expressed disappointment that the governor plans to sign the bill.

“This legislation is an affront to every parent, to every Tennessean,” Sen. Raumesh Akbari, of Memphis. “We appropriated a record amount of dollars to fund SROs in every school. But instead we’re leaning into this type of policy.”

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Bill to let some teachers and school employees carry guns heads to Tennessee governor’s desk, despite protests

2024-04-23T23:54:26+00:00

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Protesters screamed “blood on your hands!” then lay down on the floor of the Tennessee State Capitol as if they were victims of gun violence, after lawmakers passed legislation Tuesday to let some teachers and staff carry guns at school.

In between, House Speaker Cameron Sexton paused business in the House of Representatives and ordered state troopers to clear the spectator gallery of protesters.

The 68-28 vote came one year after an intruder shot and killed three children and three adults at a Nashville school, prompting mass protests by gun control advocates and ongoing calls for tighter gun laws.

But instead of restricting gun access in one of America’s most gun-friendly states, the GOP-controlled legislature is sending Republican Gov. Bill Lee a bill that would expand it.

Gun control advocates were angry.

“They’re going in the wrong direction,” said Marley Mello, a 15-year-old Nashville student. “Guns are the problem, not the solution.”

Lisa Bruce, a retired Tennessee principal, called it a “Band-Aid to cover a gaping wound.”

“I could maybe get on board with it if we were already doing common sense measures to reduce gun violence in our state,” she said. “But this feels like a huge leap.”

After the bill's passage, students shout in protest in the rotunda of the Tennessee State Capitol.

The bill’s Republican sponsors have said the legislation is needed to provide an armed presence on every Tennessee school campus, especially in rural areas. Nearly a third of the state’s 1,800-plus public schools don’t have a school resource officer, despite an influx of state money to pay for them, due to a shortage in the profession.

On the House floor, Rep. Ryan Williams, of Cookeville, emphasized that carrying a gun would be voluntary, and allowed only if the local school district and law enforcement agencies agree to the policy. The school employee carrying the gun would have to have an enhanced permit, complete 40 hours of certified training in school policing at their own expense, and pass a mental health evaluation and FBI background check.

Republican lawmakers voting for the measure liked that local officials ultimately could decide whether the policy works for their community.

“I trust my local law enforcement. I trust my director of schools. I trust my teacher,” said Rep. Brock Martin, of Huntingdon.

But Democrats said the effort was misguided, shortsighted, and dangerous.

“We’re going to give somebody a little pop gun to go against a weapon of war. It does not work, folks,” said Rep. Bo Mitchell, of Nashville.

Tennesseans would be better served, Democrats argued, if the legislature passed laws requiring safe storage of firearms and background checks, as well as to temporarily remove guns from any person who is an imminent risk to themselves or others — all proposals that have been defeated by Republicans in charge.

The vote came after an hour of debate in which Democrats tried unsuccessfully to change the bill to exclude their counties, ensure parents are notified when their child’s teacher is armed, or remove a clause that shields districts and law enforcement agencies from civil lawsuits over how a school employee uses, or doesn’t use, a gun.

On Monday, one parent at Nashville’s Covenant School, where the shooting occurred on March 27, 2023, delivered a petition signed by more than 5,000 Tennesseans asking lawmakers to vote the bill down.

“While we all want safe schools and an end to gun violence, arming teachers with guns is not the way,” wrote Sarah Shoop Neumann, whose 5-year-old son was enrolled in Covenant’s preschool.

Another Covenant parent, Mary Joyce, called the bill “ludicrous.”

“Had my daughter’s teacher left the classroom to pursue the shooter, a classroom of 9-year-olds would have been left to protect themselves,” Joyce said.

Jeff Bledsoe, the executive director of the Tennessee Sheriffs’ Association, told Chalkbeat he expects few teachers to carry a gun if the bill becomes law. More likely candidates, he said, are school staff members who have a military or law enforcement background.

His organization opposed the legislation in 2019 when Williams sponsored a similar bill. However, it is neutral on the current bill after working with the sponsors to add more requirements before a person can carry a weapon at school.

Alison Beale, a mother and former teacher, is among spectators escorted by state troopers from the House gallery at the Tennessee State Capitol on April 23. Beale, of Hendersonville, is a Democratic candidate for the House.

Two weeks earlier, the bill easily cleared the Senate, where spectators also were ejected from the gallery after defying warnings from Lt. Gov. Randy McNally to stay quiet.

The governor has signaled he likely will sign the measure into law.

“I’ve said for many years that I’m open to the idea, but the particulars are important,” he told reporters last week.

An advocate for parental rights, the governor declined to comment on the bill’s intent to block a parent from being notified if their child’s teacher is carrying a gun.

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Majority of American teachers worry about shootings at their schools, survey shows

2024-04-11T21:20:53+00:00

This story was originally published by The 19th and is republished under a Creative Commons license. Sign up for The 19th’s newsletter here.

The majority of American K-12 public school teachers say they are at least somewhat worried about the possibility of a shooting at their school, according to a new survey conducted by the Pew Research Center.

Fifty-nine percent told Pew researchers that they were concerned about shootings on their campuses, with 18% saying they were “very” or “extremely” worried. Only 7% of teachers polled said they were not worried at all. School shootings reached a record high last year, with 83 separate incidents occurring in 2023.

Juliana Horowitz, associate director of research at the Pew Research Center, told The 19th that the genesis for this research came from doing preliminary interviews with educators before launching surveys on the state of teaching today. Many brought up concerns about gun violence and safety. “In asking about the day-to-day of being a teacher, I felt like this was a really important topic to capture,” Horowitz said.

Fears about campus safety have become widespread in the 25 years since two senior students opened fire on their classmates at Columbine High School in Colorado. They killed 12 students and one teacher.

Last year, roughly one in four American teachers reported experiencing a gun-related lockdown at their school. Fifteen percent of respondents said they went through one emergency lockdown, with another 8% saying that it happened where they teach more than once.

These numbers tell an important story, Horowitz said. “Especially for high school teachers, this is something that is really top of mind for them.”

High school teachers experience gun-related lockdowns more than any other demographic: 34% said they had at least one incident during the previous school year, compared to 22% of middle school teachers and 16% of elementary school teachers.

Approximately one-third of teachers who work in urban areas said they had a gun-related lockdown during the last school year, compared with 19% of those in suburban areas and 20% in rural ones.

Teachers in urban schools were the least likely to say that they felt adequately prepared by their school, with only 21% saying their school had done a good or excellent job, compared with 32% of teachers in suburban districts and 35% of teachers in rural ones.

Most of the surveyed teachers pointed at the role mental health care could play in addressing the gun violence crisis. A large majority — 69% — said they believed improving mental health screening and treatment for children and adults would be extremely or very effective in preventing school shootings. This emphasis on improving mental health held across party lines, with 73% of Democratic teachers and 66% of Republican teachers all saying that investment in mental health resources would be an extremely or very effective prevention tool.

Only 13% said that allowing teachers and administrators to carry guns in school would be extremely effective at curbing this form of gun violence.

Related: Amid clamor from protesters, Tennessee Senate passes bill to arm some teachers

Party affiliation had a lot to do with teachers’ opinions on how to be proactive about school safety. Sixty-nine percent of Republican teachers were in favor of having police officers or armed security in schools, compared with 37% of Democrats; 43% were in favor of metal detectors compared with only 27% of Democrats; and 28% were in favor of allowing teachers and administrators to carry guns, compared with just 3% of Democrats.

Horowitz said that teachers tend to lean Democratic, meaning that the majority of those surveyed are more likely to identify as Democrats than the public overall. “The results among Democratic teachers mirror more closely what we see overall among teachers — and so that’s why it’s really important to also look at these differences and see how Democratic and Republican teachers are reacting differently to these questions.”

She also points to the 3% of teachers who say that staff at their schools are allowed to carry guns. But that circumstance depends on the political leanings of the school district where the campus is located. Teachers in districts that went for President Donald Trump in 2020 saw this number reach 5%. In districts that went for President Joe Biden, it dropped to 1%. “I think that captures that partisan differences are important not just among teachers, but that there are partisan differences in terms of the sort of political environment where the schools are that they teach in,” Horowitz said.

For this study, Pew surveyed 2,531 members of RAND’s American Teacher Panel, which is nationally representative. Survey data was weighted to state and national teacher characteristics to account for differences in sampling and response.

Parents also echo teachers’ concerns, Horowitz added. A Pew Research Center study released last fall found that a third of American parents said they were extremely or very worried about a shooting at their child’s school, with an additional 37% saying they were somewhat worried. That means about seven in 10 parents have fears about school shootings.

This survey did not tie school shooting concerns to how teachers intend to vote in the November election. But Horowitz believes it is clear that issues affecting schools “are things that people will be talking about in the context of the election and politics.”

Amid clamor from protesters, Tennessee Senate passes bill to arm some teachers

2024-04-10T00:44:08+00:00

Amid outbursts from gun control advocates in the spectator gallery, Tennessee’s GOP-dominated Senate passed a bill Tuesday to allow some teachers and staff to carry concealed handguns in public schools.

The vote was 26-5 vote along partisan lines.

Lt. Gov. Randy McNally ordered the gallery cleared of protesters after issuing several warnings before the vote, but many of them refused to leave, despite the urging of state troopers and warnings that they could be arrested.

Some held up signs that said “We’re still here” and “1 year later, are kids safer?” referring to Nashville’s Covenant School shooting, in which an intruder killed three children and three adult staff members on March 27, 2023.

Others chanted “Vote them out!” and “Let them teach!” as it took nearly 15 minutes to resume debate.

“People were damn mad,” Nashville mom Carol Buckley Frazier told Chalkbeat later.

“Some wonderful amendments were introduced to try to craft something better out of a horrific bill, but every one of them got tabled by the Republican supermajority. We just couldn’t believe it,” said Frazier, who came to the state Capitol to show her opposition to the bill.

A group of parents from The Covenant School were also in the balcony but were allowed to stay. Wearing school colors or with ribbons pinned to their chests, they have had a steady presence on Capitol Hill since the shooting to meet with legislators, attend committee meetings, and advocate for gun reforms.

The legislation still awaits a vote by the full House. If it passes there, Tennessee will be on the verge of enacting a law that most teachers and parents oppose.

The latest results from the annual statewide poll conducted by the Vanderbilt Center for Child Health Policy found that school safety is one of parents’ top education concerns, but significantly fewer parents said yes when asked if schools are safer when teachers are armed.

However, some rural lawmakers have sought the measure for a decade to help districts that can’t place an armed law enforcement officer on every campus, most recently due to a shortage in the profession.

The bill, co-sponsored by Sen. Paul Bailey of Sparta and Rep. Ryan Williams of Cookeville, lays out specific conditions before any school employee could carry a concealed handgun if they’re not a law enforcement officer.

First, the local district and law enforcement agency would have to agree to pursue such a policy.

Second, interested teachers and school staff who have an enhanced handgun permit would have to complete 40 hours of certified training in school policing at their own expense, and pass a mental health evaluation and an FBI background check. That training would have to be renewed every year that the teacher was carrying.

Parents would not be notified if their child’s teacher is armed. And one provision of the bill shields districts and law enforcement agencies from potential civil lawsuits over how a teacher or school employee uses, or doesn’t use, a handgun under the proposed law.

In remarks on the Senate floor, Sen. Raumesh Akbari, a Memphis Democrat, noted the irony of any legislation blocking a parent from being notified about a gun in their child’s classroom, given the many GOP-backed laws passed in recent years to restrict curriculum and library materials under the banner of parental rights.

And Sen. London Lamar, another Memphis Democrat, gave an impassioned speech while holding her 8-month-old son.

Sen. London Lamar, D-Memphis, holds her infant son as she speaks against legislation that would allow some Tennessee teachers and staff to go armed in public schools.

“I’m upset. My child is at risk under this bill,” Lamar said. “This bill is dangerous and teachers don’t want it. Nobody wants it.”

Bailey, the Senate sponsor, said the provision about not notifying parents is intended as a deterrent to potential intruders who would not know who is armed and who isn’t.

Any liability for an accident would be borne by the teacher who chooses to carry a weapon under the law, he said.

Sen. Ken Yager, a Kingston Republican, spoke in favor of the bill.

“We are not trying to shoot a student,” he said, “but protect a student from an active shooter whose sole purpose is to get into that school and kill people.”

But Claire Jones, a Williamson County mom and hospice nurse who was at the Capitol on Tuesday, saw it differently.

“When you ask for stricter gun legislation and they actually loosen the laws, that feels intentional,” said Jones, who is running as a Democrat for the House seat currently occupied by Republican Rep. Gino Bulso.

“How did we come from a tragedy like Covenant to this point?” she asked.

You can track the bill’s status on the General Assembly’s website.

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

How many out-of-school, out-of-work youth did Chicago reengage last school year?

2024-01-10T11:00:00+00:00

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About 1 in 5 of roughly 2,300 out-of-school, out-of-work youth contacted to participate in a new reengagement program in Chicago took part during the first year, according to a new policy brief from the University of Chicago Crime Lab.

In Chicago, roughly 45,000 teens and young adults are disconnected from school and work. With $18 million from the state, the city launched Back to Our Future in May 2022 to reach 1,000 young people ages 14 to 21 in 15 neighborhoods on the South and West sides. Data indicates fewer than 500 have participated so far.

The findings released today illustrate how difficult it is to reconnect with these young people — often referred to as “opportunity youth” — once they’ve disengaged.

“If it was easy, somebody would have already done it,” said Jadine Chou, chief safety and security officer at Chicago Public Schools. “We knew going into this that it was going to be really hard.”

The Back to Our Future program is a partnership between the Crime Lab, Chicago Public Schools, and the three community organizations tasked with doing the on-the-ground reengagement: Breakthrough, UCAN, and Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc.

Kim Smith, director of programs for the University of Chicago Crime Lab and Education Lab, said the low uptake is not entirely surprising. Back to Our Future is “a very ambitious program” to reach young people that have not been “served well by status quo services,” she said.

“This group of young people are not just going to kind of show up after a phone call,” Smith said. “There is an incredible need to tailor programming, to tailor services, even to tailor outreach strategies.”

The 12-week Back to Our Future program costs roughly $18,000 per young person to run. It includes 20 hours a week of mentoring, mental health services, job training, credit recovery to earn a CPS diploma or GED programming, and a stipend for youth participants.

However, the policy brief found many teens did not engage for the full 20 hours of programming each week. On average, participants attended nearly seven hours each week.

The policy brief analyzed referral and participation data, but was not a full evaluation of the program.

Chou said the district has a database of former students who left school before earning their diploma that they have used and shared with partner organizations in order to track down students. But often phone numbers and home addresses are no longer current or they have left Chicago. A lot of them have also aged out and would not be eligible for Back to Our Future.

“Once you do reach them, you have to really build trust,” Chou added.

She said the district is also learning a lot from the young people in Back to Our Future about how to prevent disconnection before it happens.

“They all have very important information, very important experiences that they are very happy to share,” she said, “which then I bring back to (colleagues at) CPS and say, ‘How can we work on this so that we essentially stem these young people from leaving us in the first place?’”

Chou highlighted school transfers as a signal for a student eventually dropping out.

“Once they do that transfer, that is so disruptive and destabilizing to their experience and to their sense of well-being because now they have to make new friends, now they have to navigate a new path to school,” she said. “And so, if possible, how do we support them in place?”

Smith said prevention is important so the numbers of out-of-school, out-of-work youth do not grow.

“At the point where a young person has not attended their school for 6, 12, 18 months, something has gone really wrong,” Smith said. “But it’s not ever too late, in our opinion, to try to re-engage young people and get them back on a good track.”

The brief only looked at data through May 2023. According to Chou, 346 young people are currently participating in Back to Our Future and outreach continues every day. She said 103 youth have successfully completed the program and of those, 32 earned their high school diplomas and 71 are re-enrolled in school.

“They would not have been able to do that without this program,” Chou said.

Becky Vevea is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Chicago. Contact Becky at bvevea@chalkbeat.org.

Vouchers, school safety, retention: Key education issues to watch as Tennessee lawmakers return

2024-01-08T11:00:00+00:00

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news organization covering public education in communities across America. Sign up for our free Tennessee newsletter to keep up with state education policy and the Shelby County public school system.

Five years after a bruising legislative battle opened the door to private school vouchers in parts of Tennessee, lawmakers are preparing to take up a controversial bill to create a similar program statewide.

Gov. Bill Lee’s universal voucher proposal, which eventually would make all K-12 students eligible to use public funding to attend a private or home school, is expected to dominate debate after the 113th General Assembly reconvenes on Tuesday.

But other issues affecting students and educators are sure to emerge in a state where education reform has been front and center since 2010, when Tennessee won $500 million in the federal Race to the Top competition to jumpstart changes.

And if the last few years are any indication, a few surprises may surface in the months ahead. Politics and tragedy have shaken up the education priorities of several recent sessions, from an 11th-hour Republican drive in 2021 to restrict classroom discussions about racism and bias to last year’s deadly Nashville school shooting that led to new investments in campus safety and dramatic protests over Tennessee’s lax gun laws.

With the GOP supermajority setting the agenda again this year, here’s a look at some big issues to watch as the opening gavel falls.

School vouchers: Lee’s expansion plan renews long-running debate

In November, the governor said he’ll introduce a new Education Freedom Scholarship Act to offer $7,075 in taxpayer money for each of up to 20,000 students statewide next school year to attend a private or home school, with eligibility restrictions for half of them. In 2025, eligibility would open up to all students, regardless of their family’s income.

The proposal would mark a massive expansion of Tennessee’s voucher program, which is now limited to three urban counties and still under-enrolled. But more than a month after Lee’s announcement, few details have been released.

“I have yet to understand where the financing is coming from,” said Sen. Page Walley, a Republican whose district includes eight rural counties in West Tennessee.

“If we jump to statewide vouchers, I don’t see how we fund it without robbing Peter to pay Paul,” he added.

School safety: Renewed discussion, but no gun laws (it’s an election year)

Tennesseans were unnerved when an armed intruder shot and killed three children and three adults at a private Christian school in Nashville on March 27, in the middle of last year’s legislative session. And the growing impact of gun violence on kids across the state is undeniable.

But Republican lawmakers’ response last year was to further harden schools rather than entertain any proposals to restrict gun access — not even for people who are deemed at risk of hurting themselves or others, as the Nashville shooter had been.

“We’ll be back in January,” parents wanting stricter gun laws vowed in August after a special session on public safety yielded little action on guns.

Spectators watch the Tennessee Senate doing business at the State Capitol during a special legislative session on public safety in August 2023. Lawmakers were called back by Gov. Bill Lee after a mass school shooting in Nashville in March.

Some of them have organized news conferences and rallies at the Capitol this week for students, educators, and others to voice their concerns. Meanwhile, a group of parents from The Covenant School in Nashville, where the tragedy took place, say they’ll continue to advocate for changes to “ensure responsible firearm ownership, safe schools, and accessible adequate mental health care for all individuals across Tennessee.”

GOP leaders anticipate the legislature will revisit many of the proposals left on the table.

They include several measures to let certain citizens or school employees carry handguns in schools, and a bill to require all public and private schools to create alarm policies that differentiate emergencies for fire, weather, or an active shooter.

A new bill, from Republican Sen. Mark Pody of Lebanon and Rep. Susan Lynn of Mount Juliet, would let schools purchase lanyards equipped with emergency alert buttons for school staff to wear around their necks.

But don’t expect the legislature to look seriously at bills to restrict gun access in an election year, according to several key Republicans.

“I do not believe there’s an appetite or pathway to success for any legislation that might be introduced that is going to infringe on constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens,” said Senate Majority Leader Jack Johnson, of Franklin.

With the latest State of the Child report ranking Tennessee near the bottom nationally for access to mental health resources, Johnson sees more room for discussion on that topic.

“I think a big conversation in the coming session will be how we strengthen our mental health safety net,” Johnson said, “as well as general access to mental health treatment in Tennessee.”

Third-grade reading law: Lawmakers may revisit retention provision — again

Last year, the legislature widened the criteria, beginning this school year, for determining which third graders are at risk of being held back if they aren’t deemed proficient readers under a 2021 law targeting pandemic learning lag.

Now under the same law, the state may have to retain thousands of fourth graders who test poorly this spring.

“I think we have to look into it,” said Rep. Mark White of Memphis, who chairs a House education committee. “We’ve probably got a lot of fourth graders who have already done summer school and tutoring but still won’t pass that test. It’s never a bad thing to have off-ramps and waivers.”

He added: “I want us to continue looking closer at kindergarten, first, and second grades so we’re not waiting until the third and fourth grades to address these challenges.”

But Sen. Jon Lundberg, who chairs his chamber’s education panel, is less inclined to make more changes in the 2021 law.

“We’ve set the standard for proficiency and for showing adequate growth, and I don’t want to move those,” he said.

Federal education funding: Talk about rejecting it looks like just talk, for now

House Speaker Cameron Sexton surprised many in his own party last year when he floated the idea of Tennessee rejecting more than a billion dollars in federal funding for students, which he said could be offset with state tax revenues.

In November, a task force appointed by Sexton and Lt. Gov. Randy McNally held hearings to explore the possibility. But Lundberg, the panel’s co-chairman, told Chalkbeat afterward that he didn’t expect the state to reject federal funds, even if it can find a way.

Legislative leaders polled by Chalkbeat last week said they haven’t heard of any legislation coming out of the hearings.

“It doesn’t hurt to know where our funding is coming from and how it’s being spent,” said White, the House’s education leader, said of the task force’s discussions, “but I don’t see that conversation going anywhere in the short term.”

Teacher shortages: Vacancies could lead to creative thinking

With Sexton declaring that Tennessee has enough state revenues to cover more than $1 billion in federal funding, plenty of public school advocates asked why the state wouldn’t use that excess instead to accelerate the governor’s plan to raise the minimum salary for teachers to $50,000 by 2027. (This year, the base is $42,000.)

Districts struggled to fill nearly 4,000 vacancies statewide last school year, especially in the middle grades, English as a second language, world languages, and special education, according to one report. And shortages of school bus drivers are a nationwide problem.

Lee told reporters that, while state revenues have flattened in recent months, Tennessee’s economy remains strong.

Gov. Bill Lee speaks with reporters on Thursday after a tour of a Nashville ministry. “We should probably look at our investments in public school funding and investments in teacher pay every year,” he said when asked about the prospect of accelerating pay increases.

“We should probably look at our investments in public school funding and investments in teacher pay every year,” he said when asked about the prospect of accelerating pay increases.

But with the teaching profession facing a post-pandemic crisis in Tennessee and nationally, the legislature could also pursue other avenues to elevate the profession.

Currently, the state covers less than half of health insurance premiums for its teachers, while state employees get 100% of their premiums covered. Moving teachers to the state employee plan could be a boost to both teachers and the local districts that employ them.

Professional Educators of Tennessee has also called on the legislature to develop policies to address child care access and affordability for teachers, more than 80% of whom are female.

“If you want to keep good teachers,” said Executive Director JC Bowman, “ease their burdens so they can focus on their work in school to educate and nurture our future generation.”

To follow this year’s legislative business, visit the General Assembly’s website for calendars, committees, legislation, and livestreams.

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Number of young people killed in Indianapolis reaches five-year high, despite overall drop in homicides

2023-12-12T11:20:00+00:00

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This article was co-published by Chalkbeat Indiana and Axios Indianapolis as part of a reporting partnership about youth gun violence in Indianapolis.

The day before Mother’s Day this year was hot. Hotter than it should’ve been in mid-May, reaching into the 80s. Mourners vigorously waved paper fans while they waited in line to walk past Jamar Ward’s white casket.

He should’ve turned 19 that day.

Instead, his mother leaned over his dead body and wailed to God.

At the time of his death in April, Ward — who graduated early from Arsenal Technical High School — was the 15th teenager to be killed by gun violence in what has become a record year for homicides of young people in Indianapolis. Within the next two weeks, four more teenagers would die from a shooting.

While total homicides in Indianapolis are down this year by over 20% from the record set in 2021, the number of homicides in the 19 and under age group have reached a high since 2018. The majority of such deaths involve gun violence: The number of youth in this age group killed by gun violence has more than doubled from 20 in 2018 to 44 as of Dec. 8 of this year, according to an analysis of Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department records and news articles by Axios Indianapolis and Chalkbeat Indiana. (The analysis only extends to 2018). This year all of the victims have been teenagers.

Homicides among minors, children under age 18, are up more than 25% from last year’s 19 and more than triple the pre-pandemic levels in 2018. Meanwhile, the number of teenagers shot and killed since Jan. 1 is at 44, higher than 34 last year and 36 in 2021 — the city’s most violent year in overall homicides.

The increase has left students, parents, and education officials grappling with how to stop killings that have impacted school districts and charter schools throughout Marion County. Community members who work closely with youth and gun violence attribute the causes to a variety of factors, including social media and the easy access that youth have to guns.

Two days after Ward died, 19-year-old Markes Day was found shot to death in an alley – less than a month before he would have graduated from George Washington High School. Roughly a week later, Jhavon Fisher, 17, and Nicholas Powell, 18, were killed. Three days after that, Austin Tyler Bunn, 19, was killed in what police believed to be an accidental shooting.

“We are at war,” IPS school board Commissioner Angelia Moore said at a board meeting Nov. 16 — one day after 13-year-old Dayon Darnell Lyles was shot and killed near the Meadows neighborhood on the city’s eastside.

That same night, 14-year-old Arsenal Tech High School student Kaleiah Veloise-Mae Dean would lose her life.

Police have called on the community to keep guns out of the hands of children. Last month, IMPD Commander Matt Thomas stood outside just yards away from KIPP Legacy High School, where 15-year-old Devin Gilbert III was shot and killed in an adjacent parking lot.

“We have to do better,” Thomas said. “And we owe it to our youth to lead the way in doing that.”

The deaths have also left families like Kaleiah’s dealing with the loss of multiple family members.

Derico Young lost his 21-year-old daughter Derisha Young in 2021 to gun violence. Now, the death of his stepdaughter, Kaleiah, has left him once again facing the loss of a young life.

“Why?” Young asked. “Why does someone else have to bury another kid?”

The shootings have also left some young people injured.

Andrew Holmes, an activist on gun violence prevention in Chicago, was at the scene of a mass shooting there when he got the call that his grandson Terrell was shot at a party in Indianapolis. Terrell’s mother, Holmes’ daughter, was shot and killed in Indianapolis years earlier.

Terrell, a football player at Lawrence North High School, was one of nine injured in a shooting at an Oct. 29 party on the northeast side that left 16-year-old Kalin Washington dead. Six of those injured were teenagers.

Now, Holmes said, his grandson is recovering from his shooting injury with rehabilitation and therapy as the family prays he is able to play football again.

“That’s a passion that his mother had for him,” Holmes said. “I told him just keep pushing, you shall play football again. Your mother wants you to play football.”

Read the Axios Indianapolis story here.

Amelia Pak-Harvey covers Indianapolis and Lawrence Township schools for Chalkbeat Indiana. Contact Amelia at apak-harvey@chalkbeat.org.

Arika Herron is a reporter for Axios Indianapolis. You can reach her at Arika.Herron@axios.com.

After Oxford shooting report, a call for stricter safety training requirements falters

2023-11-14T20:42:23+00:00

Michigan’s State Board of Education on Tuesday dismissed a school safety proposal calling for stricter training requirements for public school staff to help prevent gun violence, along with greater accountability for school employees and administrators for safety lapses.

But members who opposed the resolution signaled that they’re still committed to taking steps to improve school safety and are open to taking up the proposal later.

The proposal came from Republican board member Nikki Snyder in response to the release last month of an independent report on the 2021 mass shooting at Oxford High School, where a 15-year-old killed four students and injured seven others. The report found multiple failures by school officials to take steps to prevent the killings.

Snyder’s proposed resolution called for state laws requiring all school administrators and educators to receive behavioral threat assessment and management training, with the Michigan Department of Education enforcing compliance. It also called for MDE to check current student codes of conduct to make sure they align with the federal policies on notifying school resource officers of students who may pose a threat of violence.

Snyder’s proposal also called for removing any liability shield for school personnel and administrators who failed to report potential threats.

“We need to lead now in making sure this is what we expect,” Snyder said during the board meeting.

The board voted 5-3 against adding the resolution to its agenda. Republican member Tom McMillan, and board President Pamela Pugh, a Democrat, voted with Snyder.

Other members of the board agreed with Snyder that school safety is an urgent priority for the board but said they believed the proposal needed more research and input from officials before the board could consider it.

“We definitely are not voting this down and saying we don’t want to do anything with it,” said board member Tiffany Tilley, a Democrat. “We are saying we need more time. We need to make sure there is capacity to get the program, as well as MDE’s capacity to audit.”

Tilley said she would also like to work with MDE to pass additional proactive resolutions on school safety.

“There is no question that school safety is extremely important, and you’re absolutely right that this is the time to lead,” Democratic board member Judy Pritchett told Snyder. “I believe this board has been doing that.”

She cited the board’s October 2022 Resolution on Safer School Environments, which urged lawmakers to adopt Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s request for funding to support school safety and children’s mental health, as well as stronger gun safety laws.

That resolution did not recommend any new requirements in state law.

Snyder and McMillan said they voted against that resolution because it fell short of needed action.

The latest resolution “is about the requirement of that training — not the suggestion that it’s a fancy thought or a good idea,” Synder said.

Snyder added she would support amending the previously passed resolution with what she proposed.

She called the board’s choice to not take up the resolution on Tuesday “disgusting.”

“What we could do today is discuss this resolution, we could come to an agreement, and we could make a statement and lead,” she said. “And then we could work together on building the capacity to make sure students are safe and schools are safe. But you’re choosing not to do that.”

Pugh said she agrees there was room for the board to consider the resolution, but disputed the idea that it has not addressed the gun violence issue urgently enough.

“We’ve acted, and we will continue to provide guidance and support through MDE to our schools,” Pugh said.

“There are those of us who, for a long time, have been acting in urgency,” she said. “So, this resolution falls short of that urgency. We had an opportunity to give that input — and have — a year ago and have continued to work for the safety and healthy environment of children.”

Hannah Dellinger is a reporter for Chalkbeat Detroit covering K-12 education. Contact Hannah at hdellinger@chalkbeat.org.

KIPP Legacy High School student fatally shot near school identified

2023-11-06T21:01:40+00:00

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The KIPP Legacy High School student shot and killed near the school on Friday afternoon has been identified as 15-year-old Devin Gilbert III, according to the Marion County coroner’s office.

Gilbert was shot as he was walking home from school just before 1 p.m., the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department and the school said Friday. Police said the shooting was a targeted incident and no other people were injured.

IMPD homicide detectives announced on Friday night the arrest of a 15-year-old for his alleged role in the shooting, but did not release the name of the suspect. The Marion County prosecutor’s office will make the final charging decision, police said.

A spokesperson for the prosecutor’s office said charges will have to be filed in juvenile court due to the age of the suspect.

Since Gilbert’s death Friday, at least two more teenagers were shot and killed in the city over the weekend, according to the Indianapolis Star.

Legacy High School planned to have on-site support available for students and staff on Monday to help them process the tragedy, the school said in a statement on Friday.

Police urge anyone with information about the incident to call Detective Larry Craciunoiu at the IMPD Homicide Office at 317-327-3475 or send an email to Larry.Craciunoiu@indy.gov. People who wish to remain anonymous can call Crime Stoppers of Central Indiana at 317-262-8477.

Amelia Pak-Harvey covers Indianapolis and Lawrence Township schools for Chalkbeat Indiana. Contact Amelia at apak-harvey@chalkbeat.org.

Student shot and killed outside KIPP Legacy High School

2023-11-03T22:27:05+00:00

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A teenage student at KIPP Legacy High School was shot and killed Friday in a community center parking lot next to the school in what police say was a targeted shooting.

The student, who has not yet been identified, was walking home when he was shot just before 1 p.m. in the parking lot of the Edna Martin Christian Center’s Leadership and Legacy Center, both the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department and the school said Friday afternoon.

Police have detained a teenage male suspect who they said is not a Legacy student.

KIPP Legacy has a close relationship with the center, and uses space for extracurricular programming there. The community center also reserves parking spaces in its lot for KIPP staff. Both are fixtures of the Martindale-Brightwood neighborhood.

“We are in ongoing communication with the student’s family, and will continue to offer support during this extremely difficult time,” the school said in a Friday afternoon statement. “On Monday, we will have on-site supports available for students and staff as our school community processes this tragedy.”

Police said there was a disturbance at the school earlier in the day, which is being investigated, but did not elaborate further. But they said there is not enough information to conclude whether the two incidents were connected. No one else was injured in the shooting.

The homicide marks at least the fourth fatal shooting of a school-aged youth in less than two weeks in Indianapolis. One 15-year-old boy was found fatally shot on Oct. 21, and a 16-year-old girl was killed eight days later. Another 15-year-old girl was found fatally shot on Wednesday.

“It’s unacceptable that as a community, we’ve had conversations about youth violence all week, and this is how our week ends,” said IMPD Commander Matt Thomas. “It’s unacceptable that we have families hurting.”

Mayor Joe Hogsett has responded to such shootings with concerns about the accessibility of guns.

“This afternoon’s shooting of an Indianapolis teen is another example of the horrific combination of access to firearms and a failure of conflict resolution,” Hogsett said in a Friday statement. “No young person should have to worry about gun violence, let alone near a school.”

KIPP Legacy High School is a charter school within the Indianapolis Public Schools’ Innovation Network, and celebrated its first graduating class last spring.

Police urge witnesses or others with information to call the IMPD homicide office at 317-327-3475 or Crime Stoppers of Central Indiana at 317-262-8477 to remain anonymous.

Amelia Pak-Harvey covers Indianapolis and Lawrence Township schools for Chalkbeat Indiana. Contact Amelia at apak-harvey@chalkbeat.org.

Students’ mental health needs are growing. Here’s how one district is asking taxpayers to help.

2023-10-17T11:00:00+00:00

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After nine guns were found at Fort Wayne schools during the 2022-23 school year, a group of community members approached district leadership with an urgent request: Make schools safer.

Together with the district, a new safety committee made up of law enforcement, mental health professionals, and teachers compiled a list of recommendations to do so. Campuses needed technology updates and more school resource officers. But the group also recommended hiring additional staff to support students’ well-being.

Now, they’re asking voters to support the efforts by approving a property tax increase earmarked for school safety in the November election. At a rate of $0.10 per $100 of assessed value, the safety referendum would generate up to $12 million annually for eight years toward mental health staff and school resource officers, security improvements, and a program that teaches students nonviolence.

If passed, the referendum would create dozens of new positions at Fort Wayne schools working in tandem to address two major safety concerns schools are facing nationwide: An increase in gun violence and the number of weapons found at schools, as well ongoing strains on students’ mental health as a result of the pandemic.

Indiana schools have long relied on property tax increases to fund operations and construction. But in 2019, lawmakers also made it possible for districts to improve safety and security using tax dollars.

Only two districts have asked voters to approve safety referendums since 2019, and just one — Carmel schools — has been successful. Schools generally asked voters for fewer tax increases in the immediate aftermath of COVID, but the number has slowly risen since.

A tax referendum was a logical avenue to secure the funding needed for the committee’s recommendations, said Matt Schiebel, the district’s executive director of safety and community partnerships.

“Technology and security measures are important, but the well-being of students is as much or even more important to improving safety,” Schiebel said.

Referendum funding focuses on mental health staff

Fort Wayne schools, along with Bluffton Harrison schools in Wells County, are seeking to pass safety referendums this year in Indiana.

Bluffton Harrison schools intends to spend just over half of its estimated $445,000 in annual revenue from its referendum on additional school resource officers, and another one-quarter on student mental health supports.

Fort Wayne plans to use two-thirds of its total proposed funding for student mental health supports, like therapists, third-party counseling services, and positions known as student advocates, according to its spending plan.

Another one-quarter of the funding is planned for technology, including over $1 million next year for a weapons detection system. And the remainder is earmarked for more security personnel, including 12 additional school resource officers.

The average Fort Wayne taxpayer would pay a maximum of $76 more annually, though the bill would be less next year as the district intends to use only around $7 million of the available funds, Schiebel said.

Schiebel said the district has already leveraged other funding sources for safety, like its facilities referendum for building improvements, emergency funding for student mental health positions, as well as $100,000 from the state-funded Indiana Secured School Safety grant for a school resource officer. It also partners with the Fort Wayne Police Department and the Allen County Sheriff’s Office to place school resource officers in its middle schools.

But a safety referendum would offer more.

“Safety has always been a priority and we have always used any means necessary to do all we can,” Schiebel said.

The largest proposed expenditure — over $4 million — would go to hiring student advocates, adults who monitor hallways, parking lots, and bathrooms. They also may be responsible for de-escalating situations, but not disciplining students.

Their most important task is building positive relationships with students by serving as another adult to turn to when conflict arises, Schiebel said.

The district has already piloted the role at South Side High School through the use of federal emergency funding, which is now coming to an end, Schiebel said. Through referendum funds, the district hopes to sustainably expand the program and place two student advocates in each of its high schools, as well as one in each elementary and middle school, or 56 total.

They would join other new staff, including 18 new mental health therapists slated to serve middle and high schools.

Data indicates that students need these mental health supports more than ever, with nearly half of all Indiana students reporting feeling persistently sad or hopeless in 2021.

“Being in-person gives students the opportunity to learn social skills, to cope with people with varying viewpoints,” Schiebel said. “Our kids were isolated for 18 months. When students came back, we had to re-learn those skills.”

Expanding a student-led nonviolence program

The advocates and therapists would also work alongside students through a program known as the Peacemaker Academy, which trains high schoolers in the principles of nonviolence espoused by Martin Luther King Jr.

The district hopes to use a share of the referendum funds to expand the program, which is operated by the faith-based nonprofit Alive Fort Wayne. The pilot program has focused on South Side High School students, but the additional funding would allow the nonprofit to place coordinators in each of the five schools as well as hire a director.

Angelo Mante, executive director of Alive Fort Wayne, said the goal of the program is to teach students King’s principles of nonviolence to help them identify and address issues at their schools.

One project involved students beautifying the campus to improve school culture. Another student initiative keeps a “Peace Count” — tallying the number of days that the school has gone without seeing a fight between students. For every 10 days without a fight, students earn an extra minute for their passing period between classes.

Mante said that the combined efforts at South Side High School — of the Peacemakers, student advocates, and other security measures — have already led to a 40% reduction in violent incidents compared to this time last year, as well as more collective awareness of violence.

Students have earned their extra passing period minute twice this year compared to just once by October of last year.

“It’s highly beneficial to have all of these pieces working together,” Mante said.

Aleksandra Appleton covers Indiana education policy and writes about K-12 schools across the state. Contact her at aappleton@chalkbeat.org.

Roxborough High remembers Nicolas Elizalde, killed one year ago

2023-09-27T21:47:01+00:00

On a strip of ragged grass adjoining the front steps of Roxborough High School, students planted crocuses.

The bulbs, assistant principal Julian Saavedra explained to them, are perennials, meaning they die out but come back every year, bursting out in vibrant colors on patches of ground still waking up from the cold of winter.

The planting happened Wednesday, on the first anniversary of one of the most devastating events in the history of Roxborough High: a brutal shooting mere steps from the school that took the life of 14-year-old Nicolas Elizalde as he walked home from a football scrimmage at the field nearby.

Nicolas was actually a student at nearby Saul High School of Agricultural Science, which shares a football team with Roxborough.

To cope and remember, the 600-student school observed a Day of Peace on the anniversary, seeking to bring additional support to a community that is still traumatized. To start the day, students held a moment of silence. Over the past year, they helped paint a mural on the wall of the school closest to where the shooting occurred. The mural depicts, among other symbols, a football helmet filled with flowers and a large rendering of Nicolas’ jersey number, 62.

“We’re getting through it as a team,” said assistant football coach Marc Skinner. “We stand by each other, we talk to each other. … We put our focus on the field and the game and making sure we do the right thing, and not be a part of any situation that would have us in this type of tragedy again.”

Since the incident, Roxborough has partnered with organizations including Healing Hurt People to work with students and others affected. Police in the 14th District have stepped up patrols. The school has more security guards and many programs addressing students’ emotional needs.

But the pain is still raw.

“We continue to support our children with trauma-informed best practices. We share resources with our teachers, and all of our staff,” said Principal Kristin Williams-Smalley. “And we all have a schoolwide social emotional learning program that we have implemented. … It’s an ongoing issue that our children are dealing with.”

Roxborough High principal Kristin Williams-Smalley speaks to reporters

She said that Roxborough lost another student to gun violence in May.

During the last school year, 199 city students were shot, and 33 of those died, district officials said. Less than three weeks into this school year, five students have been shot, and one died. Philadelphia’s efforts to restrict gun ownership have been blocked by the courts and a state law that bars municipalities from enacting their own gun control measures.

Shortly before the shooting, Mayor Jim Kenney had signed a law that restricted gun possession at public spaces in the city, including parks, recreation centers, and pools, but it was overturned in a court challenge.

When Nicolas was killed, four other teens were wounded by the bullets flying out of an SUV that had been lying in wait near Roxborough High.

Police don’t believe Nicolas was the intended target. One of the shooters jumped out of the car and chased another, older boy down the street, firing at close range before his gun jammed.

Police have arrested four suspects in the killing and are still seeking a fifth person they believe was the main shooter.

This week, Nicolas’ mother, Meredith Elizalde, called on state lawmakers to enact gun reform. Nicolas was her only child, and he died in her arms.

“I want them to get on the front lines and fight for gun sense, because if you’re not, you’re just part of the problem,” Meredith Elizalde said.

Asked about the chances of gun reform, Williams-Smalley sounded weary.

“I’m tired to go to funerals. I’m tired of visiting my colleagues at their schools when something happens to be a support for them. We are all, my colleagues across the city, we are all tired of the violence that is pervasive.”

As the students dispersed after planting the crocuses, Saavedra called after them.

“We’ll water them later on,” he said.

A mural on one wall of Roxborough High in memory of Nicolas Elizalde features Nicolas’ football jersey number, 62.

Dale Mezzacappa is a senior writer for Chalkbeat Philadelphia, where she covers K-12 schools and early childhood education in Philadelphia. Contact Dale at dmezzacappa@chalkbeat.org.

Fired McAuliffe principal Kurt Dennis sues Denver Public Schools, alleging retaliation

2023-09-05T21:36:01+00:00

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Kurt Dennis, who was fired in July from his job as principal of McAuliffe International School, sued Denver Public Schools, Superintendent Alex Marrero, and six of the seven Denver school board members in federal court Tuesday.

The lawsuit, filed on Dennis’ behalf by civil rights attorney David Lane, alleges that DPS fired Dennis in retaliation for a televised interview he gave to 9News in March. In the interview, Dennis expressed concerns about a district practice that required McAuliffe staff to pat down a student charged with attempted murder to check for weapons.

Dennis gave the interview just days after a different student at Denver’s East High School, who was subject to the same type of weapons searches, shot and injured two school deans.

“Ultimately, Defendants are retaliating against Mr. Dennis, who exercised his right to free speech when he publicly criticized DPS and its unsafe policies in an effort to protect his students and staff from the horrifying specter of gun violence,” the lawsuit says.

A DPS spokesperson said Tuesday that the district could not comment on the allegations because “the lawsuit has not been served to DPS.”

“The allegations made in any complaint are not facts,” the district said in a statement. “We believe the preponderance of the evidence, some of which has already been released, will support our case and we look forward to responding fully in court.”

But district officials have commented before, and some of those comments are now cited in Dennis’ lawsuit.

Dennis’ initial safety concerns, his firing, rallies calling for him to be reinstated, and a subsequent district investigation into the improper use of a seclusion room at McAuliffe have been extensively covered by the local media for months.

In that time, DPS school board members made multiple public statements about Dennis, including at press conferences before and after the seclusion investigation was complete, and at meetings, such as when the board voted 6-1 last month to uphold his firing. Dennis is not suing Scott Baldermann, the one board member who voted no.

The lawsuit claims those statements were defamatory and “publicly advanced numerous pretextual reasons for the termination.” It claims board members tied Dennis to white supremacy and made statements “smearing him in public as a racist” by claiming that the seclusion room was used only for students of color, which Dennis disputes.

A district investigation found that Dennis placed students — or directed other staff to place students — in two seclusion rooms last year without proper supervision and then locked the door. But it did not find that Dennis disproportionately placed students of color in the rooms.

The lawsuit alleges DPS has not provided Dennis with an opportunity to clear his name, which has made it impossible for him to find a principal job in another school district.

In firing Dennis, DPS said he had improperly “divulged confidential student and legal records” in the 9News interview, put DPS at legal risk, caused the McAuliffe student who was being searched to be ostracized, and “repeatedly attempted to remove a young student of color” from the school, according to a document obtained by Chalkbeat.

The district also cited “a pattern of administrative actions” at McAuliffe that had a negative impact on students with disabilities and students of color, including the “overuse of out-of-school suspensions” for students of color, the document says.

The lawsuit doesn’t address the allegation about out-of-school suspensions. But it does claim that students of color achieved high academic results at McAuliffe, the district’s largest middle school. On average, McAuliffe students of color outperformed 88% of their peers statewide on state standardized tests in the 2021-22 school year, the lawsuit says.

The lawsuit also disputes that Dennis divulged confidential student records or caused the student who was being searched to be ostracized. The records Dennis provided to the press were redacted to remove personal information about the student, the lawsuit says.

Students who are subject to daily weapons searches “are already known by most everyone at the school, including fellow students, as ‘dangerous,’” the lawsuit says.

The student in this case was accused of shooting a liquor store clerk during a robbery attempt, the lawsuit says. The student wore a visible ankle bracelet as a condition of their bond and was escorted by a staff member at all times under a safety plan that deemed the student a threat, according to the lawsuit.

“Through no fault of Mr. Dennis, the identity of these students is, and always has been, widely known by other students and faculty throughout the school,” the lawsuit says.

The lawsuit also claims that Dennis was within his legal rights to request that the student be transferred to an online education program or expelled. DPS denied both requests, the lawsuit says.

In the wake of the East shooting, district leaders have defended a policy that allows students facing criminal charges to attend their regular schools while on bond.

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Weapons screening, cameras, and drones: What Philadelphia is doing to make students safer

2023-08-30T21:13:59+00:00

In an effort to save students’ lives and restore parents’ trust, Philadelphia is expanding the district’s use of weapons screening equipment in middle schools, updating surveillance cameras, and piloting drones to watch over school grounds.

The district is also extending its Safe Path program to nine new schools. The program pays adults in neighborhoods to patrol areas where students walk to and from school.

“Despite all of the things that you’ve seen across the city, and we’ve had some tragedy, our schools are the safest places for our kids to be,” Kevin Bethel, the district’s chief of school safety, said in a Wednesday press conference. “It is our job as adults to make sure we make it as safe as possible for them.”

Though law enforcement officials have said shootings in the city have declined this year compared to the same period in the prior year, gun violence has become an inescapable reality for students and young people in Philadelphia.

Nearly 200 students were shot during the previous school year and 33 young people died, according to the district. Eighteen guns were recovered from students in the district last school year, Bethel said.

This year, Bethel, outgoing Mayor Jim Kenney, Philadelphia Superintendent Tony Watlington, and Board of Education President Reginald Streater said they’ll do “everything we can” to ensure student safety. But Kenney said because guns are so easy to come by in Pennsylvania, safety challenges will likely persist this school year.

“Until we get our arms around this commonwealth’s issues relative to the availability of guns we’re still going to be running uphill,” Kenney said. “Everybody seems to have a gun.”

The city’s young people seem to share that sentiment. At a gun violence roundtable in early August, one student told Chalkbeat she felt like “no matter how hard you try to fix something that’s so constant, it’s never ending.”

The Philadelphia district’s school year begins Sept. 5. Here is what the district and city say they will do this year:

— Continue to hire crossing guards to patrol heavily trafficked school areas. So far, the city has assigned 650 crossing guards to schools across Philadelphia, and the city is still accepting applications, officials said.

— Update 150 analog cameras to digital cameras over the next three years and merge the cameras’ monitoring systems with those of the city government. Watlington has pledged this update as part of the district’s five-year strategic plan.

— Introduce new “minimally invasive gun detection systems” in 14 middle schools. Those systems will appear as two stanchions in school doorways that students must walk through, rather than a full standup metal detector or wand.

Students won’t have to take off their backpacks, or send their personal belongings through a conveyor belt like at the airport, to pass through these systems, Bethel said. In previous years, parents, students, and teachers have expressed concerns that metal detectors could make students feel like criminals. Bethel said these new “less intrusive” detectors were chosen because district officials were looking for technology “that did not add to the trauma of our young people.”

— Expand the Safe Path program from 13 schools to 22 schools in partnership with the University of Pennsylvania. Those programs will come online incrementally, Bethel said, as community groups “get on board” with staffing, security clearances, and vetting through Penn. Though maintaining consistent staffing for these programs was challenging when they launched in 2022-23, Bethel said he hopes they will be fully staffed this school year.

— Launch district-owned drones, in some cases piloted by students. Bethel said the district is still in the early stages of planning for drones, but they are looking into expanding the use of drones to patrol violence-prone areas without the need for police on the ground. Bethel said he’s aware of concerns about increasing student and city resident surveillance, but said “the core purpose” of using them would be to “make sure that I’m keeping my children safe. There’s no ulterior motive to try to look for.”

Bethel said students would not monitor the drone footage, however, as the idea of students surveilling other students is highly controversial.

“We don’t want to put kids in a position where their … peers could construe it to be something negative,” Bethel said.

— Increase participation in the city’s many out-of-school-time programs. These include homework help, field trips to ice skating rinks and museums in and around Philadelphia, peer mentoring programs, and community-based prevention programs for youth who have been impacted by violence.

— Increase Philadelphia police presence in and around schools using a new $600,000 grant. At Wednesday’s press conference, Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw did not give an estimate for how many officers this would pay for.

— Train all district employees in ALICE active shooter response training; ALICE stands for Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, and Evacuate. This comes after school staff expressed concern that their prior training was inadequate, and Watlington and the school board committed nearly $1 million to upgrade their approach.

Carly Sitrin is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Philadelphia. Contact Carly at csitrin@chalkbeat.org.

Tennessee’s special session on public safety ends with little action on guns

2023-08-30T01:56:49+00:00

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Parents who lobbied for curtailing access to guns after a horrific school shooting in Nashville blasted the Tennessee legislature’s special session on public safety, which ended Tuesday without the passage of a single bill targeting the state’s lax gun laws.

In their six days of work, lawmakers approved three bills designed to speed up background checks, provide free gun locks to Tennessee residents, and require an annual state report on human trafficking.

Another approved measure, which appropriates money to cover the estimated $340,000 cost of the session, also includes extra funding for school safety officers, mental health resources and workers, and an advertising campaign encouraging gun owners to lock up their weapons.

But none of the bills that passed specifically address concerns about easy access to guns that were raised by the March 27 shooting at Nashville’s Covenant School, where a 28-year-old intruder used legally purchased guns to shoot through glass doors and kill three students and three adults. Authorities said the shooter, who died after being shot by police, was under a doctor’s care for an “emotional disorder.”

The disconnect — after days of protests, prayers, and pleas for meaningful reforms — left parents, students, and gun control activists angry.

“We’re talking about life and death, and this legislature has basically done nothing,” said Sierra Barnett, a mother of two preschoolers in Mt. Juliet, near Nashville.

Barnett was among the throng of mostly female demonstrators who showed up daily during the session to urge lawmakers to pass a bill letting judges order the removal of firearms from people at risk of hurting themselves and others.

“I’m devastated, and I hope people are paying attention,” she said tearfully in the Capitol Rotunda after lawmakers had exited. “I’m praying there’s an uproar across the state of Tennessee.”

Governor calls extra funding a victory

Gov. Bill Lee, who was largely absent during the gun debate after lawmakers convened on Aug. 21, framed the session’s output as “important, difficult, and hopeful.”

“We made progress and elevated a conversation about public safety that will continue into the future,” he told reporters.

In his remarks, Lee cited the legislature’s appropriation of more than $100 million in additional one-time funding as a victory, including:

$50 million to bolster community mental health agencies;
$30 million for safety upgrades at higher education education institutions;
$10 million in K-12 safety grants to provide school resource officers for charter schools or school safety officers for schools that can’t immediately hire an SRO due to a shortage of law enforcement officers;
$12 million for sign-on and retention bonuses for mental health workers in the state Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services;
$4 million for behavioral health safety net grants;
$3 million for a scholarship program for people wanting to work in the mental health field;
$1.6 million to provide free gun locks to Tennessee residents and to pay for an ad campaign on gun safety through the state Department of Safety

Gov. Bill Lee speaks with reporters about the results of Tennessee’s special legislative session on public safety that adjourned on Aug. 29, 2023.

“Our state is safer today as a result of this session,” said Lee, noting that the legislature also invested $230 million more in school safety earlier this year.

But outnumbered Democrats slammed the governor and GOP leadership for results that they called “fluff” and “solution-less.”

“It’s been a complete waste of time,” said House Minority Leader Karen Camper, of Memphis. “The people wanted more and expected more.”

“No one should leave this building saying we made Tennessee safer,” said Senate Minority Leader Raumesh Akbari, also of Memphis, where 115 children have been injured or killed in gun violence since January.

“People made a lot of promises. When we come back in January” for the regular legislative session, Akbari added, “we sure as hell better do something.”

Lee’s proclamation put gun control proposals out of reach

More than a hundred bills were filed based on Lee’s official proclamation, which called lawmakers back to the Capitol and identified 18 potential topics, from school safety to juvenile justice to mental health. But the governor backed off of his early proposal for a law to keep guns out of the hands of people having a mental health crisis.

Democrats complained that parameters set by Lee left little room for meaningful gun reforms in one of the most gun-friendly states in America. For instance, Lee said lawmakers could pass measures that encourage safe storage of firearms, but not enact penalties for failing to do so.

A gun control advocate holds up a sign outside the Tennessee State Capitol in Nashville on August 21, 2023, the first day of the legislature’s special session on public safety.

Lee’s proclamation opened the door, however, to proposals that could put more guns in schools — several of which advanced out of House committees but ultimately stalled.

One proposal to let citizens with enhanced permits carry handguns in schools narrowly failed in the House Education Committee after clearing two earlier panels, while Rep. Ryan Williams of Cookeville pulled his bill to arm teachers who meet certain requirements. Williams said the legislature can take up his bill next year in regular session.

The House sought to pass more than a dozen bills, including ones requiring all public and private schools to create alarm policies that differentiate emergencies for fire, weather, or an active shooter; expand handgun carry policies at private schools to include pre-K; enact harsher penalties for juvenile offenders; and increase penalties for stalking.

But the Senate worked to limit the number of bills debated. On the session’s third day, its education committee met for less than a minute and tabled all 21 items on its agenda.

Ultimately, the Senate’s refusal to negotiate differences with the House led to an abrupt adjournment of both chambers.

“You’ve done nothing!” “Do your job!” “Vote them out!” chanted spectators as Republican leaders gaveled out their daily sessions.

Legislative process unraveled amid political infighting

Democratic Reps. Justin Jones of Nashville and Justin Pearson of Memphis speak with supporters and reporters after adjournment.

The session in Nashville was frequently chaotic, with issues about school and public safety often overshadowed by political infighting, the expulsion of protesters, GOP efforts to limit public access to the Capitol, a lawsuit over new House rules prohibiting spectators from holding up paper signs, and several incidents of representatives shoving each other on the floor of the House in the tense minutes after adjournment.

“Things got hot,” House Speaker Cameron Sexton said about brief physical interactions that involved him, Republican Reps. Justin Lafferty of Knoxville and Scott Cepicky of Culleoka, and Democratic Reps. Justin Jones of Nashville and Justin Pearson of Memphis.

“We’re moving forward from it,” Sexton said when asked if he would pursue disciplinary action against those involved. “At this point, I think everybody needs to figure out how to calm down.”

Parents of several students at The Covenant School, who actively lobbied for several bills to bolster school safety and mental health, said they had hoped for more out of their elected officials. Several were in tears at various points throughout the week as they tried to advocate for legislation on behalf of their children and the victims killed at their private Christian school: Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs, and William Kinney, all age 9; custodian Mike Hill and substitute teacher Cynthia Peak, both 61, and Katherine Koonce, 60, the head of the school.

Sarah Shoop Neumann, joined by other parents at The Covenant School, speaks during a press conference on the steps of the Tennessee State Capitol on August 21, 2023.

“Today is a difficult day,” said David Teague, a father of two children at Covenant. “A tremendous opportunity to make our children safer and create brighter tomorrow’s has been missed. And I am saddened for all Tennesseans.”

Sarah Shoop Neumann, another Covenant parent, called for respectful, thoughtful, bipartisan debate going forward to work to diminish gun violence.

“Those who are not of this mindset do not deserve a seat in the House or the Senate,” Neumann said, “and we will work toward ensuring every one of those seats is replaced by someone who has a true desire to listen to their constituents over firearm association lobbyists.”

“We will be back in January.”

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Bills to let Tennessee teachers and citizens carry guns in schools advance in legislature

2023-08-23T01:00:37+00:00

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Two bills that would let some teachers and citizens carry handguns in Tennessee public schools cleared a House subcommittee Tuesday, but Senate leaders signaled they’ll work to stymie the proposals in their chamber.

Meanwhile, House Republican leaders continued to crack down on behaviors from gun control advocates deemed as disruptive during the second day of a special legislative session on public safety.

The developments reflected mounting tensions in Tennessee’s splintering gun debate after Gov. Bill Lee called lawmakers back to the Capitol in response to a Nashville school shooting that left six people and the shooter dead — and prompted mass demonstrations from gun control advocates during the legislature’s regular session.

While GOP leaders want to focus this week on juvenile justice and mental health issues, polls show that most Tennessee voters want them to tighten the state’s lax gun laws. However, because of the limited scope of the governor’s proclamation, the legislature won’t take up gun control measures during its special session.

And Lee, whose wife knew two of the adult victims at The Covenant School, where the shooting occurred on March 27, appears to have abandoned his proposal for keeping firearms out of the hands of people having a mental health crisis. Since issuing his proclamation for the special session two weeks ago, he’s had no visible presence at the Capitol and made few public appearances.

A day after the House’s GOP supermajority passed rules that will limit debate, ban signs, and allow fewer members of the public inside the Capitol, state troopers escorted several women holding up paper signs with anti-gun messages from a legislative hearing room. Minutes later, troopers cleared the packed room of everyone but lawmakers, staff, and media after a handful of people ignored several warnings against clapping during committee business.

“Everything feels really raw right now,” said Linda McFadyen-Ketchum, a retired teacher and leader with her Nashville-area chapter of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America.

“People are angry and frightened,” she said, especially over any notion that the solution to gun violence is more guns.

Proposals would put more guns in schools

Both GOP-sponsored bills that advanced in the House Civil Justice Subcommittee would open the door to people other than law enforcement officers having guns in schools.

One measure would let a teacher or school staff member carry a concealed handgun after completing 40 hours of certified training in school policing at their own expense, as well as passing a mental health evaluation and FBI background check.

It would be up to the local district whether to let employees carry firearms under the legislation sponsored by Rep. Ryan Williams of Cookeville and Sen. Paul Bailey of Sparta.

But the school’s parents and students would not have to be notified under this legislation, which runs counter to the GOP’s emphasis on parental rights and notification in other areas of education, such as curriculum and library materials.

A second bill would allow a person with an enhanced permit, which requires eight hours of training, to carry a handgun openly or concealed in any K-12 public school building, campus, or bus. The proposal also would apply to law enforcement officers and military personnel, whether on duty, off duty, or retired.

The bill, sponsored by Bailey in the Senate and Rep. Chris Todd of Jackson, is opposed by Lee’s administration, which budgeted an extra $140 million this spring to place a full-time, armed officer in every public school in the state, beginning this school year.

Todd countered that many schools still don’t have SROs because of a shortage of law enforcement officers. And he noted that private schools already can set policies so that some employees carry handguns.

Several citizens spoke against any measures that would place additional burdens on teachers.

Sarah Shoop Neumann, a parent at The Covenant School, said she believes the tragedy would have been worse if teachers had focused on anything but keeping students safe in their classrooms as the shooter walked the hallways.

Sarah Shoop Neumann, joined by other parents at The Covenant School in Nashville, speaks during a press conference on the steps of the Tennessee State Capitol on Aug. 21, 2023.

Fighting back tears, she recounted conversations with Covenant teachers who described how their hands shook while they worked to keep their students quiet, hidden, and secure.

“They are heroes,” she said. “They enacted every protocol in place perfectly, and they could not have done those things if they were also meant to be armed and go out and attack the shooter.”

More votes are scheduled

Both House bills are scheduled to be taken up Wednesday in the Civil Justice Committee. But their path in the Senate looks harder, judging by the actions and comments of several GOP leaders in that chamber.

The Senate Judiciary Committee was scheduled to take up the Senate version of Todd’s bill on Tuesday, but didn’t vote on it. The committee, chaired by Todd Gardenhire of Chattanooga, passed only three of 55 bills on its calendar before adjourning.

The bills must clear committees chaired by Sens. Todd Gardenhire and Jon Lundberg (front left).

In the days after the Covenant shooting, Gardenhire said he would defer any action on gun-related legislation until next year.

The Senate version of Williams’ bill — to let some teachers carry firearms — is scheduled for a vote Wednesday in the Senate Education Committee.

But on Tuesday, Sen. Jon Lundsberg of Bristol, who chairs the panel, indicated he would vote against it.

Any bills to allow guns in schools “require a great deal of input from multiple stakeholders,” he told Chalkbeat. “I believe they would require several weeks of testimony and input.”

Currently, special session business is scheduled through Thursday, although leaders could extend it several more days.

Also Tuesday, three bills to create so-called extreme risk protection orders failed in the same House subcommittee where members of the public were kicked out. Those bills, sponsored by Democratic Rep. Bob Freeman of Nashville, would allow courts to order temporary removal of firearms from people at risk of hurting themselves or others.

Authorities said the 28-year-old shooter at the Covenant School was seeing a doctor for an “emotional disorder” and had legally obtained multiple weapons.

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Tennessee legislature will avoid gun control in special session prompted by mass school shooting

2023-08-22T00:12:11+00:00

As Tennessee lawmakers and lobbyists returned to the state Capitol Monday to discuss guns and public safety, 12-year-old student Juliette Dominguez showed up too, in hopes that her perspective would make a difference.

Fresh from two days of classroom instruction on how to respond if an armed intruder breaks into her school, Juliette was frustrated that Tennessee is focusing on preparing school communities to defend themselves from people with guns — instead of taking action to restrict gun access from people at risk of hurting themselves or others.

“Why is this something that children should have to worry about?” asked Juliette, a seventh grader in Goodlettsville, north of Nashville.

Gov. Bill Lee called the special legislative session in response to a school shooting in Nashville in which three 9-year-old children and three adults were killed. The session is expected to last a week.

But any drive to tighten Tennessee’s gun laws has been squelched by a Republican supermajority in one of the nation’s most gun-friendly states, even as a recent poll of Tennessee voters showed significant bipartisan support for various gun regulations.

More than a hundred bills have been filed based on Lee’s official proclamation identifying 18 potential topics, from school safety to juvenile justice to mental health. But Lee’s proclamation never uses the word “gun,” and it mentions “firearms” only in relation to measures that would encourage safe storage of weapons, but with no new penalties allowed.

The House also passed new rules Monday in response to the body’s dramatic expulsion in April of two Democratic members for the way they protested the body’s failure to pursue significant gun reforms this spring. Under the changes, Speaker Cameron Sexton can suspend recognition of members for escalating amounts of time if he determines they are disrupting legislative business, speaking off topic, or impugning another member. The rules also limit the number of people allowed in the chamber’s galleries, as well as the nearby rotunda.

“The rules that are being put forward now are to limit freedom of speech,” said Rep. Justin Pearson of Memphis, who was expelled and then reelected in a special election this month. “With these rules, you are silencing our constituency.”

Lee called lawmakers back after acknowledging that the March 27 attack on The Covenant School confounded many elements of Tennessee’s school safety policies, including a sweeping plan that Lee had proposed just weeks earlier to require all K-12 public schools to keep their exterior doors locked, among other things.

Eventually, the legislature increased funding to further fortify both public and private schools but rejected the governor’s late proposal for a law allowing authorities to temporarily remove guns from people having a mental health emergency.

Gun control advocates, who held mass demonstrations after the tragedy and while lawmakers were in their regular session, returned to the Capitol as lawmakers prepared to start the special session, even as Nashville police recommended that people avoid the downtown area this week if possible.

At the invitation of a coalition of Christian groups, hundreds of people, including Juliette and her family, encircled the stone building in the morning to pray for passage of meaningful gun restrictions.

“I’m tired of people saying there’s nothing we can do, because we seem to be able to do things about everything else,” said Juliette’s mother, Jen. “We’re quick to yank books off of library shelves, or limit how students can dress. Why are guns impossible?”

Jen Dominguez stands outside of the state Capitol with her children Juliette, Alice, and Celia, after participating in a prayer circle for gun control on Aug. 21, 2023.

Meanwhile, a group of parents of surviving students at The Covenant School endorsed 10 bills that they said offer a start. They praised proposals to beef up school safety plans but said there’s an urgent need for new laws to keep guns out of the hands of people having a mental health crisis and for the state to provide more mental health care. They also criticized several bills that could allow teachers to be armed in school.

“As the spouse of an educator and the child of a retired educator, I am acutely aware, especially this time of year as we head back to school, of the heavy demands and lack of margins many of our teachers currently have,” said David Teague, the parent of two children at The Covenant School. “We should not add armed security guard to their list of extracurriculars.”

The Covenant School serves about 200 students in preschool to sixth grade. The six people killed there were students Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs, and William Kinney, all age 9; and three school staff members: custodian Mike Hill and substitute teacher Cynthia Peak, both 61, and Katherine Koonce, 60, the head of the school.

Authorities said the 28-year-old shooter was seeing a doctor for an “emotional disorder” and had legally obtained multiple weapons.

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Community violence is traumatizing my students. Here’s how I help them cope.

2023-08-18T14:15:00+00:00

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Half of Chicagoans will witness a shooting before they turn 40. And the average age of a Chicago resident witnessing gun violence: 14. That’s according to a new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

What does this disturbing data say about the collective trauma Chicagoans are experiencing? What does it mean for the long-term well-being of our children? These questions loom large for me since I work with teens and preteens who attend Chicago Public Schools. My goal is to help students stay in school by giving them the tools to cope with trauma, set goals, make progress on their graduation plans, and prepare for life beyond high school.

LaToya Winton

For the past two years, I’ve worked at a K-8 school in Chicago’s West Englewood neighborhood, providing one-on-one counseling and other programs through the nonprofit Communities In Schools of Chicago.

West Englewood is made up of sturdy bungalows and two-flats located about a dozen miles southwest of Chicago’s Loop. It also happens to be one of the Chicago neighborhoods where gun violence is most prevalent. As of Aug. 1, 69 people have been shot; that’s about one shooting every three days. Seven of those victims were teens, just like my students.

These are more than grim statistics to me. I grew up in West Englewood, near the school I work in today. One of my extended family members was a victim of gun violence, so I know all too well that every shooting represents a person, a family, and a community devastated.

Despite the neighborhood’s tough reputation, the block I grew up on in the early 1990s was a nurturing place where we watched each other’s back and celebrated graduations and birthdays together. Bad things went on back then, but as a kid, I felt mostly insulated from it because of the strength of my caring family and neighbors.

Things are harder now for kids in West Englewood, despite many families still wanting the best for their children. Many former residents have moved away, leaving old familiar streets frayed. Enrollment has declined in the area’s schools, including the one where I’m based. Poverty and joblessness are a fact of life as well, with almost half the community’s households earning less than $25,000 a year.

Each day, I see young people coming to school with clear signs of distress. Last fall, for example, one of my students lost a brother in a shooting. He tried to keep his emotions under control, but one day a class discussion reminded him of the incident, and he stormed out of the room and punched lockers in the hallway.

Another one of my students who lost an older brother to gun violence broke down in tears in my office. She had come in to speak to me about her loss, and I sat with her, listened, and let her feel those emotions. I also asked her to share with me some of the good times she had with her brother and told her that I was always there to talk if she needed it.

Each day, I see young people coming to school with clear signs of distress.

We don’t keep official records about which of our students have been directly impacted by gun violence, but the numbers are high; by my estimate, at least 20 of the 50 students I provided one-on-one support to last school year either saw a shooting or know a friend or loved one harmed or impacted by gun violence. Gun violence prevention isn’t in my job title, but so much of my work involves me helping young people cope with and curb community violence. I’m lucky to have support from teachers, administrators, and fellow counselors where I work.

How do you teach students to avoid violence? It starts with building trusting relationships with young people and steadily equipping them with the knowledge and skills they need to lead safer lives. This is far from a one-size-fits-all strategy, but there are key principles that the work is grounded in:

Building positive relationships is an essential life skill that can be taught. I want my students to know that they can come to me for encouragement and feedback, and I’ll always strive to be transparent and relatable.
Encouraging effective coping strategies — from deep breathing to creating art to reflective journaling — can help young people learn to manage stress and anxiety. During our sessions, I provide a space for students to sit with their emotions. Often, the young men whom I work with think crying is a sign of weakness; on the contrary, showing their emotions is a sign of strength.
Offering more evidence-based approaches like cognitive-behavioral therapy and brief solution-focused interventions for students who need more robust support. This can reduce fight-or-flight responses and help students choose the path of de-escalation.
Building young people’s self-esteem and sense of purpose in life helps them frame interpersonal conflicts within a broader context, increasing the chances they will pursue peaceful solutions. Small discussion groups, such as the one I hold for girls in fifth and sixth grades, have helped some of my students find their voice.

There are no overnight transformations. This work takes time, patience, and consistency to make a difference. I’m also aware that even when my students embrace these principles and make great progress, we are still sending them out into a city where community violence is all too common and anything can happen. We adults have to acknowledge those risks, even as we work tirelessly to empower young people to lead positive and peaceful lives.

LaToya Winton is a student supports manager at Communities In Schools of Chicago, a Chicago nonprofit helping students succeed in school and stay on the path to high school graduation.

Philadelphia families rejoice at school’s new playground amid fears for children’s safety

2023-08-17T22:24:53+00:00

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When Duane Watts was a student at Edward Steel Elementary School in Philadelphia’s Nicetown neighborhood more than 40 years ago, he remembers running excitedly out of his classroom for recess and being confronted with concrete.

No swings, no slides, no monkey bars to climb on. “We would play tag, but nothing was actually present and given to us to play with,” he said.

But that’s no longer true for the children attending Steel, a pre-K-8 school of more than 300 students. On Thursday morning, school officials and nonprofit leaders cut the ribbon on a new $45,000 playground in Steel’s side yard.

Built over the summer with donated funds, the playground gives children more room to play at a time when policies like the city curfew and restrictions on unaccompanied minors at businesses, as well as gun violence that has affected Nicetown and other Philadelphia neighborhoods, have made it harder for children to congregate and spend productive time together in public spaces.

Teachers and counselors at Steel who fought for the playground by writing grants and building partnerships and community support for it looked on in tears at the ribbon cutting. At least a dozen parents brought their children to be the first to test out the new equipment.

“This is a huge deal for us,” said Nicole Wyglendowski, a special education teacher for K-3 students who helped with the effort. Younger children especially need playgrounds with inviting activities to help them to learn to get along with each other and “just have fun,” she said.

Counselor Maria Lajara, who helped write the grant proposal for the playground with fellow counselor Klarissa Hudson, pointed out most Steel students “don’t really have a nearby city playground that is safe to play in. They want to play, and they didn’t have anything to play with. This is a great asset for them, they deserve that.”

A study in 2019 found that only one third of Philadelphia’s schools had playgrounds, and most of those were in more affluent areas. Advocates have made the case that quality playtime is vital to children’s physical and emotional health, and the lack of playgrounds in some areas of the city has become part of the broader debate about the need for educational equity.

District spokesperson Marissa Orbanek said the situation has improved since then. Of 149 district schools with elementary-age students in the city, 79 have fully equipped playgrounds and 70 don’t, although 11 of those have play equipment in various stages of planning or construction.

The cost of the playground was underwritten by The Block Cares, a two-year-old nonprofit organization with a mission to uplift children; the Robert Half Company, a recruiting firm; and some private donations. The Block Cares is affiliated with The Block Church, a non-denominational Christian congregation founded in 2014.

Maria Little, director at The Block Cares, said her organization has a “mission to empower urban youth and kids to experience a limitless future.” When the organization began working in the Nicetown area, it connected with Steel Elementary and became especially interested in supporting teachers and students as they returned to in-person learning from the pandemic.

Parent Samantha Dowd, who has five children at Steel, had just heard that morning about the playground and the dedication ceremony.

“I was shocked,” she said. “This is really nice. To see something like this is important, especially at a time when so many tragedies are happening,” referring to the gun violence that is plaguing the city.

She was grateful her kids now have a safe space to play. As she spoke, her son Isaac Carter was already on the monkey bars, and her daughters were enjoying the swings. “It’s fun,” Isaac said.

Najalene Bey’s daughter, third grader Amina Ray, made a beeline for the swings as soon as she could. Bey said she had attended Steel herself. When she was a student, they would play sidewalk games like hopscotch, foursquare and jump rope during recess. But surveying the new playground, she said, “I wish we had this.”

Grandmother Darlena Green, watching the children, observed: “They’re not gonna go home now.”

Orbanek said that the district partners with outside organizations for funding what she called “schoolyard transformations.” They include the Eagles Annual Playground Build project and the Trust for Public Land (although not The Block Cares). Grants are provided by the William Penn Foundation, earmarked funds through state legislators, and neighborhood groups connected to schools. (Chalkbeat receives funding from the William Penn Foundation.) The Steel project falls into the latter category.

She noted that the district’s strategic plan includes providing safe, welcoming spaces for students, and that building more playgrounds fits into this.

“We have a vision for our schoolyards to be much more than paved asphalt parking lots,” said Oz Hill, the district’s chief of operations, in a statement. “We strive to provide a dynamic space for playful learning with green space, active recreation, quiet areas, and space to refocus and unwind and creatively engage in learning and socializing through play.”

Watts, who remembers the schoolyard’s concrete during his days as a Steel student, is now the school’s academic teacher leader. After graduating from Dobbins Area Vocational Technical High School and attending college, he went on to a career in finance before switching to education.

He has family members who still live in Nicetown, and he said the neighborhood’s public park is not safe.

“Yeah, this is significant,” he said. “To see this now as a new playground in the area and have it attached to the school that I attended, and the community having access to it, it’s just indescribable.”

Dale Mezzacappa is a senior writer for Chalkbeat Philadelphia, where she covers K-12 schools and early childhood education in Philadelphia. Contact Dale at dmezzacappa@chalkbeat.org.

Tennessee governor calls lawmakers back to address guns, public safety after school shooting

2023-08-08T23:09:47+00:00

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Defying Tennessee’s powerful gun lobby, Gov. Bill Lee said Tuesday he’s calling lawmakers back to the state Capitol on Aug. 21 to take up public safety proposals after a shooter killed three children and three adults at a Nashville school this spring.

The Republican governor, whose wife knew several of the adult victims at the private church campus known as The Covenant School, wants legislators in one of the nation’s most gun-friendly states to pass a law to keep firearms out of the hands of people who could hurt themselves or others.

The 28-year-old shooter at The Covenant School was shot and killed by police on the campus after using legally purchased firearms in the March 27 attack. Authorities later said the shooter was seeing a doctor for an “emotional disorder.”

In calling for a law allowing “temporary mental health orders of protection,” Lee has tried to satisfy gun rights advocates who view any restrictions as an infringement of Second Amendment rights.

“As our nation faces evolving public safety threats, Tennessee remains vigilant and is taking continued action to protect communities while preserving the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens,” Lee said in a statement.

But Democrats said Lee’s official proclamation doesn’t go far enough to try to address the proliferation of guns across Tennessee.

“For such a broad call, this proclamation somehow manages to miss the target,” said Rep. John Ray Clemmons of Nashville, who chairs the House Democratic Caucus.

Lee’s proclamation is important because it sets the legal parameters for what they can and can’t take up.

The list of what’s fair game is long and includes mental health resources, providers, and related Medicaid coverage; school safety policies; measures encouraging safe storage of firearms; and timely law enforcement access to criminal and juvenile records, as well as to records for individuals “who are subject to mental health commitment.”

It also includes stalking offenses, reports from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation regarding human trafficking, the structure or operations of state or local courts, and limiting the circumstances in which juvenile records may be expunged.

The call comes after the governor met privately this summer with small groups of lawmakers to talk through his proposal and their ideas for quelling gun violence and increasing school safety in hopes of eventually passing meaningful legislation.

Then just a week ago, police in Memphis shot a man suspected of trying to enter a Jewish school with a gun.

Meanwhile, advocates on both sides of the gun debate have pressed Lee to pursue or abandon the special session.

Last weekend, the state’s Republican executive committee adopted a resolution encouraging Lee to back off, while groups like the National Rifle Association and the National Association for Gun Rights have urged legislators to oppose any gun control measures.

“We expect Tennessee Republicans to stand firm in their defense of the Second Amendment and vote to adjourn the special session upon its start in August,” Dudley Brown, president of the gun rights association, said last month.

On the other side, numerous gun control advocates have launched campaigns promoting firearm safety legislation. A Democratic-backed bus tour of the state kicks off Wednesday in Memphis to talk with Tennesseans about gun violence. Everytown for Gun Safety is spending $100,000 on digital ads, while Voices for a Safer Tennessee released a video message featuring the mother of Evelyn Diekhaus, one of the victims, on what would have been her 10th birthday.

“What’s more important?” asked Katy Dieckhaus, in her emotional plea for “responsible firearm safety laws that will work toward protecting our children and their right to life.”

The shooting at Covenant happened as lawmakers were meeting in their regular session, sparking daily mass demonstrations at the Capitol by Tennesseans protesting loose gun laws, especially those allowing easy access to military-style semiautomatic weapons.

Lawmakers responded by passing the governor’s sweeping school safety plan, which pumped $230 million more into hardening public and private K-12 schools by hiring additional armed security guards, upgrading school buildings, and placing a homeland security agent in every Tennessee county, among other things.

But most of them rebuffed Lee’s proposal to pass a law to restrict gun access for people experiencing a mental health crisis. Instead, after a House vote to expel two Democratic representatives for the way they protested the failure to pursue significant gun reforms, the GOP-controlled legislature rushed to adjourn in May without revisiting those laws. Lee quickly vowed to call a special session on the matter.

The governor has lobbied for Tennessee to pass a law on “extreme risk protection orders” and has avoided references to a so-called red flag law, which he has described as a “toxic political label.” Nineteen states have such laws on the books, including Florida, which passed its version after 17 people were murdered in the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, despite numerous complaints to law enforcement about threatening statements by the 19-year-old gunman.

An extreme risk order allows courts to temporarily remove guns — typically for up to a year — from people deemed a threat to themselves or others. Family members or law enforcement often must petition a court for an order.

Soon after issuing his proclamation, Lee came under fire from both sides of the debate.

Senate Democratic Leader Raumesh Akbari of Memphis said the governor’s proclamation will prevent most gun safety reforms from being debated during the upcoming session.

“A promise to do something to stop future shootings was made to Covenant parents, but sadly this proclamation eliminates many paths forward,” Akbari said in a statement.

Victims in the Nashville shooting were students Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs, and William Kinney, all age 9; and three school staff members: custodian Mike Hill and substitute teacher Cynthia Peak, both 61, and Katherine Koonce, 60, the head of the school.

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Tickets and arrests didn’t increase when SROs were reinstated at Denver schools, police data shows

2023-07-27T22:42:33+00:00

Tickets and arrests of students at 13 Denver Public Schools campuses were lower when police officers were not stationed inside the school buildings than when they were, according to state and local data from the 2019-20 and 2022-23 school years.

The data backs a key criticism of school resource officers, which is that they increase tickets and arrests and feed the school-to-prison pipeline.

But when SROs were reintroduced on those 13 campuses for the last two months of the 2022-23 school year, after a shooting inside East High School, the monthly average of tickets and arrests did not go up, according to data from the Denver Police Department.

East High student Stella Kaye has a theory as to why.

When Kaye, a 16-year-old junior, thought about the data on SROs, “I thought about, Wow, they probably know how many people don’t want them to be there,” she said. “So if they start arresting kids left and right, it would not look good for the police or DPS. It’s almost like they had to be on their best behavior. It’s like they were put in their place a little bit.”

It’s a theory shared by parents, students, advocates, and elected officials on both sides of the issue. Those who support the return of SROs point to the data as a hopeful sign that students won’t be overpoliced. Those opposed to SROs are skeptical that two months of data, at a time when school safety was closely watched, proves that anything will be different.

When school starts in Denver next month, SROs will be back at the same 13 high school campuses. The data from the 2019-20 and 2022-23 school years provides a window — albeit a limited one — into what parents and students can expect.

DPS had SROs starting in the 1990s. In the 2019-20 school year, SROs were stationed at 18 middle and high schools. Those 18 campuses included the 13 that will have an SRO this fall.

In 2019-20, there were 30 student arrests and 160 tickets issued on those 13 campuses, according to the Colorado Division of Criminal Justice, which uses data from law enforcement agencies and school districts to track student interactions with police.

In the summer of 2020, amid nationwide protests against racist policing, the Denver school board unanimously voted to end DPS’ contract with the Denver Police Department. The 18 SROs were phased out of schools the following year, and gone by June 2021.

The pandemic made it difficult to assess the impact of removing SROs. The 2020-21 school year was largely remote for high school students, and the following year, 2021-22, was interrupted by returns to remote learning as COVID variants spiked.

This past school year, 2022-23, was the first prolonged test of in-person school without SROs. Data from the Denver Police Department shows that arrests and tickets at the 13 campuses were lower this past year than in 2019-20 when the campuses had SROs.

In 2022-23, there were 18 student arrests at the 13 campuses, compared to 30 in 2019-20 for those same campuses — a 40% decrease. Similarly, there were 75 tickets issued to students at the 13 campuses this past year, compared to 160 in 2019-20 — a 53% decrease.

A majority of the tickets — 57 of the 75 — were for assault or public fighting.

The 2022-23 data includes the months of April and May, when SROs were temporarily placed at the 13 campuses following a shooting inside East High on March 22. A 17-year-old student shot and injured two deans before fleeing and taking his own life.

After SROs were reinstated, the number of tickets and arrests at the 13 campuses held steady at about 10 incidents per month across all 13 campuses, the data shows. Most of the incidents were tickets. Only two students, both 15 years old, were arrested in that time period: one for third-degree assault and one for indecent exposure, according to the data.

School board member Scott Baldermann wrote the policy to reintroduce SROs. The policy includes a requirement that DPS monitor the number of times SROs ticket or arrest students to ensure marginalized students aren’t disproportionately targeted.

Before SROs were removed, Black students were targeted more often. In 2018-19, one in four tickets or arrests involved Black DPS students, even though only about one in seven students were Black, state data showed. The monitoring is meant to safeguard against racist policing.

“Now they’re being watched,” Baldermann said.

But the 2022-23 data also shows a disproportionality. White students were underrepresented in tickets and arrests, while Black students were overrepresented. A third of tickets and arrests in 2022-23 involved Black students, but only 14% of DPS students are Black.

Steve Katsaros, an East High parent who helped form a safety advocacy group after the March shooting, is supportive of SROs. But he said the bigger issue is DPS’ rules for when educators can suspend or expel students or call the police. Those rules are spelled out in a chart known as the discipline matrix, which DPS amended in 2021 to limit calls to police.

“The elephant in the room is that the discipline matrix says educators cannot refer to [the Denver Police Department],” Katsaros said.

Given the changes to the discipline matrix and other factors, such as the effects of the pandemic on students’ behavior, Katsaros said it’s hard to draw conclusions by comparing data from before and after remote learning. “The data can be twisted,” he said.

Elsa Bañuelos-Lindsay is also skeptical of the data. She is the executive director of Movimiento Poder, an advocacy organization that strongly opposed the return of SROs.

“Our worry as an organization is we will see an increase … in the criminalization of [Black, Indigenous, people of color] working-class young people,” Bañuelos-Lindsay said, and “a lot of schools relying on policing to deal with issues that should be dealt with in schools, like mental health.”

Seventeen-year-old Skye O’Toole is a student at Denver School of the Arts, which doesn’t have an SRO. At a closed-door school board meeting held the day after the East High shooting, Superintendent Alex Marrero said DSA had turned down the offer of an SRO this past spring, a recently released recording revealed.

But that’s no guarantee DSA won’t get an SRO sometime in the future. It’s an outcome that O’Toole, who is an active member of Marrero’s student cabinet, opposes.

Even though the recent data does not show a spike in tickets and arrests after SROs were reintroduced this past spring, O’Toole said she still fears that could happen.

“We can’t jump to any conclusions based on two months of data,” O’Toole said. “The first few months or the first few years, [the SROs are] likely going to be on their best behavior. They were being brought back with a lot of caution and concern around them.

“We can start judging the data more when we’re one or two years into the process. I have a feeling that arrests will go up. I’ll be watching very closely.”

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Newly released recording of Denver board’s closed-door meeting reveals tensions

2023-07-24T02:14:54+00:00

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In a closed-door meeting the day after a shooting at East High School in March, Denver school board members worried about being blamed, about Superintendent Alex Marrero overriding their authority by returning police to schools, and about the technicalities of how to proceed.

Board Vice President Auon’tai Anderson, a chief proponent of removing school resource officers back in 2020, said he was scared for his personal safety. Marrero expressed frustration that board members had not asked right away about the health of the two East High deans who were shot and injured the day before by a student who later died by suicide.

Denver Public Schools leaders fought for four months to keep the conversation private. Chalkbeat and other media organizations sued in April, alleging that the meeting violated the Open Meetings Act. A Denver District Court judge agreed and ordered the recording released in its entirety. DPS refused and appealed that decision, but on Friday, the school board voted unanimously to release a redacted version.

Chalkbeat reviewed the four-hour recording that was released Saturday to the media organizations through their attorneys. The audio quality is poor, and the sound sometimes cuts in and out. But the recording provides new insight into how and why the Denver school board initially decided to approve returning school resource officers to Denver campuses — a major policy reversal made unanimously with no public discussion.

The recording shows that school board members mostly treated the return of SROs as inevitable, even as several said SROs would not entirely solve the problem of gun violence.

Tensions flared at times, especially between Marrero and Anderson.

A few hours after the shooting on March 22, Marrero informed board members that he would return armed police officers to high schools in violation of board policy.

During the March 23 closed-door meeting, known as an executive session, some board members were upset about it — not necessarily about what Marrero had done, but about how he’d done it.

“The school board is the ones being blamed for this,” Anderson said of the shooting. “You’ve made yourself the hero. Everybody is applauding you. … We got the emails thanking you: ‘Go SROs! Go SROs! Thank you for your courage, Superintendent Marrero. But f—k the rest of the seven board members.’ Those are the emails: ‘Resign today.’”

Marrero said he acknowledged that Anderson, who co-authored a 2020 policy banning school resource officers from Denver schools, was bearing the brunt of the criticism.

But Marrero said he too was getting calls to resign, and that his decision to reinstate police in schools could have repercussions for his career as a superintendent.

“People are calling for my resignation because I am pro-cop all of a sudden,” Marrero said. “I have a career beyond this. Fifty percent of the districts won’t see me from here on out.”

Meeting redacted after question about legal liability

Only 20 seconds of the recording were redacted. The redaction involves a discussion of the Claire Davis Act, named for a Colorado student killed in a school shooting. The state law creates a legal obligation for schools to exercise “reasonable care” to protect all students, faculty, and staff from “reasonably foreseeable” acts of violence that occur at school.

In the meeting, a DPS staff member asked DPS attorney Aaron Thompson if the Claire Davis Act could “open the door” to school board members or Marrero being held liable.

“Yeah, it could,” Thompson said. “I don’t think we’re there yet based on the incident that happened at East.” Then the recording cuts out.

Throughout the meeting, board members said the community wanted SROs back.

“I think that the community is clamoring for SROs,” board member Carrie Olson said. “And we all know that is not the answer.”

Board member Scott Esserman said, “We can’t simply respond with SROs. It’s the easy response. It’s the convenient response. But it can’t be the only response.”

Board member Michelle Quattlebaum said that if DPS moved to bring back SROs, “it needs to be thoughtful. They can’t come back the way they were.”

Anderson repeatedly said the board’s hands were tied. Marrero had said former Mayor Michael Hancock told him he would issue an executive order to put police in schools. Because of that, Anderson said, “the decision has already been made without the duly elected school board.”

But at another point, Marrero implied Anderson was in favor of SROs. In a tense exchange, Marrero said that Denver Police Chief Ron Thomas told him Anderson had called Thomas after the East shooting and demanded Thomas put 80 officers in the schools. And Anderson himself said he had asked for SROs to return after East student Luis Garcia was shot in February.

A previous school board that included Anderson, Olson, and board member Scott Baldermann voted unanimously in 2020 to remove SROs from Denver schools amid concerns about racist policing and how Black students were disproportionately ticketed and arrested.

Baldermann came to the executive session with a resolution he’d drafted to temporarily suspend the SRO ban. The resolution backed what Marrero had said he’d do the day before, but it put the decision back in the school board’s hands, where board members said it should be.

“What I’m most interested in is that we as a board take action,” Baldermann said. “And I think the public is expecting us to take action as well.”

However, Baldermann’s proposed resolution sparked a lengthy debate about a wonky topic that dominated the executive session: whether the board was acting in accordance with policy governance, the governance structure that dictates how the board should operate.

Under policy governance, resolutions that order the superintendent to take a certain action are discouraged. Instead, the board is supposed to govern by setting policies and goals that the superintendent must follow and achieve. The board can also set limitations that spell out what the superintendent can’t do. At the time, there was a limitation — called executive limitation 10.10 — that said the superintendent could not staff schools with SROs.

Marrero argued during the executive session that the board passing a resolution would violate his contract, which said the board must operate using policy governance.

Board members questioned if meeting should be public instead

In the end, the board members decided to turn Baldermann’s resolution into a memo. They spent an hour and a half wordsmithing it, debating changes as small as whether to capitalize certain words and as big as whether to delete a sentence that implied “trained professionals,” and not school staff, would pat down students for weapons.

The East High student who shot the deans had a safety plan that required him to be patted down daily by an assistant principal. On the day of the shooting, the assistant principal wasn’t available and a dean had taken over, Marrero said.

Some board members said the phrase “trained professionals” implied that SROs would be patting down students. But a DPS attorney told them that wouldn’t be allowed unless the SROs had probable cause. The board ended up deleting the sentence.

The board held a brief public meeting when it came out of the session. Board members read the memo aloud and voted unanimously to adopt it without discussion.

Chalkbeat and the other media organizations sued on the basis that the board made a major policy decision behind closed doors, and that the meeting was not properly noticed. State law allows elected officials to meet in private for certain reasons, but says that the “formation of public policy is public business and may not be conducted in secret.”

The meeting notice said the executive session would cover confidential matters, specialized details of security arrangements, and information about individual students who would be harmed by the public disclosure of that information.

After listening to the recording, Denver District Court Judge Andrew Luxen found the school board’s discussion didn’t match the meeting notice, and that the board didn’t discuss any confidential matters. He ordered DPS to release the recording, but the district appealed that decision.

The recording reveals that board members asked at various times during the executive session whether they should be meeting in public instead.

“As we are talking about suspending policy, this conversation doesn’t need to be public?” Anderson asked DPS attorney Thompson at one point.

“I think what we’ll have to do is present this memo and then vote to suspend the policy,” Thompson said.

The board’s decision to temporarily return SROs kicked off several months of intense community and board debate about whether to keep SROs next school year, and whether Denver has the right safety and discipline policies.

On June 15, the board voted again to reinstate SROs — but that time, the debate was public and the vote was divided. Anderson, Esserman, and Quattlebaum voted no.

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Denver school board votes to release recording of closed-door meeting about police

2023-07-21T22:57:07+00:00

The Denver school board voted unanimously Friday to release a recording of a March closed-door meeting at which board members discussed returning police officers to schools.

“In the interest of transparency of the board, it’s best that we release it now and be done with it,” board member Charmaine Lindsay said. “I don’t think anybody has anything to hide.”

However, the board voted to withhold any parts of the recording in which members discussed “confidential student information.” The March 23 closed-door meeting, called an executive session, happened one day after East High student Austin Lyle shot and injured two deans and later took his own life.

Board Vice President Auon’tai Anderson said at a press conference after the vote Friday that the board had discussed Lyle during the closed-door meeting.

Anderson also gave a brief description Friday of other topics the board had discussed, including a fear that former Denver Mayor Michael Hancock would issue an executive order reinstating police in schools without the school board’s approval.

Anderson said the board also talked about “the need to have a personnel discussion” about Superintendent Alex Marrero, the board’s sole employee. Hours after the East shooting, Marrero sent a letter to the board indicating he planned to return armed police to high schools even though it violated a board policy banning police from schools.

A coalition of news organizations, including Chalkbeat, sued Denver Public Schools to release the recording of the five-hour executive session. That lawsuit was still underway when the board voted Friday.

It was not immediately clear when or how the recording would be released. Several board members said they wanted the recording to be widely available to the public, not just to the media organizations who sued or to people who filed open records requests for it.

DPS attorney Aaron Thompson told the board that the length and format of recording may make it difficult to post the video online, and that the district may have to distribute it via USB drives.

The school board emerged from the closed-door meeting on March 23 and, with no public discussion, voted unanimously to temporarily return police officers to some high schools. The board subsequently voted in June to make that decision permanent. When school starts next month, 13 high school campuses will have a school resource officer, or SRO.

Chalkbeat and six other media organizations argued in a lawsuit that the topics of the closed-door meeting were not properly shared with the public beforehand, and that the board made its decision about returning SROs in private. State law says the “formation of public policy is public business and may not be conducted in secret.”

A Denver District Court judge listened to the recording last month and ordered DPS to release it. DPS is appealing that decision. Earlier this month, the coalition of news organizations asked a judge to hold DPS in contempt for not releasing the recording.

Late Friday afternoon, Anderson tweeted a two-minute clip from the executive session that shows he and Marrero discussing a possible executive order from Hancock. “The Board President attempted to censure me for sharing this information with our communities and the Mayor denied making this remark,” Anderson tweeted.

Board President Xóchitl “Sochi” Gaytán moved in April to censure Anderson for holding a press conference at which he talked about the potential executive order, which Gaytán alleged was confidential information. But the other school board members rejected the effort to censure Anderson.

Much of the discussion among board members Friday was not about whether to release the recording but about the timing of the meeting. The board does not typically meet in July. Gaytán called a special meeting to discuss the recording — a move questioned by board members Anderson, Michelle Quattlebaum, and Scott Esserman.

“Why now?” Quattlebaum asked. “Why the urgency during the month of July when there was no urgency in June?”

Anderson said he’d written an email to his fellow board members on June 23, the day Judge Andrew Luxen ordered DPS to release the recording, saying the district should comply. But the district appealed Luxen’s ruling instead.

“I raised this on June 23 and there was no response from anybody whatsoever on my inquiry to go ahead and release this footage,” Anderson said.

Gaytán explained that she wanted to get this issue out of the way before school starts next month. Voting now to release the recording would allow the district and board to “move on to other issues that actually impact our students positively,” she said.

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Denver school board to vote on whether to release recording of closed-door meeting about police

2023-07-20T18:10:17+00:00

The Denver school board will hold a special meeting Friday to vote on whether to release the recording of a closed-door meeting it held in March. Several news outlets, including Chalkbeat, are suing Denver Public Schools for the recording of the meeting.

DPS spokesperson Bill Good said Thursday that he didn’t know when the recording would be released if the board votes to do so.

The board held the closed-door meeting on March 23, one day after an East High School student shot and injured two deans before fleeing and later taking his own life.

The school board emerged from the five-hour meeting, which is called an executive session, and with no public discussion voted unanimously to temporarily return police officers to schools — a decision board members made permanent in June.

In a lawsuit, Chalkbeat and six other media organizations argued that the topics of the meeting were not properly noticed and that the board made its decision in private. State law says the “formation of public policy is public business and may not be conducted in secret.”

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Chicago swears in new members to city’s last fully appointed Board of Education

2023-07-19T19:58:21+00:00

Chicago’s Board of Education ushered in a new era of leadership Wednesday by swearing in five of Mayor Brandon Johnson’s appointees.

The new members, who include vocal critics of the system, took an oath of office during a meeting to review agenda items ahead of the board’s full meeting next week. They will be part of the last fully appointed board before it shifts to an elected body in 2025.

As board members introduced themselves, Mariela Estrada, director of community engagement at the United Way of Metro Chicago, recounted being a “fierce” parent advocate. New board president Jianan Shi, former executive director of influential advocacy organization Raise Your Hand, noted that he is the first educator appointed as board president.

“I am used to sitting on your side of the glass fence,” new board member Mary Fahey Hughes told the audience at the meeting. Fahey Hughes formerly worked for Raise Your Hand as a parent liaison for special education and is an outspoken advocate for students with disabilities.

The inclusion of board critics at the decision-making table is in some ways similar to Johnson’s path, who rose to power through his teachers union ties.

Earlier this month, Johnson nearly cleaned house by appointing six new board members, who come from advocacy, philanthropy, and business backgrounds. In addition to Shi, Estrada, and Fahey Hughes, the mayor also tapped Michelle Morales, Rudy Lozano, and Tanya Woods (read more about each here). Lozano and Morales were not present at Wednesday’s meeting; a spokesperson for CPS did not explain why but said they will be sworn in at the board’s July 26 meeting.

The only holdover from former Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration is Elizabeth Todd-Breland, who will be the board’s vice president.

All seven members’ terms end Jan. 1, 2025, when the city’s partially elected, 21-member school board will be seated. Several members highlighted that shift. Todd-Breland called her term a “bridge” to that elected board with “so much hope and optimism for Chicago Public Schools.”

Wednesday’s agenda review meeting was the third of its kind, allowing board members to publicly ask questions about agenda items ahead of the meeting where they’ll vote.

During the meeting, members reviewed and asked questions about a slew of agenda items expected to come up for approval next week, including a new agreement for marketing services, the opening of a comment period for a new parental leave policy for CPS employees, and a renewed contract for math tutoring.

One agenda item — about X-ray machines in school — signaled a possible shift in approach that Johnson’s appointees may bring to the board.

Shi asked a school safety official whether there is research that such machines, which are meant to detect weapons, make schools safer. The official said it’s hard to determine exactly what makes schools feel safe, but that such machines have found weapons in the past. Last month, the old board approved a slightly costlier contract for campus police.

Shi asked that district officials engage in “actual community dialogue” on school safety policies as the district continues work on its Whole School Safety initiative. The CPS official said it’s the district’s goal to get more “buy-in” from the community.

Board members like Shi have also previously expressed interest in making meetings more accessible to the public, such as working parents who can’t attend the meetings that are held downtown during weekday mornings.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org.

Mi estudiante compartió un poema sobre su temor a la violencia con armas de fuego. Más tarde ese día, le dispararon.

2023-07-19T00:08:29+00:00

Read in English.

Cada día en mi salón de clases, invito a los estudiantes a que compartan con los demás un poema que hayan escrito. Esta actividad es una manera de hacer que los estudiantes se entre sí y a las diferentes Dénveres en las que vivimos. Los niños de Park Hill comparten sus realidades en Park Hill. Los niños de Swansea comparten sus realidades en Swansea.

Fue en este entorno que, el pasado mes de febrero, Jose Luis Garcia escribió esto: “Mi ciudad es el sonido de disparos … Es que te disparen solo porque estabas en el lugar equivocado en el momento equivocado”. Y luego, más tarde ese día, a Jose Luis — Luis para sus amigos — le dispararon.

Andy Bucher, al centro, con su familia.

El lugar equivocado fue 17th y Esplanade. Está justo al lado del campus de East High School, donde enseño inglés y donde Luis era estudiante de 11º grado e integrante del equipo campeón de fútbol de la escuela. El momento equivocado fue durante el séptimo período. Luis estaba en su coche y murió debido a sus heridas alrededor de dos semanas después de que le dispararan.

Todos pensamos que había escrito poesía, no profecía.

Después del tiroteo, me quedé preocupado por haber hecho algo incorrecto, pero me di cuenta de que mi único pecado fue hacer que los niños se sintieran seguros y compartieran su verdad. La verdad de Luis era que temía que le dispararan.

El mismo grupo de estudiantes se sentó en un círculo dos días después del tiroteo e intentó procesar lo que habíamos escuchado que Luis dijera. Hablamos, lloramos y tratamos de encontrarle sentido a lo que no tiene sentido.

En las siguientes semanas, me obsesioné pensando en formas de abogar a favor del cambio, como con hacer que regresaran los agentes de seguridad armados o SRO [por sus siglas en inglés], quienes por mucho tiempo habían estado presentes en las escuelas de Denver. En junio de 2020, el consejo de educación de Denver votó unánimemente para sacar a los agentes de las escuelas públicas de Denver. Recuerdo cuando nuestro personal se despidió con una ovación de pie, tristemente y a regañadientes, de nuestro SRO, Chris Matlock, su último día. Envié mensajes electrónicos a todos los seis integrantes del consejo de educación de las Escuelas Públicas de Denver; dos de ellos respondieron. Un integrante me dijo, desdeñosamente, que los SRO no regresarían nunca, y otro explicó que estaba equivocado con mi esperanza.

Algunas semanas más tarde, me encontré en una cumbre para la prevención de la violencia con armas de fuego organizada por los estudiantes de East High School. Los estudiantes organizaron la cumbre, pero los participantes eran políticos y administradores.

A mitad de la cumbre, me di cuenta de que la familia de Luis había llegado silenciosamente y encontrado un asiento. Me impresionó que estuvieran ahí, debido a lo que probablemente estarían pasando. Cuando la cumbre terminó, observé mientras su hermano, un estudiante recientemente graduado de East High School, se acercó a un integrante del consejo de educación que se opone a los SRO. Escuché mientras le decía al integrante del consejo: “Si mi hermano hubiera tenido un SRO a quien acudir, quizás estaría vivo hoy”. Escuché cuando el integrante del consejo de educación respondió con: “Siento tu pérdida, pero…” y luego continuó dándole un montón de razones por las que el hermano mayor de Luis estaba equivocado.

Unas semanas después, me senté durante otro cierre de emergencia mientras un estudiante les disparaba a dos de mis amigos y colegas que lo estaban revisando como parte de un plan de seguridad. Y mientras estábamos bajo cierre de emergencia, el superintendente de Denver anunció que enviaría a los SRO de regreso a las escuelas. El día siguiente, el consejo de educación, cuyos integrantes habían ignorado a la comunidad—y habían ignorado a la familia de Luis—finalmente vieron la sabiduría de tener agentes en las escuelas y votaron 6-0 a favor de que regresaran en la primavera. (Hace solo un par de semanas, un consejo dividido de educación votó para mantener a los SRO en las escuelas el próximo año y más adelante.)

Mis estudiantes y yo tenemos un deseo muy simple: seguridad. Lo que quiero es que los integrantes del consejo de educación de Denver escuchen y no supongan que saben más sobre lo que es mejor para las escuelas que los estudiantes, los maestros y las familias que han sufrido la pérdida de un ser querido debido a la violencia con armas de fuego. El regreso de los SRO no es la única solución para la seguridad escolar. Pero es una pieza del rompecabezas que incluye planes prudentes de seguridad, además de explorar posibilidades como cerrar el espacio abierto frente a la escuela o agregar detectores de metales. Necesitamos estar abiertos a nuevas ideas. Necesitamos ser proactivos, no reactivos.

Luis escribió sobre su temor de que le dispararan por estar en “el lugar equivocado en el momento equivocado”. Espero que todas nuestras escuelas, e East High School en particular, dejen de ser el lugar equivocado en el momento equivocado. Y que recordemos a Luis no solo como una víctima de violencia sino también como un estudiante, un campeón de fútbol y un poeta cuyas palabras fueron dolorosamente proféticas.

Andy Bucher es un maestro de inglés en East High School en Denver. Es un esposo y un padre. Sigue fielmente a los Cubs de Chicago y monta semifielmente su bicicleta.

Firing of McAuliffe principal is having a chilling effect, Denver educators say

2023-07-13T01:24:53+00:00

Natalie Barrios said her colleagues were worried about her taking the microphone at a rally Tuesday in support of fired McAuliffe International School Principal Kurt Dennis.

“They’re worried that speaking out will backfire on us,” said Barrios, the athletic director and assessment coordinator at the Denver middle school, who said she considers Dennis a friend and mentor.

Dennis was fired last week in the aftermath of a televised March interview he did with 9News expressing concerns about gun violence and school safety.

Current and former Denver Public Schools staff say Dennis’ removal reflects a new lack of tolerance for dissent at a time when discipline and safety policies are under intense scrutiny after a shooting inside East High School this spring.

Dennis, meanwhile, is gearing up to fight his dismissal with a grievance and a lawsuit. He’s most upset, though, that the timing means a school community he cherishes has little time to find a new leader before the school year starts.

“Waiting until the middle of July to do this was really punitive,” Dennis said in an interview Wednesday. “It’s not fair to the kids or our staff. That part really bothers me. It’s one thing if you’ve got a bone to pick with me and you want me gone, but to take it out on the kids and my teachers just to me feels like it’s not a very student-centered approach.”

In a letter to staff last week, Superintendent Alex Marrero said accusations that Dennis was fired for speaking up were “100% false,” according to a copy of the letter obtained by Chalkbeat. Rather, Marrero said, Dennis was terminated for sharing private student information.

Dennis had expressed concerns in the 9News interview about McAuliffe International staff being required to pat down a student who was accused of attempted murder.

In his letter, Marrero referenced a 2022 district memo that said principals should keep any concerns about district policies or decisions internal and report them only to their supervisors.

“As an organization dedicated to continuous improvement, we cherish the feedback we receive from our leaders, even if it is sometimes hard to hear,” Marrero wrote in the letter.

The impact of Dennis’ firing is being felt beyond McAuliffe International. Two recently retired DPS principals said they worry it will have a chilling effect on the speech of other DPS staff.

“I feel like everyone needs to be on watch,” said Suzanne Morris-Sherer, a longtime DPS educator who retired earlier this year as principal of McAuliffe Manual, the sister middle school to McAuliffe International. “That’s not a good way to feel.”

John Youngquist, the former principal of East High who’s now running for a seat on the Denver school board, said the timing of Dennis’ firing “lends to leaders having less confidence in what their status might be and what their situation might be. We retain leadership when they have confidence that people believe in them and they’re being invested in.”

In a statement, DPS said it followed its normal process for terminating an employee. “It is important to note that not all employee discipline data would be publicly known or shared with other school leaders,” the statement said.

The principals union has filed a grievance

The Denver School Leaders Association filed a grievance Tuesday alleging that Dennis’ termination violated the process outlined in an agreement between DPS and the Northeast Denver Innovation Zone, which oversees McAuliffe International and two other schools, according to a copy of the grievance obtained by Chalkbeat.

Innovation zones are groups of semi-autonomous public schools. The schools are governed by a separate zone board of directors, but their teachers and principals remain DPS employees, which can create confusion over who’s in charge. An agreement between the zone and DPS says the district won’t remove principals without seeking the zone’s approval.

But zone leaders said they were blindsided by Dennis’ firing. In addition to the grievance, the zone’s board of directors sent a letter to DPS Tuesday. It says that if DPS doesn’t admit it acted improperly, the zone board will invoke its right under state law to have a neutral third party review the firing, according to a copy of the letter obtained by Chalkbeat.

Ulcca Joshi Hansen, a McAuliffe parent and zone board member who’s also running for a seat on the Denver school board, said Dennis’ firing is “an indication that the district is not operating as it should. That things are arbitrary. That things can be capricious. That we can’t trust the processes. The community — this says to them, ‘Well, yeah, you don’t matter.’”

A Denver Public Schools spokesperson said Wednesday that the district can’t comment on the grievance because it is a personnel issue.

Dennis’ attorney, David Lane, said he is planning to file a lawsuit on Dennis’ behalf after the grievance plays out “alleging retaliation for First Amendment free speech.”

The Denver school board is set to vote next month on whether to accept Dennis’ termination. Such votes are usually routine and merit no discussion. But this one could be different.

Supporters hold homemade signs in support of Kurt Dennis, who was recently fired as principal of McAuliffe International School.

District alleges disparate discipline

In March, Dennis gave the televised interview to station 9News in which he expressed concerns about his staff having to search students for weapons, including the student who was accused of attempted murder. He said the district had blocked McAuliffe’s attempts to transfer the student to an online school or expel the student.

A few days before the interview, an East High student shot and injured two deans during a search for weapons. The search was part of a safety plan developed because administrators feared the East student, Austin Lyle, might pose a threat. Lyle had a prior weapons charge.

Dennis told 9News he was speaking out because parents deserved to know that the weapons searches happening at East were happening at other schools, too, and that “it needs to stop.”

The East shooting sparked intense debate and calls for change. The school board voted last month to reverse its ban on police in schools, and Marrero released a new safety plan that calls for armed safety officers to help school staff with weapons searches.

Dennis’ attorney Lane told 9News that DPS put Dennis under investigation after the televised interview, which did not name the student accused of attempted murder.

But a DPS investigator concluded that Dennis “divulged confidential student and legal records” in the interview, which violated district policy, put DPS at legal risk, and caused the student to be singled out and ostracized, according to a document provided to Chalkbeat.

The investigator also concluded that Dennis “repeatedly attempted to remove a young student of color from McAuliffe International,” despite being told removal “was not available or appropriate.” In the wake of the East shooting, district leaders have repeatedly defended a policy that students facing criminal charges can attend their regular schools as long as a judge has decided the student can be out in the community and not behind bars.

A July 3 letter informing Dennis that he was terminated cited those findings, according to a copy of the letter provided to Chalkbeat. The letter also cited “a pattern of administrative actions” that had a negative impact on students with disabilities and students of color.

More specifically, an investigator found that McAuliffe International’s “overuse of out-of-school suspensions … was having a disparate impact on students of color,” the letter said.

Data shows McAuliffe not alone

McAuliffe International is the district’s largest middle school with nearly 1,500 students, and one of its most diverse. In the 2022-23 school year, McAuliffe issued 106 out-of-school suspensions for a rate of 7%, according to data obtained by Chalkbeat in a public records request.

That’s a lower rate than many other large Denver middle schools. Hamilton Middle School had a suspension rate of 26%, while Skinner Middle School had a rate of 22%. Lake Middle School had a rate of 12%, and Merrill Middle School had a rate of 10.5%.

Racial disparities in discipline did exist at McAuliffe International last year. The data shows 14% of McAuliffe students were Black, but 30% of the suspensions were issued to Black students.

The same type of disparity existed for Black students at Hamilton and Merrill, though not at Lake. Skinner had too few Black students to calculate a percentage.

Colleen O’Brien, the executive director of the Northeast Denver Innovation Zone and Dennis’ direct supervisor, said McAuliffe was aware of the discipline disparity and was taking steps to address it, including hiring a new part-time staff member to mentor boys of color.

She also pointed out that students of color at McAuliffe International scored higher than students of color districtwide in both literacy and math on state tests last year.

O’Brien called Dennis’ termination “a shock” and said the timing “is unbelievable to me.”

O’Brien said that in her opinion, as the person responsible for conducting Dennis’ annual evaluations, his performance as a principal did not warrant being fired.

“I would not have terminated him, no,” she said.

Supporters want Dennis back at McAuliffe

On Tuesday evening, hundreds of parents, students, and community members gathered outside McAuliffe International before a wall of television news cameras to rally for Dennis’ return. The rally was organized by Denver school board candidate Kwame Spearman. Most of the crowd was white. But several speakers were staff or alumni of color.

Shemar Magee was a student when McAuliffe International opened in 2012. He said Dennis, the founding principal, always promoted doing the right thing and “swiftly corrected” any unkindness. Magee said he left McAuliffe a stronger student and became the first person in his family to graduate college and go on to graduate school.

“Without Kurt, the little small boy who walked through those doors in 2012 would not be standing here today doing big things that he never thought he could do,” Magee said.

Barrios, the school’s athletic director, said it was Dennis who encouraged her to take a job in the public schools 20 years ago when she was a young single mom.

“It has been my goal to make sure my kids are better than me,” Barrios said. “But I had to do that by showing them you have to work hard and have integrity. Kurt taught me that.”

Barrios’ daughter, Cecilia Pablo, also spoke. A former McAuliffe International student who now works at the school with students learning English as a second language, Pablo said Dennis — who she calls “Great Uncle Kurt” — has been a role model for her.

“I am proud to say I broke the cycle of teenage pregnancy and am the first in my family to graduate college with a degree in social work,” Pablo said. “If it were not for the opportunities and doors Mr. Dennis opened for my family and I, we would not be where we are today.”

Prateeti Khazanie, whose son will be in eighth grade at McAuliffe International this fall, stood in the crowd and listened to the speeches. She said she disagrees that the school is an unwelcome place for students of color like her son. Dennis’ firing, she said, was wrong.

“This feels like retaliation,” she said.

For his part, Dennis said in an interview that he wants one thing most.

“I’d like my job back,” he said. “I want to be with my kids and my staff. I want to get this school year off to a great start.”

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Agentes de seguridad armados permanecerán en 13 escuelas de Denver según el plan final de seguridad

2023-07-11T21:45:55+00:00

Read in English.

Policías permanecerán en grandes escuelas preparatorias este otoño, agentes armados de seguridad en el distrito escolar ayudarán con la búsqueda de armas, y los líderes de las Escuelas Públicas de Denver “examinará[n] exhaustivamente las prácticas actuales de disciplina estudiantil”.

Esos son algunos de los detalles en el borrador final de un plan de seguridad a largo plazo que el superintendente Alex Marrero publicó a finales de junio. El plan entrará en vigor el próximo año escolar, pero quizás siga modificándose.

“Por ningún motivo quiero que alguien piense que esto es uno y se acabó”, Marrero dijo en una entrevista. “Es el principio de una conversación más amplia, no solo aquí sino también a nivel nacional”.

El consejo le ordenó a Marrero crear un plan después de un tiroteo adentro de East High School en marzo. Un estudiante de 17 años a quien la escuela debía inspeccionar a diario para ver si tenía armas le disparó e hirió a dos administradores. El estudiante se escapó de la escuela y más tarde terminó con su propia vida.

El tiroteo desató un intenso debate y activismo comunitario, incluida la formación de un grupo de padres que exigió mayor seguridad, al igual que una reacción contra el regreso de los policías a las escuelas. Un consejo escolar dividido votó para permitir el regreso de agentes de seguridad armados, conocidos como SRO (School Resource Officers, en inglés).

Un consejo anterior votó en 2020 para sacar a los SRO de las escuelas—una prohibición que se suspendió temporalmente después del tiroteo en East High School.

El consejo de educación no necesita votar por el plan.

Los cambios incluyen que las Escuelas Públicas de Denver (DPS, por sus siglas en inglés):

Harán que regresen los agentes de seguridad armados a escuelas secundarias y preparatorias integrales.

El plan no especifica qué escuelas, pero Marrero dijo en una entrevista que los SRO regresarán este otoño a las 13 escuelas donde fueron colocados esta primavera después del tiroteo en East.

Esas 13 escuelas son: las preparatorias East, North, South, West, Northfield, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, Montbello y Manual, al igual que Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Early College y el campus de Evie Dennis.

Dieciocho escuelas secundarias y preparatorias tenían un SRO cuando el consejo votó para prohibirlos en 2020. Marrero dijo que el distrito desarrollará un protocolo para decidir qué escuelas tienen agentes de seguridad.

Permitirán que las escuelas decidan, después de una amplia interacción con la comunidad, si van a usar sistemas de detección de armas.

Las Escuelas Públicas de Denver ya cuentan con cuatro unidades móviles para la detección de armas de la compañía Evolv Technology que el distrito usa para “eventos deportivos y eventos solicitados por administradores”. Un memorándum fiscal dice que “los sistemas de detección considerables y de amplio uso en todas las escuelas o solo en escuelas preparatorias probablemente superen los $5 millones”.

Realizarán un análisis del personal para evaluar la presencia de agentes de seguridad desarmados en las escuelas.

A los agentes sin armas los colocan en escuelas secundarias y preparatorias y son distintos a los SRO. El análisis determinará “dónde puede necesitarse más personal o cómo pueden compartirse los recursos”, el plan dice. Marrero dijo en una entrevista que quizás demuestre que el distrito necesita contratar más agentes desarmados.

Proporcionarán más apoyo al personal escolar para realizar inspecciones de los estudiantes, especialmente si es posible que se encuentren armas.

Por ejemplo, el plan dice que si un estudiante debe pasar por una inspección porque se encontró que tenía un arma afuera de la escuela, un agente de seguridad armado de DPS “se designará un agente de patrulla de seguridad de DPS para que brinde apoyo durante la ventana de tiempo específica que permita realizar una inspección segura y supervisada y el ingreso al edificio”.

Los agentes de patrulla de seguridad son diferentes a los agentes de seguridad desarmados y a los agentes de seguridad armados (SRO). Son parte de una unidad móvil que responde a llamadas en todas las Escuelas Públicas de Denver.

Después del tiroteo en East High School, algunos padres y educadores dijeron que la policía o el personal de seguridad debe realizar las inspecciones, en lugar de los administradores, lo que estaba sucediendo en East. El distrito ha dicho que los SRO no pueden hacer inspecciones de estudiantes sin pruebas suficientes, pero un agente de patrulla de seguridad de las DPS—quien es un agente jurado de policía—sí puede.

Trabajarán con las agencias locales de seguridad para organizar reuniones sobre la violencia juvenil en cada región de la ciudad.

Las reuniones serían “para vigilar las tendencias de violencia que afectan a las comunidades escolares y reforzar las asociaciones para desmantelar las barreras que afectan [el] acceso de los jóvenes a los programas,” según el plan.

Ampliarán la enseñanza preparatoria en línea del distrito y posiblemente ofrecerán aprendizaje híbrido.

Después del tiroteo en East, algunos padres cuestionaron por qué el estudiante que disparó el arma, a quien habían expulsado de un distrito escolar vecino y quien tenía un cargo por posesión de armas, estaba asistiendo a la escuela en persona y no virtualmente.

Aunque Marrero dijo que el distrito cree que el aprendizaje presencial es mejor y “no está en el negocio de solo despachar a los niños”, dijo que las DPS están considerando un protocolo que permita que los estudiantes aprendan virtualmente mientras el distrito desarrolla un plan para que regresen al aprendizaje presencial de manera segura.

Crearán un panel informativo virtual para darle mejor seguimiento y monitorear los “planes de acción e intervención”, los cuales se establecen para estudiantes que quizás presenten una amenaza para sí mismo o para otras personas.

Realizarán auditorias de seguridad en los edificios escolares de DPS y ofrecerán “recomendaciones sobre infraestructuras físicas, como vestíbulos seguros, colocación de cámaras, iluminación, etc.”, el plan dice.

Esas recomendaciones podrían incluir botones de pánico para que usen los maestros, Marrero dijo. Las auditorias ya están realizándose con la ayuda del consultor Murphy Robinson, exdirector del Departamento de Seguridad Pública de Denver.

Harán que los líderes del distrito asistan al Instituto del Programa de Liderazgo en Educación Pública en la Universidad de Harvard este verano para colaborar con otros distritos urbanos grandes en asuntos como la seguridad.

Los líderes de DPS luego examinarán las prácticas disciplinarias estudiantiles con el objetivo de aumentar la seguridad a la vez que protegen los derechos de los estudiantes y promueven la equidad e inclusión de todos los estudiantes, el plan dice.

Aumentarán la capacitación del personal de DPS sobre temas como la prevención del suicidio, las amenazas que presentan los estudiantes, la gestión de emergencias y la recuperación tras una crisis.

Aumentarán los programas que ofrecen a los estudiantes, incluidas clases avanzadas de educación preparatoria, cursos de nivel universitario, aprendizaje basado en el trabajo y programas extraescolares y de verano.

Exigirán programas anuales sobre la prevención del suicidio para todos los estudiantes en 5º, 6º, 9º y 12º grado. Estos programas antes eran opcionales, Marrero dijo.

Exigirán que se evalúe la salud social y emocional de todos los estudiantes tres veces al año, lo cual “representa un aumento drástico” en el uso de la herramienta de evaluación, según dice el memorándum de impacto fiscal. Las DPS planean pagar por las evaluaciones del año próximo con fondos federales del estímulo económico por COVID.

Ofrecerán por lo menos una sesión sobre el duelo y la pérdida para el personal y los padres que lo necesiten.

Melanie Asmar es una reportera principal para Chalkbeat Colorado, cubriendo las Escuelas Públicas de Denver. Comunícate con Melanie por correo electrónico a masmar@chalkbeat.org.

My student shared a poem about fearing gun violence. Later that day, he was shot.

2023-07-10T16:00:00+00:00

Leer en español.

Every day in my classroom, I invite students to share with the class a poem that they have written. This exercise is a way for the students to get to know each other and the different Denvers that we live in. Park Hill kids share their Park Hill realities. Swansea kids share their Swansea realities.

It was in this setting that, back in February, Jose Luis Garcia, wrote the this line: “My city is the sound of gunshots … Its getting shot just cuz you were at the wrong place at the wrong time.” And then, later that day, Jose Luis — Luis to his friends — was shot.

Andy Bucher, center, with his family.

The wrong place was 17th and Esplanade. It’s just off of the East High School campus, where I teach English and where Luis was in 11th grade and a member of the school’s championship-winning soccer team. The wrong time was during seventh period. He was in his car and died of his injuries about two weeks after the shooting.

We all thought that he had written poetry, not prophecy.

After the shooting, I worried that I had done something wrong but realized my only sin was getting kids to feel safe and share their truth. Luis’ truth was that he feared getting shot.

The same class sat in a circle two days after the shooting and tried to process what we had heard from Luis. We spoke, cried, and tried to make sense of the nonsensical.

In the weeks that followed, I found myself obsessed with advocacy for change, such as bringing back school resource officers, or SROs, which had long been stationed at Denver schools. In June 2020, the Denver school board voted unanimously to remove officers from Denver public schools. I remember our staff giving our SRO, Chris Matlock, a standing ovation as we, sadly, reluctantly bid him adieu on his final day. I emailed all six Denver Public Schools board members; two of them responded. One member told me dismissively that SROs would never return, and another explained that I was mistaken in my hope.

A few weeks later, I found myself at a gun violence prevention summit that was hosted by students from East High School. The students organized the summit, but the participants were politicians and administrators.

I noticed midway through members of Luis’ family came in quietly and found a seat. I was impressed at their attendance, given what they must have been going through. When the summit was over, I watched as his brother, a recent East High School graduate, went up to a school board member who opposes SROs. I listened as he told the school board member, “If my brother had had an SRO to run to, then he might be alive today.” I listened as the school board member responded with, “I’m sorry for your loss, but …” and then went on to give a bunch of reasons that Luis’ older brother was wrong.

We all thought that he had written poetry, not prophecy.

A few weeks later, I sat through another lockdown as two of my friends and colleagues were shot by a student whom they were patting down as a part of a safety plan. And while we were sitting in lockdown, the Denver superintendent announced that he would send SROs back to schools. The following day, the school board, whose members had ignored the community — and had ignored Luis’s family — finally saw the wisdom in having officers on campus and voted 6-0 to bring them back for the spring. (Just a few weeks ago, a divided school board voted to keep SROs on campus next year and beyond.)

My students and I have a very simple desire: safety. What I want is for Denver’s school board members to listen and not assume that they know better than students, teachers, and family members who have lost loved ones to gun violence what is best for schools. The return of SROs is not the only solution to school safety. But it is a piece of a puzzle that includes common-sense safety plans as well as exploring possibilities such as closing the Esplanade in front of the school or adding metal detectors. We need to be open to new ideas. We need to be proactive, not reactive.

Luis wrote about his fear of being shot for being in “the wrong place at the wrong time.” May all of our schools, and East High School in particular, cease being the wrong place at the wrong time. And may we remember Luis not only as a victim of violence but also as a scholar, soccer champion, and poet whose words were painfully prophetic.

Andy Bucher is an English teacher at East High School in Denver. He is a husband and a father. He faithfully follows the Chicago Cubs and semi-faithfully rides his bike.

7 preguntas para el nuevo jefe de seguridad de las Escuelas Públicas de Denver, Greg Cazzell

2023-07-08T00:22:01+00:00

Read in English.

Las Escuelas Públicas de Denver (DPS) tiene un nuevo jefe de clima y seguridad: Greg Cazzell, que fue director de seguridad de las Escuelas Públicas de Aurora por ocho años.

El puesto en DPS había estado vacante por seis meses cuando el distrito anunció que había contratado a Cazzell, que estuvo 22 años en el departamento de policía de Glendale antes de trabajar en Aurora.

Greg Cazzell

En estos momentos, la seguridad escolar es una prioridad para muchos estudiantes, familias y educadores de Denver. Los tiroteos dentro y alrededor de las escuelas secundarias este año han provocado protestas de estudiantes, la formación de un grupo de padres, llamados a la renuncia de la junta escolar, un debate sobre la reintroducción de los agentes de recurso escolar (SRO), y el desarrollo de un plan de seguridad a largo plazo.

Chalkbeat habló con Cazzell sobre sus prioridades y su enfoque de seguridad antes de su empleo comience oficialmente el 10 de julio. Esto es lo que tenía que decir.

Usted está llegando a DPS de las Escuelas Públicas de Aurora y una comunidad que también ha lidiado con la violencia armada de menores de edad. ¿Qué traerá a Denver de lo que aprendió en Aurora?

Asociaciones con la comunidad. Las escuelas no pueden hacerlo solas. Tenemos a nuestros estudiantes unas 7 horas y 40 minutos al día. Y eso no es tiempo suficiente. Por eso necesitamos asociarnos con la comunidad, asociarnos con las familias y unir a todas las partes interesadas para que juntos podamos resolver algunos de los retos.

Si hay violencia en la comunidad, va a tener impacto en nuestras escuelas. Así que en realidad no hay diferencia entre las dos. Nuestros estudiantes están en la comunidad, ven la violencia y se ven afectados por ella. Se necesita la participación no solo del distrito escolar, sino también de organizaciones sin fines de lucro, organizaciones comunitarias y ciudades. Se necesita de todos.

¿Hay algún ejemplo de una colaboración en Aurora de la que se sienta especialmente orgulloso?

Creo que el trabajo que están haciendo todos nuestros programas después de la escuela: Boys and Girls Club, COMPASS, Rocky Mountain Kids. Todos están proporcionando un poco de estructura y eso logra que los estudiantes participen, los mantiene en la escuela, los mantiene protegidos y es parte de todo ese sistema de apoyo.

Entonces, diría que esos tres programas después de la escuela. Y he tenido muy buenas relaciones con los tres. Y de hecho, espero, traer algunos de esos programas a DPS.

La junta escolar de Denver recién levantó la prohibición de los agentes de recurso escolar y permitió que la policía regrese a las escuelas. Las Escuelas Públicas de Aurora han tenido agentes de recurso escolar (SRO) desde hace años. ¿Qué opina de los SRO?

Como mencionaste, ellos llevan más de 20 años en las Escuelas Públicas de Aurora. En cada secundaria tenemos dos, además de un agente de seguridad armado. Ese es el modelo que han adoptado el superintendente y la junta escolar de APS.

Ellos decidieron tener esa política, y es parte del debate que se está oyendo ahora mismo en las reuniones de la unta de DPS. Y yo seguiré la dirección que se decida.

Una de las mayores preocupaciones es que los estudiantes traigan armas de fuego a la escuela. Algunas personas han propuesto instalar detectores de metal. Aurora ha utilizado perros detectores de drogas que también podían detectar residuos de pólvora. ¿Qué medidas sugeriría que adoptara Denver para mantener las armas fuera de las escuelas?

Todo lo que has mencionado sería una buena respuesta para eso.

Tenemos que examinar toda nuestra tecnología, y todas las opciones que puedan ser beneficiosas para asegurar que tengamos un ambiente seguro y propicio para el aprendizaje. Y eso nunca se detiene. Es algo que siempre se va a cuestionar. Nosotros tenemos que asegurar que siempre estemos reevaluando.

No se trata de un plan integral de seguridad para el DPS que se hace una vez y ya. Habrá que evaluarlo. Nosotros tendremos que determinar qué está funcionando y qué no. Ese será el camino a seguir.

No creo que debamos eliminar ninguna de las opciones que tenemos. Pero de nuevo, todas estas medidas van de acuerdo con la política establecida y con lo que la junta escolar de DPS decidió.

DPS dijo que estaba buscando un nuevo jefe de seguridad que tuviera experiencia en “seguridad y protección” y con “una mentalidad enfocada en el estudiante”. Los líderes del distrito han hablado de la importancia de ponerle fin al problema de los estudiantes que van de la escuela directo a la prisión. ¿Usted opina lo mismo? ¿Qué haría para ayudar a resolver ese problema?

Absolutamente. Tenemos que asegurar que no estemos criminalizando el comportamiento normal de un adolescente.

Por eso necesitamos trabajar de cerca con nuestros agentes colaboradores, ya sea con el SRO que atienda la situación o cualquier otro componente adicional de la policía. Necesitamos asegurar que nuestro personal entienda las comunidades de las que proceden nuestros estudiantes, algunos de los retos que enfrentan, y entender ese enfoque integral para asegurar que no estemos operando de manera aislada o en una burbuja. Es importante que tengamos esa visión completa y nos demos cuenta de cómo todo eso impacta el ambiente de seguridad cotidiano en nuestras escuelas.

¿Por qué quería el puesto en DPS?

Aparte de la diferencia en tamaño de los dos distritos [Aurora Public Schools tiene unos 39,000 estudiantes, mientras que Denver Public Schools tiene unos 88,000], creo que son muy similares. La composición socioeconómica [de las familias de los estudiantes], la cantidad de estudiantes que reciben comidas gratis o a precio reducido.

Creo que el distrito de Aurora es probablemente un poco más diverso que DPS. Sé que el DPS podría no querer oír esto, pero Aurora es una comunidad muy diversa y tenemos que asegurarnos de reconocer esa diversidad, de reconocer a esos grupos de refugiados — sé que no se limitan a Aurora, claramente, pero esa ha sido mi experiencia — y asegurar que ellos entiendan cuál es nuestro papel en la seguridad del plantel escolar.

Es importante entender que no somos la policía. Nuestro enfoque es la seguridad. Esas personas vienen de países donde ven un uniforme y lo asocian con lo que les ha oprimido. Así que tenemos que asegurarnos de reconocer esa diversidad.

En el pasado, en DPS y en los distritos escolares de todo el país, ha habido una desproporción en la disciplina. Algunos lo llaman exceso de vigilancia sobre los estudiantes de minorías raciales. ¿Cómo usted resuelve y mitiga este problema?

Es algo que está ocurriendo. No hay una solución única.

Tienes que mirar esos datos. Hay que asegurarse de contar con las personas correctas. Si la junta decide tener SRO en las escuelas, tenemos que asegurarnos de trabajar con la policía de Denver y encontrar los SRO correctos que van a ser ideales en cada una, que van a ser la persona correcta para esa cultura escolar. Nuevamente, tenemos que reconocer de dónde vienen esos estudiantes, entender sus antecedentes. Una vez más, hay que asegurar que tanto el SRO, como mi equipo son la combinación perfecta para esa escuela.

No ocurría a menudo, pero hubo veces en que íbamos a la policía de Aurora y decíamos: ‘Oye, esta persona no encaja bien en esta escuela. Busquemos otro candidato’. Esa puede ser una opción si la junta aprueba los SRO.

De nuevo, mi trabajo se basa en la política establecida. Cualquiera que sea la dirección final que la junta le indique al superintendente, esa será la dirección que tomaré en cuanto a seguridad y protección.

Melanie Asmar es reportera senior de Chalkbeat Colorado y cubre las Escuelas Públicas de Denver. Para comunicarte con Melanie, escríbele a masmar@chalkbeat.org.

‘It awakened a part of us’: How NYC students are turning the trauma of gun violence into action

2023-07-05T15:30:00+00:00

Leslie R., a recent Brooklyn high school graduate, still thinks about the February afternoon that three people were shot outside her campus.

She watched police gather at the scene from a window inside the Williamsburg Charter High School. Her brother, a ninth grader with no cellphone, had already left the building. She had no way to ensure he was safe.

“You shouldn’t have to worry about that,” she said. “You shouldn’t have to worry about somebody being shot, or somebody dying.”

Students and educators at the school continue to reel from that day, when violence arrived at their doorstep. A teenager, who didn’t attend the school, allegedly shot two students and a staff member. All three of the shooting victims survived. But the trauma of the incident has lingered among members of the school community.

In the immediate aftermath, reporters flocked to the scene to interview students — carrying cameras and microphones — an ordeal students described as further traumatizing as they tried to make sense of the situation. Though the overwhelming attention has for the most part faded, the community continues to feel its impact. (Some students’ last names are being withheld to protect their privacy.)

The school bolstered security efforts, installing metal detectors and conducting bag checks after the shooting. It brought in additional counseling services. Teachers gave space for discussion in class. And in the months that followed, the community stood unified in pushing for changes that could help prevent other shootings from happening at local schools.

While gun violence at schools remains rare, it often occupies outsized space in the minds of children. Young people in New York City also feel the impact of shootings in their larger community. As of April, roughly 20% of shooting victims in New York City this year were under 18, NYPD data showed. And between 2018 and 2022, the number of teenagers arrested and charged with murder grew at a rate twice as fast as adults, according to the state’s Division of Criminal Justice Services.

As high-profile school shooting incidents have spurred national movements over the past decade — mobilizing students to advocate for change — that trend has continued on a smaller scale locally, as students call for action to help make their neighborhoods safer.

For Williamsburg Charter High School, that meant holding a rally, with students making signs and performing, as they called for local changes they believe could help make their community and others safer. So far, their efforts haven’t resulted in any concrete changes, but that hasn’t stopped further action from teachers and students. The school is planning to hold another rally in the fall, along with encouraging students to write letters to legislators in a continued push for policy changes in New York.

The city has taken some steps to address concerns about youth-related gun violence: holding weekly meetings between school administrators and local police precinct commanders, bringing violence interrupters to schools, and creating opportunities for discussions between students and NYPD officers. This year, though the number of shooting victims in New York City has dropped by nearly a quarter from more than 700 last year, young people still feel the urgency.

“After the shooting, in some students, it awakened a part of us,” Leslie said. “This is the world that we live in. This is reality. So what can we do now to help?”

Students push for change, even as fear lingers

After the shooting, the school transitioned to remote learning for seven days, followed by the week-long mid-winter break and a phased-in return. During that time, teachers Alexandra Sherman and Ryan Fuller felt an urgency to take action.

“Something like this can’t just happen and we go on as usual,” Sherman said. “As a community, we needed to heal emotionally.”

It began with a petition calling for an end to gun violence, along with concrete measures — like expanded partnerships between neighborhood schools and the NYPD and legislation to support school-to-school information networks. The petition also called for improvements to violence interrupter coordination in the community, streamlining communication between schools and the groups who work to de-escalate potentially violent situations. They also called for expanded funding for schools’ social-emotional support and after-school programs, and job opportunities for young people. The petition has since garnered nearly 4,000 signatures.

From there, Shante Martin, an assistant principal at the school, connected with New Yorkers Against Gun Violence to organize the rally in March.

“I feel like the students gave us a push,” she said. “Because they were really like, ‘We need to do something.’ They kept reaching out, they kept emailing us, and telling us that we have to do something so that we can move forward.”

A student at Williamsburg Charter High School holds up a newspaper clipping about their rally against gun violence.

Witnessing violence or tragedies can often spur young people into action, said Sara Suzuki, a researcher at Tufts University’s Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement.

For students who do get engaged, though, it’s critical they find support from their community, she said.

“The link between mental health and political activism can be negative, unless there is a supportive environment for the young person,” she said. “It’s not that if a young person gets engaged post-massive political event, that will automatically help them process that trauma or help them heal. It really needs to be in a supportive civic environment.”

At Williamsburg Charter High School, students encouraged one another to come to the rally, and to speak with social workers and other support staff, Martin said. To Sherman, the experience has brought the school community closer together. But the teacher still feels the aftereffects of the incident. She’s still on edge when hearing sudden loud sounds in her apartment.

The shooting weighs heavily on the students, too.

“That fear is still here,” said Arianna S., a recent graduate of the school. “Sometimes, we’ll be feeling wary about coming to school.”

Students seemed more subdued and anxious in the aftermath of the shooting, said Brittany Gozikowski, a social work counselor at the school. She saw a slight initial drop in attendance, too.

“A location where an incident took place can be triggering,” Gozikowski said in an email. “It can ignite overwhelming emotions that the body is naturally adapted to flee from. So that can look like skipping school, requesting to do learning remote, or finding a new school altogether. However, coming back to that space and finding it safe — finding a supportive community and people who care — that can be healing.”

She worked with some students and their families to “process the trauma,” she said. She helped them “take small steps toward eventually getting back in the building and not being hindered by anxieties.”

Anti-gun violence rallies in Bed-Stuy

At another school in Brooklyn, anti-gun violence rallies are an annual occurrence, featuring student poems and performances at Restoration Plaza in Bed-Stuy.

Middle schoolers at Launch Expeditionary Learning Charter School have been holding walkouts and rallies against gun violence for eight years — an act that has given Tiayana Logan, the school’s director of enrichment, a “renewed sense of hope.”

Students and school staff gathered in the plaza last month, sporting orange T-shirts calling for an end to gun violence.

Neighborhood violence impacts everything from student mental and physical health to academic performance, Logan said, adding students are constantly considering how they can stay safe moving to and from school.

“These are things that 10-year-olds and 12-year-olds are thinking about,” she said. “It’s our job as school officials, as teachers and leaders, to reassure them every day that they will be safe.”

Sonali Rajan, associate professor of health education at Columbia University’s Teachers College, noted the impacts of gun violence on mental health can be devastating.

“It’s not just individuals who are shot and killed with firearms,” she said. “But even for children who survive a school shooting, who witness gunfire, who regularly hear gunshots, who have lost a close friend or family member to firearm violence — these are examples of indirect experiences with gun violence that absolutely shape a child’s sense of stability and safety.”

Both short- and long-term intervention are critical in helping children and teenagers process a traumatic incident, particularly as students may face multiple, compounding incidents over their time in school, Rajan said.

Diamond Smith, an alumni of Launch and recent high school graduate, has been thinking deeply about gun violence and its impact on her community for years. She remembers a time before students at Launch had a plaza to host the rallies — when they gathered just outside the nearby Applebee’s to make their voices heard.

Students and staff from Launch Expeditionary Learning Charter School gather at Restoration Plaza in Bed-Stuy for their eighth annual rally against gun violence.

Smith was in sixth grade during the second rally, and since her time in middle school she has worked with Save Our Streets to help keep students safe from gun violence. To her, the anti-gun violence rally helped her understand what was happening in her community around her — a realization she equated to landing in a pool and needing to learn how to swim.

“I want to give kids a safe space,” she said of her work with SOS and as an after-school teacher for younger students. “Because out there isn’t always safe, maybe sometimes home isn’t safe, but you have somewhere to put all your emotions. When you come here, we’re here for you.”

Her time at Launch and with SOS helped crystallize her own goals beyond school. Smith, who will soon attend Albany State University in Georgia, hopes to help those who are struggling — first as a social worker, and eventually, as a lawyer.

“I want to do public service work. I feel like that is my path,” she said. “The gun violence work, the outreach, all of it — it made me realize that.”

‘The activist years’

Students at Williamsburg Charter High School watched in the weeks that followed the incident as more shootings occurred across the country — including one in Nashville that sparked national coverage. Seeing those incidents brought back memories of their own experience, and students said they empathized with the victims on a deeper level.

“It’s one thing to realize and know about it, and it’s another thing to experience it,” said Savannah F., a recent graduate. “It made me more aware of how much not only legislation is not doing enough for us, but also just how exhausted we are.”

It’s been challenging balancing advocacy work with their studies, college applications, and more — but it’s also helped fortify their interests moving forward. Leslie said she plans to work in government in some capacity after college to address systemic issues, including gun violence. For Arianna, this experience has given insight she’ll carry forward as she hopes to study psychology and work in counseling after graduation.

“I never envisioned having such a close connection to this topic,” Arianna said, noting their time in high school has also been disrupted by major incidents like the murder of George Floyd and the pandemic.

“It’s just mind boggling. We already didn’t have the best four years, because of COVID and everything in general. So we tried to make the best of it,” she said. “But I feel like the last four years have been the activist years.”

Julian Shen-Berro is a reporter covering New York City. Contact him at jshen-berro@chalkbeat.org.

SROs to stay at 13 Denver campuses, armed officers to help with weapons searches under safety plan

2023-06-30T21:00:53+00:00

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Police officers will stay at large secondary schools this fall, armed school district safety officers will help with weapons searches, and Denver Public Schools leadership will “comprehensively examine current student discipline practices.”

Those are among the details in the final draft of a long-term safety plan that Superintendent Alex Marrero released Friday in line with a deadline set by the school board.

In an interview, Marrero called the plan “an index of what we have to offer.” He implied that the plan would continue to evolve with the district’s needs.

“By no means do I want anyone to think this is one and done,” Marrero said. “It is the start of a larger conversation, not only here but also nationally.”

The board ordered Marrero to create the plan after a March shooting inside East High School. A 17-year-old student who was required by the school to be searched daily for weapons shot and injured two deans. The student fled the school and later took his own life.

The shooting spurred intense debate and community activism, including the formation of a parent group that called for increased safety, as well as backlash against returning police to schools. A divided school board ultimately voted to allow the return of armed school resource officers, known as SROs.

A previous board had voted in 2020 to remove SROs — a ban that was temporarily suspended following the East shooting.

The final safety plan released Friday is its third iteration. Marrero released the first and second drafts last month. The final version is clearer in that it lists the “current state” of certain district safety programs and the “future state” — to show what will change.

The school board does not need to vote on the plan.

The changes include that DPS will:

Return SROs to comprehensive middle and high schools.

The plan doesn’t specify which schools, but Marrero said in an interview that SROs will return this fall to the 13 campuses where they were stationed this spring following the East shooting.

Those 13 campuses are: East, North, South, West, Northfield, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, Montbello, and Manual high schools, as well as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Early College and the Evie Dennis campus.

Eighteen middle and high school campuses had an SRO when the board voted to ban them in 2020. Following this fall, Marrero said in an interview that the district will develop a protocol for deciding which campuses have SROs.

Allow schools to determine, after extensive community engagement, whether to employ weapons detection systems.

DPS already has four mobile weapons detection units by the company Evolv Technology that the plan says the district uses for “athletic events and events requested by administrators.” A fiscal memo says “substantial and widespread detection systems at all schools or at high schools only would likely exceed $5 million.”

Conduct a staffing analysis to evaluate the presence of unarmed campus security officers.

Unarmed officers are stationed at middle and high schools and are different from SROs. The analysis will determine “where more staff may be needed or how resources can be shared,” the plan says. Marrero said in an interview that it could show the district needs to hire more unarmed officers.

Provide more support to school staff in conducting student searches, especially if weapons may be found.

For example, the plan says that if a student is required to undergo a search because they were found to have a gun outside of school, an armed DPS safety patrol officer “will be designated to support that for the specific window of time that allows for a safe, supervised search and entry into the building.”

Armed DPS safety patrol officers are different from both unarmed campus safety officers and SROs. They are a part of a mobile unit that responds to calls throughout DPS.

In the aftermath of the East shooting, some parents and educators said searches should be conducted by police or security staff rather than administrators, as was happening at East. The district has said SROs can’t search students without probable cause, but an armed DPS safety patrol officer — who is not a sworn police officer — can.

Work with local law enforcement to host youth violence meetings in each region of the city.

The meetings would be “to monitor trends of violence impacting school communities and strengthen partnerships to dismantle barriers impacting access to programming for youth,” according to the plan.

Expand the district’s online high school and potentially offer hybrid learning.

After the East shooting, some parents questioned why the shooter, who had been expelled from a neighboring school district and had a weapons charge, was attending school in person and not online.

While Marrero said the district believes in-person learning is best and is “not in the business of just shipping kids out,” he said DPS is considering a protocol that would allow students to learn online while the district figures out a plan for them to safely learn in-person.

Develop an online dashboard to better track and monitor “action and intervention plans,” which are put in place for students who may pose a threat to themselves or others.

Conduct safety audits of DPS school buildings and make “physical infrastructure recommendations such as secure vestibules, camera placement, lighting,” the plan says.

Those recommendations could also include wearable panic buttons for teachers, Marrero said. The audits are already underway with the help of consultant Murphy Robinson, who was formerly head of the Denver Department of Public Safety.

Have district leaders attend the Public Education Leadership Program Institute at Harvard University this summer to collaborate with other large urban districts on issues including safety.

DPS leaders will then “comprehensively examine current student discipline practices with the goal of enhancing the experience of safety, while maintaining compliance with federal and state law, and achieving the goal of equity and inclusion for all students,” the plan says.

Increase training for DPS staff on issues such as suicide prevention, threats posed by students, emergency management, and crisis recovery.

Increase offerings for students, including advanced high school coursework, college-level courses, work-based learning, and after-school and summer programming.

Require annual suicide prevention programming for all students in 5th, 6th, 9th, and 12th grades. This programming was previously optional, Marrero said.

Require all students be screened for social and emotional health three times per year, which “represents a dramatic increase” in the use of the screening tool, the fiscal impact note says. DPS plans to pay for the screener next year with federal COVID stimulus funds.

Offer at least “one session on grief and loss” for staff and parents who need it.

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

The ‘Tennessee 3’ created a historic teachable moment. Will schools be allowed to teach it?

2023-06-16T19:34:07+00:00

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When Wyatt Bassow and Ava Buxton missed classes one morning this spring to see democracy in action in Tennessee, they witnessed history that they acknowledged probably wouldn’t be fully taught at their high school less than a mile away.

Justin Pearson, one of two young Democratic lawmakers who were dramatically expelled from office just a week earlier by the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, was taking his oath of office again that day outside the state Capitol in Nashville after being voted back in by officials in Shelby County.

A few days earlier, Rep. Justin Jones of Nashville had been reinstated after a similar vote by his city’s council.

Both men had been ousted from the legislature for staging a protest on the House floor urging gun reforms after a mass school shooting in Nashville. The votes temporarily robbed some 140,000 Tennesseans in the state’s two largest cities of their representation.

“What I’ve learned these last few weeks is that democracy is incredibly fragile,” said Bassow, a senior at Nashville’s Hume-Fogg High School, as he cheered Pearson’s reinstatement in the shadow of the Capitol building.

“But because of the power of the people,” he added, “we were able to fix this.”

Less certain, the students said, is whether the controversial ouster of the two young Black Democrats by the House’s all-white GOP supermajority would be fully discussed at their school, or any public Tennessee school, as part of a course in U.S. government, civics, history, contemporary issues, or social studies.

While Republican leaders maintain the ouster was not racially motivated, the racial optics were undeniable, as was the supermajority’s suppression of legislative voices with whom they disagreed.

Cameron Sexton, a Republican from Crossville, is the speaker of the Tennessee House of Representatives.

Meanwhile, Tennessee is at the front of a conservative-driven wave of censorship about what can and cannot be taught in K-12 schools.

A 2021 state law restricts classroom discussions about systemic racism, white privilege, and the ongoing legacy of slavery. Republican Gov. Bill Lee, who signed the law, has championed civics education that emphasizes American exceptionalism and plays down the origins of present-day U.S. injustices.

School libraries are under scrutiny too, especially for materials that have to do with race and gender. A 2022 law gives the state unprecedented authority to overrule local school boards and remove certain materials from libraries statewide. And a 2023 law puts book distributors and publishers at risk of criminal prosecution if materials they provide to Tennessee schools are deemed obscene.

“We definitely have noticed that a silencing is happening in our schools.” —Ava Buxton, student

“We definitely have noticed that a silencing is happening in our schools,” said Buxton, also a senior at Hume-Fogg, when asked whether the expulsions of Jones and Pearson had been discussed in her classes.

“Thankfully, our teachers are wonderful and intelligent educators who do their best to give students the space we need to have important conversations,” she continued. “But I think these conversations would go much deeper if our teachers didn’t have the fear of these new laws hanging over them.”

The rise, fall, and rise of the Tennessee Three

The expulsions of the two Black lawmakers came during the dramatic last weeks of a tumultuous legislative session gripped by large citizen protests over Tennessee’s lax gun laws, after an armed intruder killed three children and three adults at The Covenant School in Nashville on March 27.

Frustrated that House Speaker Cameron Sexton was not allowing them to voice the concerns of demonstrators during debates, Pearson, Jones, and Rep. Gloria Johnson of Knoxville took their protest to the House floor, where Jones and Pearson alternately used a bullhorn to shout “Gun control now!” and “Power to the people!”

In the process, the trio broke the chamber’s rules of decorum. GOP-sponsored ouster resolutions accused the so-called Tennessee Three of “knowingly and intentionally bringing disorder and dishonor to the House of Representatives.”

(From left) Reps. Justin Jones of Nashville, Gloria Johnson of Knoxville, and Justin Pearson of Memphis speak at a press conference on April 4, 2023, about GOP-sponsored resolutions to kick the three Democrats out of office.

Ultimately, Republican representatives voted overwhelmingly to kick out the two young Black men, while Johnson, who is older and white and was less vocal during the protest, kept her seat by a single vote.

The last time the House had expelled multiple members was in 1866, when six representatives were thrown out for conspiring to deprive the chamber of a quorum during a special session to ratify the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Two others have been expelled in more recent times, one for soliciting a bribe, and the other for sexual misconduct.

By contrast, the ousters of Jones and Pearson over their peaceful protest of gun violence — now the No. 1 killer of children and teens in America — seemed heavy-handed to their supporters. The House could have chosen simply to censure them for breaking House rules of decorum instead of kicking them out altogether.

In a subsequent four-page rebuke, the nation’s professional organization for social studies teachers denounced Tennessee’s House as attacking foundational principles of democratic and republican norms. Intentionally or not, the state was sending Tennessee students a message that the rights to free speech, peaceful protest, and holding their elected officials accountable are “reserved for those who have a specific view or perspective,” the National Council for the Social Studies wrote.

“Just as disturbing,” the group continued, “this action sends a message to the larger community that civil discourse and active citizenship will result in punishment rather than in finding consensus in ways that uphold the principles of democracy and the functioning of our republic … (which) will have a long-term impact on our students’ faith in the democratic process and our constitutional principles.”

Tennessee’s living history drama was filled with teachable moments

Political science and social studies experts say it’s hard to narrow down the events in Tennessee this spring to one teachable moment.

Tens of thousands of citizens descending on the Capitol to protest gun violence after a school shooting and the subsequent expulsions and reinstatements of Jones and Pearson are rich runways for academic inquiry. Among the issues: freedom of speech, legislative rules of decorum, the enduring influence of racism on public policy, and — as Bassow, the Nashville student, articulated — the fragility of democracy.

Students protest outside the Tennessee State Capitol on April 3, 2023, during a demonstration against gun violence and the state’s lax gun laws after a deadly school shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville.

John Geer, a political science professor who helped to launch the Vanderbilt Project on Unity and American Democracy, heartily agrees with Bassow.

“The teachable moment is that democracy fundamentally rests on genuine competition among political parties,” said Geer. “But because of supermajorities in our state legislatures, the minority party has no real influence and is left to scream or complain. They’re not part of the governing process. There’s no give and take, no compromise. Meanwhile, the majority party has so much power that they don’t need to negotiate, and that leads to excesses.”

It didn’t take long for resources to become available to help teachers broach the controversies in Tennessee as well as in Montana, where that state’s House speaker silenced Democratic Rep. Zooey Zephyr, a transgender lawmaker who refused to apologize for telling colleagues they would have “blood” on their hands if they supported a ban on gender-affirming care for youths.

Facing History and Ourselves, a nonprofit group that creates resources about current events to spawn thoughtful classroom discussions, zeroed in on two issues in its lessons: how to discuss politics in non-polarizing ways and the implications of using rules of decorum to censure legislators.

“What norms should guide our conversations about political issues?” asks the group’s lessons designed for middle and high school students.

“How could rules around speech be used to silence people?”

Parameters have narrowed on what teachers can teach

The availability of resources doesn’t mean such questions are being regularly asked in Tennessee classrooms, however.

The state’s public school teachers don’t have much wiggle room on what they’re allowed to teach. They’re also under increased scrutiny over the resources they can use.

“Tennessee civics is really nowhere in the standards. If something isn’t in the standards, it’s probably not going to be taught.” —Bill Carey, Tennessee History for Kids

Teachers are guided by hundreds of state-approved academic standards that set learning goals by subject and grade, and that dictate decisions around curriculum and testing. And social studies teachers already are hard-pressed to cover all of the standards for their subjects during a single school year. Even if they do, only a few courses offered in grades five, eight, and 12 include standards that might lend themselves to discussions about the Tennessee Three.

“Tennessee civics is really nowhere in the standards,” said Bill Carey, who sells resources for educators through his nonprofit Tennessee History for Kids. “And if something isn’t in the standards, it’s probably not going to be taught.”

Social studies lessons, in particular, are monitored closely by parents and activists.

In 2015, some complained that some Tennessee teachers were “indoctrinating” students into Islam in their seventh-grade world history classes, prompting state officials to order an early review of those standards.

More recently, amid a conservative backlash to anti-racism protests after a white policeman killed Black American George Floyd in Minneapolis (an incident that prompted a federal investigation into systemic racism on the police force), Tennessee was among the first states to enact a law intended to restrict K-12 classroom discussions about race, racism, and gender.

Specifically, the 2021 law prohibits teachers from discussing 14 concepts that the state has deemed divisive, including that the United States is fundamentally or irredeemably sexist or racist, or that an individual is inherently privileged, racist, sexist, or oppressive because of their race or gender.

Educators have complained that the law and the state’s rules for enforcing the statute aren’t clear about exactly what teachings cross the line. But teachers found in violation could have their licenses suspended or revoked, while their school districts could face financial penalties.

“To be honest, I just didn’t mention this in class. I am just overly cautious with what I cover in class for now.” —Tennessee social studies teacher

The potential fallout has influenced small but pivotal decisions that educators make every day in Tennessee and in other states that have passed similar laws targeting so-called critical race theory: how to answer a student’s question, which articles to read as a class, how to prepare for a lesson, which examples to use.

That includes whether to discuss the Tennessee legislature’s vote to expel Jones and Pearson, which made national headlines.

“To be honest, I just didn’t mention this in class,” said one Tennessee social studies teacher who asked not to be identified, for fear of retribution. “I am just overly cautious with what I cover in class for now.”

Students ‘come up with all these great questions’

Mark Finchum, executive director of the Tennessee Council for the Social Studies, says the law — and a related climate of fear — has had a chilling effect on teachers who might normally contemplate lessons about the Tennessee Three, or perhaps about the insurrection at the Capitol in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. But it also depends on the teacher.

“If you’re a new teacher who is teaching in an area of the state where you feel insecure, you may not want to go there,” Finchum said. “But if you’re an experienced teacher and feel strongly about these events and how your students can learn from them, you may go ahead.”

Erika Sugarmon falls in the latter category.

One Friday at White Station High School in Memphis, students showed up to Sugarmon’s weekly current events discussion with lots of questions about the expulsion. The day before the legislative vote, many White Station students had walked out of school to show support for gun reforms called for by the Tennessee Three.

“The kids come up with all these great questions. Sometimes there’s not an answer,” said Sugarmon, a veteran educator who teaches courses in U.S. government.

Protesters listen from the gallery of the House of Representatives at the Tennessee State Capitol on April 3, 2023, while demanding gun reform and justice for The Tennessee Three.

But it’s important to give students a safe and constructive space to discuss hard things, added Sugarmon, who is also an elected official on the Shelby County Commission, where she cast a vote to reinstate Pearson to his seat.

One student in her class brought up racism, she said, prompting a conversation about why Tennessee lawmakers have sought to ban some books and squelch classroom discussions about racism.

“Students have been very vocal about not just what happened with Pearson, but with state laws in general,” said Sugarmon.

She encourages them to explore source documents to formulate their own options.

Evidence-based discussions are the way that teachers should take up politically charged topics with their students, Vanderbilt’s Geer said.

“The evidence should be your guidepost,” he said, “while avoiding injecting ideology into the classroom.”

“Yes, facts need to be interpreted,” Geer added. “But if we can agree on a basic set of evidence, we can have a conversation. And that’s an important part of democracy.”

Maya Logan, a rising senior in Memphis at Germantown High School, talked about the lawmakers’ expulsions with her friends, but didn’t discuss the event as part of her 11th-grade American history class. Just the same, the deadly shooting at Nashville’s Covenant School, which prompted the protest and led to the expulsions, was a big deal to her. And as a young Black person, she related to Pearson and Jones, who are among the youngest members of the House.

Logan hopes this year’s events at the state Capitol will resurface as discussion topics during her senior year when she takes a U.S. government class. She has important questions. And she’s looking for answers.

“These are people,” she explained, “that are setting things up for us for our futures.”

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Laura Testino is a reporter for Chalkbeat Tennessee, where she covers K-12 education in Memphis. Contact her at ltestino@chalkbeat.org.

Divided Denver school board votes to keep police in schools

2023-06-16T02:24:08+00:00

Police officers will return to Denver schools next year, after the school board voted 4 to 3 Thursday to allow “the persistent presence of school resource officers” at schools.

The new policy reverses a 2020 board decision to remove SROs from Denver schools and puts to rest — at least for now — a debate that has raged in the community for nearly three months.

The split vote came after nearly four hours of debate, several amendments to the proposal, and accusations that some board members intentionally delayed the vote.

Board President Xóchitl “Sochi” Gaytán and members Scott Baldermann, Charmaine Lindsay, and Carrie Olson voted in favor of bringing police back to schools.

“This is about deterrence,” said Baldermann, who authored the proposal. “If it stops one kid from bringing a loaded gun into a school, I think it’s worth it.”

Board Vice President Auon’tai Anderson and members Scott Esserman and Michelle Quattlebaum voted no. The three board members had backed an alternate proposal that would have established a group of “community resource officers” that would have responded to schools when necessary but would not have been stationed inside them.

Anderson said returning SROs was going “back to an oppressive system.”

“The police system in America is designed to oppress,” Esserman said.

The much-anticipated decision comes after a particularly violent school year. A shooting inside East High School in March, in which a student shot and injured two deans and later took his own life, most forcefully reignited the debate about police in schools.

The new policy doesn’t specify which schools will have SROs. It simply directs the superintendent to establish a memorandum of understanding with the Denver Police Department for when SROs are necessary at district-run and charter schools.

However, it does allow the superintendent to “promptly remove” SROs who don’t follow district policy and best practices. It also requires the district to monitor the number of times SROs ticket or arrest students to ensure marginalized students aren’t disproportionately targeted.

Denver Police Chief Ron Thomas has said that his preference is to have school resource officers in high schools but that he will work within the parameters established by the district.

A majority of board members removed other guardrails that Baldermann had included in the proposal, including that SROs not be involved in student discipline, not store firearms at schools, and that the officers “reflect the students at the school” demographically.

Baldermann said he included those limits to prevent disproportionate policing of students of color — something opponents of police in schools say is nearly inevitable.

But Anderson, Esserman, and Quattlebaum criticized those guardrails as getting too deep into operational details. Olson said she preferred the simplified policy.

The Denver school board uses a governance model that calls for board members to set policy and leaves the superintendent responsible for operations. Criticizing an idea as too operational has become a way for board members to reject ideas they oppose.

Over the course of the meeting, Anderson and Esserman proposed numerous amendments that would place fewer limits on how police operate in schools — the opposite of the position they have advocated for. Other board members accused them of purposely extending the debate.

“To me, this feels more like a delay to not vote on the original motion,” Gaytán said after Esserman offered one of his amendments.

Esserman disputed that he was trying to delay. “This is about getting it right,” he said.

Lindsay also expressed frustration about delays. “So all I have to do is make a motion in the middle of a motion and I can stifle everybody else’s speech?” she said.

“If you get a second,” Anderson said.

Denver school board Vice President Auon’tai Anderson led the effort to remove SROs from schools and has strongly opposed their return.

A previous board voted three years ago, in June 2020, to remove school resource officers from Denver schools. At the time, 18 SROs were stationed in middle and high schools across the district. Denver Public Schools and the Denver Police Department split the cost.

But amid protests against racist policing following the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, the Denver school board unanimously decided to sever ties with the police department. Anderson, Baldermann, and Olson were on the board at the time and voted in favor.

After SROs were removed, the number of DPS students ticketed and arrested at school went down. But the number of real and fake guns confiscated at schools went up. And several high-profile shootings in and around East High sparked community concern.

A day after the shooting inside East in March, the school board temporarily lifted its ban on SROs. For the last two months of school, 14 SROs were stationed on 13 high school campuses.

The temporary suspension was set to expire June 30. That’s also the deadline the board gave Superintendent Alex Marrero to come up with a long-term safety plan for the district.

Public opinion on whether to reinstate SROs varied widely. In an April survey conducted by DPS, 33% of staff, 41% of students, and 48% of parents who responded said SROs would help.

At a raucous school board meeting last week, Deputy Superintendent Tony Smith said more recent surveys showed more support for SROs. But the feedback from a series of telephone town hall meetings in May was that parents consistently ranked SROs second behind weapons detection systems as the resource they wanted DPS to invest more money in.

The advocacy group Movimiento Poder has strongly opposed reintroducing SROs. The Denver-based organization has pushed for years to disrupt the school-to-prison pipeline. In a press release after the vote, Executive Director Elsa Bañuelos-Lindsay condemned the decision as “a false solution that will directly endanger students.”

“It will mean plunging students back into the harm and criminalization that cops are known to bring to classrooms and especially students of color, while not providing protection to students,” she said.

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

7 questions for Denver Public Schools’ new safety chief, Greg Cazzell

2023-06-13T23:37:46+00:00

Leer en español.

Denver Public Schools will soon have a new chief of climate and safety: Greg Cazzell, who served for eight years as the director of safety for neighboring Aurora Public Schools.

Greg Cazzell

The DPS position had been vacant for six months when the district announced it had hired Cazzell, who spent 22 years with the Glendale police department before working in Aurora.

School safety is top of mind for many Denver students, families, and educators right now. Shootings in and around high schools this year have led to student protests, the formation of a parent advocacy group, calls for the school board to resign, a debate about whether to reintroduce school resource officers, and the development of a long-term safety plan.

Chalkbeat spoke to Cazzell Tuesday about his priorities and approach to safety before he officially starts the job on July 10. Here’s what he had to say.

You’re coming to DPS from Aurora Public Schools and a community that also has grappled with youth gun violence. What did you learn in Aurora that you’ll bring to Denver?

Community partnerships. Schools can’t do it alone. We have our students for about 7 hours and 40 minutes a day. And that’s just not enough time. So community partnerships, family partnerships, bringing all the stakeholders together to tackle some of the challenges.

If it’s violence in the community, it’s impacting our schools. So there’s no really differentiating between the two. Our students are in the community, they see the violence, they’re impacted by the violence. And so it takes not only the school district but nonprofits, community organizations, cities. It’s all-encompassing.

Is there an example of a partnership in Aurora that you’re particularly proud of?

I think the work that all of our after-school programs are doing: Boys and Girls Club, COMPASS, Rocky Mountain Kids. Those are all providing some after-school structure that engages the students, keeps them at the school, keeps them safe and part of that overwhelming umbrella.

And so all of those after-school programs, I’ve had great relationships with all three. And will continue to, I hope, bring some of those over to DPS.

The Denver school board is currently debating whether to lift a ban on school resource officers and allow police back into schools. Aurora Public Schools has had school resource officers for years. What is your opinion on SROs?

As you mentioned, they’ve been in Aurora Public Schools for over 20 years. We have two at every high school, along with an armed campus safety officer. So that’s the model that the superintendent and board of education in APS has adopted.

It’s a policy decision, and so that’s some of the debate you’re hearing right now in the DPS board meetings. And that will be the direction that I follow.

Students bringing weapons to school is a major concern. Some people have proposed installing metal detectors. Aurora has used drug-sniffing dogs that could also detect gunpowder residue. What approaches would you suggest Denver take to keep weapons out of schools?

All of the above would be kind of a good answer for that.

We really got to look at all of our technology, all of our options that may be beneficial to ensuring that we have a safe environment that’s conducive to learning. And that never stops. That is always going to be challenged. And we need to make sure we’re re-evaluating.

This isn’t a one-and-done comprehensive safety plan for DPS. It will have to be evaluated. We’ll have to determine what’s working, what’s not working. That will be the path forward.

I don’t think we should eliminate any of the options before us. But again, they’re all based on policy and what has the DPS board of education decided.

DPS said it was looking for a new safety chief with both “safety and security chops” and “a student-centric mindset.” District leadership has talked about the importance of disrupting the school-to-prison pipeline. Do you believe in that work? How would you further that work?

Absolutely. We need to make sure we are not criminalizing adolescent behavior.

So we need to work closely with our partners, whether they are the SRO that responds or any additional law enforcement component. We need to make sure that our staff understand the communities that our students are coming from, some of the challenges that they are faced with, and understanding that comprehensive approach to make sure that we’re not operating in a silo or a bubble. It’s important for us to get that big view of the big picture and realize how that impacts the day-to-day safety environment of our schools.

Why did you want the job in DPS?

Aside from the size of the two districts [Aurora Public Schools has about 39,000 students, while Denver Public Schools has about 88,000], I think they’re very similar. The socioeconomic makeup [of student families], the free and reduced-[price lunch] population.

I think Aurora is probably a little more diverse than DPS. I know DPS might not want to hear that, but Aurora is a very diverse community and we need to make sure we are recognizing that diversity, recognizing those refugee populations — I know they’re not limited to Aurora, clearly, but that’s been my experience — and making sure they understand what our role is in campus safety.

It’s important to understand we’re not law enforcement. We are safety-focused. And they’re coming from countries where they see the uniform and that’s what has been oppressive for them. So we need to make sure that we’re recognizing that diversity.

In the past, in DPS and in school districts all over the country, there has been that disproportionality in discipline. Some people call it over-policing students of color. How do you approach that and mitigate that?

It’s ongoing. There’s not one solution.

You need to look at that data. You need to make sure you’ve got the right people. If the board chooses SROs, we need to make sure that we’re working with Denver police and finding the right SROs that are going to fit with those schools, fit in with that school culture. Again, recognizing where those students come from, understanding their background. And again, making sure that the SRO, as well as my team, is a good fit for that school.

It didn’t happen often but there were times when we did go to Aurora police and say, ‘Hey, this person just isn’t fitting in well with this school. Let’s look at a different candidate to come on board.’ That may be an option should the board approve the SROs.

Again, my work is all based on policy. And so whatever that ultimate direction given from the board to the superintendent to me, that will be the direction I take safety and security.

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Raw emotions, shouting, and prayers as Denver school board debates police in schools

2023-06-06T18:45:21+00:00

A Denver school board discussion of police in schools Monday began with board members shouting to be heard after the president cut off their microphones and ended with a series of ministers praying that the district’s children be safe and that its leaders show good judgment.

“This topic is too important for us to gloss over,” board member Michelle Quattlebaum, who opposes stationing police officers inside schools, said after her microphone was cut off. “I will continue to press back on structures of oppression.”

The tumult at Monday night’s Denver school board meeting reflected ongoing conflict on the board, the deep division in the community over police in schools, and how strongly each side feels their solution is safest for students. The debate follows several incidents of gun violence, including a shooting inside East High in March that prompted the board to temporarily lift a ban on police in schools.

Now the board is weighing whether to bring the officers back on a long-term basis. But with dueling proposals on the table, the seven board members don’t agree.

Superintendent Alex Marrero invited Denver Police Chief Ron Thomas to Monday’s meeting to explain how police would partner with Denver Public Schools if the board reinstates school resource officers, known as SROs. The agenda item read only “Superintendent’s Update.”

Thomas promised specialized training in de-escalation and the adolescent brain. He pledged that the officers would come from the community and want the assignment. He said they would focus on positive interactions with students and deterring crime, not on discipline.

“I’ve seen it work where young people have had a great opportunity to develop relationships with police officers in their schools,” Thomas said.

Deputy Superintendent Tony Smith then read off a long list of just-in survey results overwhelmingly in favor of police: 95% of students at Montbello High, 90% of parents at Northeast Early College, and 85% of staff at Lincoln High are in support of SROs, Smith said.

The results were notably different from previous survey results. An April survey conducted by the district found just 41% of students in favor of SROs. At a series of telephone town hall meetings last month, parents consistently ranked SROs second behind weapons detections systems as the resource they wanted DPS to invest more money in.

Quattlebaum questioned the validity of the survey results presented by Smith. Black students, she said, “do not feel safe speaking their truth” for fear of being seen as opposing school safety. The survey, she said, supports what Marrero, board President Xóchitl “Sochi” Gaytán, and board members Scott Baldermann and Charmaine Lindsay want: to return SROs to schools.

“But have we done the real research, is what I’m asking,” Quattlebaum said. “Creating and holding the space that’s actually required to address the situation?”

Gaytán tried to cut Quattlebaum off. She said it wasn’t Quattlebaum’s turn to speak.

“Please, I ask for your respect,” Gaytán said. “As president of the board, I’m asking you kindly and respectfully to respect procedure.”

Quattlebaum kept speaking. “When we go down the list of traits of white supremacy, this is actually one of them,” she said.

Gaytán gestured toward the technical crew controlling the microphones. Board Vice President Auon’tai Anderson jumped to Quattlebaum’s defense. “Do not cut her mic!” he said.

But Gaytán did. Quattlebaum stood up and spoke loudly.

“I will continue to be a voice and a beacon,” Quattlebaum said.

Anderson’s microphone was cut off a few minutes later, after Marrero said it was “impossible to fathom” that Denver’s students of color would be over-policed by SROs under his watch, even though it happened in the past. “Then is not now,” Marrero said.

“Respectfully, Dr. Marrero, I have to just,” Anderson began.

“Vice President Anderson,” Gaytán said. “Would you please follow procedure and ask for the floor?”

“I’m not doing this with you today,” Anderson said to Gaytán.

When Anderson’s microphone went dead, he also stood up and shouted.

“Just because we have new faces doesn’t mean we trust what you’re going to do!” he said.

The board is considering two proposals. One, authored by Baldermann, would let the superintendent decide when, where, and for long SROs should be stationed in schools. While Gaytán and Lindsay have not formally endorsed Baldermann’s proposal, Gaytán called the return of SROs “inevitable,” while Lindsay has said they could help.

Another proposal, backed by Quattlebaum, Anderson and board member Scott Esserman, says the district should instead work with the city to create community resource officers who would be available to schools only when necessary.

The bulk of Monday’s meeting was set aside for public comment — and the topic of SROs dominated among the speakers in the packed auditorium. Nearly all speakers, including a large group with the advocacy organization Movimiento Poder, were opposed to bringing back SROs.

They said SROs cause trauma, ticket and arrest Black and Latino students, and do nothing to stop school shootings. They accused the school board of being reactionary and ignoring data.

“For my sake, and thousands of students’ sake, please stop ignoring the Black and brown voices,” said Carold Carter, a sophomore at Denver School of the Arts.

“It’s important we show our community of beautiful students that we truly care about them and will refuse to treat them as criminals or their schools as prisons,” the 15-year-old said.

At a press conference just a half hour before the meeting Monday, some parents expressed a more complicated view. Dorian Warren, a Black mother with a son at East High, said that the SROs at East have tried to build a rapport with her son.

Warren is part of a group called Resign DPS Board that is calling on all seven board members to step down — or at least for voters to get rid of any incumbents who run for reelection.

In a year filled with gun violence, Warren said there were no incidents after the SROs returned.

“I don’t want to see another child die and more finger pointing,” Warren said. “This board needs to be proactive and stop dragging their feet, stop making excuses, stop being divisive.”

Before Monday’s board meeting was over, Quattlebaum had apologized for “stepping out of order.” More than three hours of public comment ended with a series of nine ministers who used their allotted three minutes each to stand at the microphone and pray.

“I’ve been here for a few hours, so I’m tired,” said Brandon Washington, pastor of Embassy Christian Bible Church. “And I know you are too. One of the things that was fatiguing was not just the passage of time, but the manner in which this conversation occurred. So I want to be careful to give some attention to remembering that the agenda here is not self. It is others.”

School safety, Washington said, is “a complex matter.” “Let everyone here think the best of the other,” he said, “knowing that everyone here desires the welfare of children.”

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Denver board divided on competing school policing proposals

2023-06-01T23:55:08+00:00

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A divided Denver school board failed to find much common ground in an hourlong debate Thursday over two competing proposals on the role of police in schools.

The meeting concluded with no decision, with no scheduled vote, and with uncertainty about next steps. The board even discussed setting aside both proposals until they held an up-or-down vote on the policy that was in place for almost two years — a ban on armed police officers on Denver campuses.

Superintendent Alex Marrero had asked the board to decide whether to allow police on campuses and in what circumstances as he finalizes a new school safety plan, and board members presented two different visions.

Board member Scott Baldermann’s proposal would allow Marrero to decide when, where, and for how long to station police at Denver schools. The proposal says police would not get involved in discipline but would be present for ensuring safety, deterring crime, mentoring students, and building community.

Baldermann said he hopes Denver schools can benefit from the presence of police without seeing a return to disproportionate discipline, tickets, and arrests that affected students of color.

“I don’t want to fall back,” Baldermann said.

Board member Scott Esserman countered: “This policy is falling back.”

Esserman backs a proposal from Vice President Auon’tai Anderson to direct the superintendent to negotiate a memorandum of understanding with the Denver Police Department to create community resource officers who would receive special training and get to know schools within regions of the city — without being stationed inside buildings.

Anderson called it a “third way” between having school resource officers on campus and the recent status quo, in which school leaders called 911 when safety issues arose and any on-duty officer responded.

“We need to center the needs of our students and not make reactionary decisions,” Anderson said.

With Anderson leading the charge, the Denver school board voted in 2020 to remove school resource officers amid the protests that followed the murder of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis. Community groups such as Movimiento Poder, formerly known as Padres y Jóvenes Unidos, had been working toward that change for a decade.

Then in March, after a student shot two administrators inside East High School, the board temporarily suspended the ban. Marrero had already publicly stated his intention to bring police back to schools, and after spring break, Denver police officers were stationed at 13 Denver campuses.

The first version of Marrero’s safety plan would have allowed building principals to decide whether police should be stationed at their schools. After many principals said they didn’t want that responsibility, Marerro asked the Denver school board to make a long-term decision.

In a written statement emailed to Chalkbeat, Denver Police Chief Ron Thomas said he would work with the district wherever the board lands but has a “clear preference” for full-time school resource officers in every large high school.

“They will serve as a layer of safety planning and, more importantly, maintaining positive relationships with youth in schools,” Thomas said. “This position was shared with members of the school board. The decision will ultimately be that of DPS. DPD will comply with the direction of the DPS Board and School Administration.

“There are still a number of uncertainties with multiple options still on the table. While the department has begun logistical planning internally for different options, we will not comment about those plans until after a final determination has been made.”

The unanimous March vote to temporarily allow police on campuses occurred after a five-hour closed-door meeting and with no public discussion. Thursday’s meeting gives the public more insight into how board members are thinking about safety and policing. Esserman said the disagreement is a sign of healthy democracy in action, not dysfunction.

Board President Xóchitl “Sochi” Gaytán called the return of police “inevitable” and said the board should set guidelines such as proposed by Baldermann for what their role should be.

But board member Michelle Quattlebaum said the decision only becomes inevitable after the board votes. She said the board’s first decision should be whether it wants to stick with the policy in place from 2020 until March of this year — a ban on police in schools. Only once that policy has been overturned should the board consider a new policy.

Quattlebaum said she wanted to name the “elephant in the room.”

“I have Black sons who have gone through DPS and I know what their experience was,” she said. “We are talking about policing Black children. That is what we are talking about, without saying it. How do we make sure the white students are safe when they are in school with Black students?”

“I’m just as concerned as about my brown boys and my brown community,” Gaytán said. “What I want is a say in what that looks like.”

Board member Charmaine Lindsay says she has seen the impact of disproportionate policing and discipline on her 10 grandchildren, who are all children of color. Lindsay, who is white, said she also has seen children meet a bad end that might have been avoided if there had been earlier intervention.

“I’ve seen kids end up dead and kids end up with 20- or 30-year prison sentences that could have been prevented if someone said, ‘you’re going to get a ticket’ or ‘you’re going to go to a pathways school,’” she said.

She also said school resource officers could help teachers feel safer, and that shouldn’t be overlooked.

Board member Carrie Olson, who was attending remotely, did not weigh in.

With the board reaching a self-imposed deadline for wrapping up the discussion, Anderson suggested holding an up-or-down vote on the previous ban at a future meeting before taking up either of the new proposals. It takes three board members or the president to place something on the agenda.

Baldermann said he feared that ending the ban without agreement on a replacement policy — one possible outcome of an up-or-down vote — would leave Denver students without protections and the superintendent without guidance.

The board’s next meeting is Monday, when the board is scheduled to hear public comment. However, the board doesn’t have a meeting allowing voting until June 15. The board could also schedule a special meeting.

Bureau Chief Erica Meltzer covers education policy and politics and oversees Chalkbeat Colorado’s education coverage. Contact Erica at emeltzer@chalkbeat.org.

Denver school district hires safety chief from Aurora schools, filling 6-month vacancy

2023-06-01T22:26:33+00:00

Denver has hired longtime Aurora Public Schools safety chief Greg Cazzell to be the district’s next chief of climate and safety.

The key position has been vacant for more than six months as Denver Public Schools grapples with rising community violence and shootings both inside and just outside school buildings. Superintendent Alex Marrero is developing a new safety plan, the school board is debating the role of police in schools, and community groups are advocating for competing visions.

In a press release announcing the hire Thursday, the district said Cazzell would be responsible for overseeing and implementing the safety plan set to be finalized later this month. Cazzell is scheduled to start July 10.

Greg Cazzell

“I am very proud to accept this role with Denver Public Schools,” Cazzell said in the press release. “I am very aware of the work in front of us, and I am excited to get started on implementing the safety and security features of the new plan in support of our students, staff and community.”

A district spokesman said Cazzell is on a family trip and not available for interviews.

Cazzell has worked as Aurora Public Schools’ director of safety and security for eight years. Before that, he spent 22 years with the Glendale, Colorado, police department. He also has been an adjunct professor teaching criminal justice classes at Johnston & Wales University.

The neighboring Aurora school district has dealt with similar challenges with community violence. In 2021, within weeks, nine students were shot and injured in two incidents, one in the parking lot of Hinkley High School and the other in a park near Aurora Central High School.

Aurora, though, has maintained school resource officers throughout social justice protests and student advocacy. Then-Superintendent Rico Munn said the district put its own money toward mental health supports and restorative justice, while the city paid for police salaries, striking a good balance.

During his tenure, Cazzell implemented ID check procedures at Aurora schools that raised concerns among advocacy groups that work with immigrant parents and faced questions about the use of drug-sniffing dogs in schools.

“I know that Chief Cazzell will help DPS move forward in our ongoing commitment to providing a safe environment for every student to thrive,” Marrero said in a press release. “He will play a pivotal role in safeguarding our students and building trust among parents and staff.”

Bureau Chief Erica Meltzer covers education policy and politics and oversees Chalkbeat Colorado’s education coverage. Contact Erica at emeltzer@chalkbeat.org.

Denver board to weigh competing proposals on police in schools

2023-06-01T00:55:11+00:00

The Denver school board is divided on whether to keep police officers on campuses, with two competing proposals on the board agenda for Thursday.

One proposal, authored by board member Scott Baldermann, would give the superintendent authority to decide when, where, and for how long police should be stationed in Denver school buildings. School communities would be informed and their opinions considered, the proposal says, but the decision would rest with the superintendent.

The superintendent would deem when police presence is necessary and would work to ensure officers don’t get involved in school discipline and have special training and certifications, the proposal says.

The proposal says that police should be in schools for preserving safety, deterring crime, mentoring students, and building community and that they should have a softer presence, wearing less formal uniforms and not parking their cars where students would have to walk around them.

Baldermann, who voted to remove school resource officers back in 2020, said he changed his position due to the number of weapons being confiscated in Denver schools and feedback he has heard from the community.

He hopes his proposal will provide safety benefits and deter students from taking weapons to school without leading to more tickets and arrests for students of color — the reason advocates wanted police out of schools in the first place.

“At the end of the day, I do want this to be a positive relationship, and I think we can do that,” he said.

The other proposal, authored by Vice President Auon’tai Anderson and endorsed by members Scott Esserman and Michelle Quattlebaum, says police should not be stationed in schools — district- or charter-managed — on a regular basis. Instead the district would develop a memorandum of understanding with the city to create community resource officer positions.

Those officers would be assigned by region and available to schools when necessary. Their role would be limited to protecting the physical safety of students and staff, responding to a threat from someone outside the school community, and responding to situations in which schools are required to call law enforcement. The memorandum would include guidelines for when it’s appropriate for police to be on school grounds and when school staff should handle a situation, the proposal says.

Anderson’s proposal says that any officer engagements with students should include district support staff, restorative justice workers, and if needed a special education caseworker to help de-escalate the incident and intervene without criminalizing students.

Anderson said during a news conference Wednesday that the proposal represents a middle ground. The district won’t place police officers in schools but schools will have a police presence when needed.

“We cannot turn back on the progress that we have made,” he said.

While Baldermann’s proposal calls for officers to be trained by the National Association of School Resource Officers, Anderson lays out more extensive training requirements with curriculum to be developed by community groups. Topics would include restorative practices, culturally responsive de-escalation, working with students with disabilities, trauma-informed approaches, racial equity, and the school-to-prison pipeline.

Both proposals call for not spending school district funds on school resource officers. Instead, the city, state, or grants should cover police salaries, the proposals say.

The school district cannot unilaterally compel the city or the police department to agree to its terms.

Anderson said he’s spoken with Denver Police Chief Ron Thomas about the proposal. Questions remain about details of the memorandum of understanding, such as officers’ duties, the number of officers, and school assignments, Anderson said.

Baldermann said he hasn’t talked with the police chief, but he hopes the department would find the guidelines he’s proposing reasonable.

The role police will play in Denver schools is a significant question as Superintendent Alex Marrero develops a new safety plan that also emphasizes mental health resources for students, after-school programming, and community partnerships. Last week, in a second draft of the plan, he asked the school board to adopt a districtwide policy rather than leave the decision up to school principals in consultation with teachers and parents.

The Denver school board voted unanimously in March to temporarily return armed police officers to high schools the day after a student shot and wounded two administrators inside East High School. That decision reversed a ban adopted in 2020 in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis. Anderson was the leading advocate for removing police from schools.

The district was supposed to develop a new agreement with the Denver Police Department, but that never happened.

Without police on campuses, tickets and referrals to law enforcement fell, a major goal of advocates who pointed to significant racial disparities in student interactions with police.

Since then, rising community violence, more weapons being found on school grounds, and three prominent shootings in or near East High School — including one in which a student was killed — all pushed questions of school safety, discipline, and school resource officers to the forefront.

For the last two months, 13 Denver campuses have had school resource officers. Community surveys have found parents, students, and educators all divided on whether the presence of police would make schools feel safer. Advocacy groups like Movimiento Poder have urged the district not to return police to campuses, while many school principals say they would prefer to have officers in their buildings who know and are familiar with their students.

Board member Esserman, who supports not putting police back into schools, said the district shouldn’t switch its approach every time an incident occurs.

“When we do that, we’re just swinging a pendulum back and forth,” he said. Instead, the change will modify the district’s approach to keeping cops out of schools while also getting cops more involved with the city’s communities, he said.

Baldermann said those pendulum swings are one reason he wants the superintendent to make the decision on an as-needed basis.

“Right now, the board was saying you can’t do this, and Dr. Marrero did it anyway,” Baldermann said. “If there is a known threat or intelligence from the community, the superintendent should be able to respond. The board does not need to be involved in the operational level of where and when and how long.”

School Board President Xóchitl “Sochi” Gaytán said that as she’s met with Latino community groups, the large majority — especially mothers — want to see police in schools provided they have training and understand the community and its culture.

“It’s important we all come to the table with an open mind, that we come from the heart as well as bring analytical and critical thinking skills to determine what the best route is with this divisive SRO issue,” she said.

This article has been updated throughout with quotes from school board members.

Jason Gonzales contributed to this article.

Bureau Chief Erica Meltzer covers education policy and politics and oversees Chalkbeat Colorado’s education coverage. Contact Erica at emeltzer@chalkbeat.org.

New Denver schools safety plan asks board to decide on police on campus

2023-05-26T21:41:08+00:00

The second draft of Denver Public Schools’ new safety plan doesn’t answer a key question — whether Denver schools will station armed police officers on campus next school year.

While the first draft suggested that school principals would have the authority to decide for themselves, the second draft released Friday kicks that question back to the school board, which still hasn’t voted on whether to permanently end a ban on school resource officers enacted in 2020.

Superintendent Alex Marrero now recommends the board decide for all comprehensive high schools and all 6-12 schools. The board is scheduled to discuss police in schools next week.

School principals would be able to decide whether to install metal detectors or other weapons detection systems after “extensive community engagement,” according to Marrero’s plan.

The plan reiterates that every student has the right under federal law to access a free and appropriate public education — a response to those in the community who said students with a history of concerning behavior should be required to attend alternative schools or online school. However, the plan also says the district is expanding hybrid and online options.

The plan does not recommend specific changes to the discipline matrix — another source of concern for some educators and parents who feel the district has gone too far in keeping certain students in school — but mentions that Denver Public Schools leadership will work with a team from Harvard and large urban school districts on effective discipline strategies.

The board directed Marrero to draft a long-term safety plan one day after a student shot two deans at Denver’s East High School in March. Marrero released a first draft of the plan on May 1. He has until June 30 to finalize it.

Whether police officers should be stationed on DPS campuses is among the most hotly debated aspects of the plan. The school board had removed officers — known as school resource officers, or SROs — from schools in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. But after the East High shooting, the board held a lengthy closed-door meeting and temporarily suspended its ban on police.

Thirteen Denver high school campuses now have SROs. But the temporary suspension is set to expire next month.

The topic was on the agenda at the board’s May 18 meeting. However, after voting to give Marrero a 10% raise, the board ran out of time to discuss the SRO policy.

Board President Xóchitl “Sochi” Gaytán said Friday that the board is set to discuss the policy, known officially as executive limitation 10.10, at a work session Thursday. The board could vote later in June, Gaytán said. Currently, the policy says the superintendent shall “not staff district schools with school resource officers or the consistent presence of security armed with guns or any other law enforcement personnel.”

Opinions vary on whether schools should have SROs. In a survey conducted last month, 33% of DPS staff, 41% of students, and 48% of parents who responded said SROs would help. White parents were overrepresented among the respondents.

The draft plan says a majority of Denver school principals want to host school resource officers at their schools but also want the school board to make the decision, rather than make the decision themselves. In contrast, classroom teachers are less likely to support having school resource officers on campus but want the decision made at the school level.

Should the school board decide to keep police on campuses, the plan says the district would work closely with the department on selecting and training officers.

DPS held four telephone town hall meetings about the first draft of the safety plan. Marrero briefly discussed the feedback at the May 18 school board meeting.

He said more than 24,000 people attended the telephone meetings, and participants ranked SROs and weapons detection systems as the top two systemwide strategies in which the district should invest more resources. The other choices included unarmed and armed DPS security guards, communications, student discipline, and out-of-school programming.

A high-level summary of the townhall feedback included in the new safety plan shows a majority of participants did not feel the proposed strategies addressed student safety very well, not at a personal level, a school level, or a district level.

At 48 pages long, the first draft of the safety plan largely repeated things DPS already does or policies it already has in place. For instance, it talked about expecting schools to have the equivalent of one-full time mental health worker on staff and highlighted 20-minute daily lessons on social and emotional learning that happen in elementary schools.

The first draft also detailed DPS’s existing summer school programs, its commitment to culturally relevant curriculum, and its bullying prevention efforts.

The second draft is 62 pages and very similar to the first. The executive summary says in response to feedback, the district made an effort in the second version to better distinguish between programs that are already in place and those that are planned for future years.

The plan rejects the idea of requiring clear backpacks as unlikely to be effective and says that small class sizes — a top priority of the teachers union — do “not address all aspects of school safety.”

The draft plan doesn’t include any cost estimates yet but promises that the final version will.

Read the plan here.

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Bureau Chief Erica Meltzer covers education policy and politics and oversees Chalkbeat Colorado’s education coverage. Contact Erica at emeltzer@chalkbeat.org.

Papá de Luis García: Si ese día hubiese habido policías en la East High, ‘quizás mi hijo estaría todavía con nosotros’

2023-05-24T23:48:52+00:00

Read in English.

El viernes la familia de Luis García regresó por primera vez a City Park Esplanade, la carretera asfaltada que pasa por el frente de la Secundaria East High de Denver y se adentra al parque, desde que el adolescente de 16 años murió por un balazo allí en febrero.

Ellos notaron la presencia de policías de Denver en la escuela, una medida de seguridad que no existía cuando Luis fue baleado mientras estaba sentado en su auto, estacionado en la calle City Park Esplanade. Los policías de Denver no regresaron a la secundaria East hasta un mes y medio después, cuando hubo otro tiroteo en el que un estudiante de la escuela disparó e hirió a dos adultos dentro de la escuela.

“Todos los adultos a cargo, que se supone deben hacer que la escuela sea segura, le fallaron a mi hermano”, dijo Jovana García, hermana de 20 años de Luis, en una conferencia de prensa el viernes con el abogado de la familia.

“Ningún tipo de seguridad o protección. Pero eso no es lo peor. Lo peor es que semanas después de morir mi hermano, hubo un incidente y dos adultos resultaron heridos. Heridos, no muertos. Y entonces quisieron cambiar. ¿La vida de Luis no era suficiente?”

La familia le notificó a las Escuelas Públicas de Denver que tiene previsto presentar una demanda por homicidio culposo contra el distrito, dijo el abogado Matthew Barringer. El aviso también nombra a la junta escolar, que votó en 2020 a favor de remover a los policías de las escuelas de Denver.

El asesinato de Luis, un talentoso futbolista cuyo padre lo describía como “la felicidad de nuestro hogar”, sigue sin resolverse y no han arrestado a nadie. La policía ha dicho que todo parece indicar que los disparos que alcanzaron a Luis procedían de otro auto.

El padre de Luis, Santos García, dijo que si la policía hubiera estado dentro de la secundaria East en febrero, con sus autos patrulla estacionados al frente, “creo que quizás mi hijo estaría hoy aquí con nosotros”

Cuando la familia preguntó por qué no había seguridad en la escuela, García dijo que la policía les había dicho que la junta escolar no quería que los oficiales detuvieran o multaran a los estudiantes por cosas como drogas.

“Ellos se ocupan de esos niños, pero ¿quién se ocupa de los nuestros?”, dijo García. “Los estudiantes que van a la escuela, que trabajan, que hacen deporte. Los buenos.

“¿Quién los cuida?”

Al remover a la policía de las escuelas, la junta dijo que su deseo era detener el flujo de estudiantes de la escuela a la cárcel, conocido en inglés como school-to-prison pipeline, porque es algo que afecta desproporcionadamente a los estudiantes de minorías raciales. En las escuelas de Denver, los estudiantes negros tenían más probabilidades que los blancos de ser multados y arrestados.

Luis Garcia, a la derecha, jugaba en el equipo de fútbol de East High.

Después del incidente en el que dos adultos fueron heridos de bala en marzo, la junta escolar suspendió temporalmente la medida de remover a los policías de la escuela. La secundaria East High y otras 12 escuelas tienen oficiales de recurso escolar hasta que termine este año escolar, y se espera que pronto la junta discuta si va a cancelar de manera permanente su decisión de eliminar los policías.

García dijo que a su familia le gustaría que se mantuviera la seguridad adicional.

“No queremos 100 ni 200 policías”, dijo, “pero queremos algún tipo de seguridad para que los estudiantes se sientan protegidos”. No queremos que tengan miedo. Solamente queremos que se sientan seguros”.

La rueda de prensa del viernes fue la última de una serie de eventos semanales organizados por Parents - Safety Advocacy Group, un grupo que se formó después del tiroteo de marzo. También fue la primera vez que muchos familiares de Luis hablaron públicamente de su muerte.

Varios familiares describieron el 13 de febrero, el día en que le dispararon a Luis. El padre de Luis recordó su última conversación con él esa mañana, en la que le dijo a su hijo que tuviera un día estupendo.

Omar Bobadilla, un primo de 17 años, recordó haber hablado con Luis 20 minutos antes de que le dispararan. Era el cumpleaños de Omar y estaban haciendo planes para salir más tarde.

Jovana, la hermana de Luis, recordó cómo el superintendente del DPS Alex Marrero, a quien calificó como “desconocido para nosotros”, fue al hospital y pidió ver a su hermano.

“Se sintió con derecho de preguntar, cuando ni siquiera a sus hermanos se les permitía verlo”, dijo. “Esa fue la última vez que yo personalmente lo vi dar la cara por mi hermano”

El hermano de Luis de 19 años, también llamado Santos García, dijo que nunca quiere que otra familia pase por lo mismo que la suya. “Te sientes perdido”, dijo. “Sientes un hueco. Yo solamente quiero un cambio en quién toma las decisiones y que la gente asuma su responsabilidad”.

Melanie Asmar es reportera senior de Chalkbeat Colorado y cubre temas sobre el Distrito de Escuelas Públicas de Denver. Para comunicarte con Melanie, escríbele a masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Father of Luis Garcia: If police had been at East High, ‘maybe my son would still be here with us’

2023-05-19T19:59:19+00:00

Leer en español.

The family of Luis Garcia returned Friday to the City Park Esplanade, a paved road that runs in front of Denver’s East High School and loops into the park, for the first time since the 16-year-old was fatally shot there in February.

They pointed out the presence of Denver police at the school — a security measure that was absent when Luis was shot while sitting in his car, parked on the Esplanade. Denver police officers didn’t return to East until a month and a half later, after another shooting in which an East student shot and injured two deans inside the school.

“All the adults in charge that are supposed to make school safe failed my brother,” Luis’ 20-year-old sister Jovana Garcia said at a press conference with the family’s attorney Friday.

“No type of security or protection. But that’s not the worst part. The worst part is that weeks after my brother passed, there was an incident where two other adults were injured. Injured, not dead. And then they wanted change. Was Luis’ life not enough?”

The family has given Denver Public Schools notice that it plans to file a wrongful death lawsuit against the district, said attorney Matthew Barringer. The notice also names the school board, which voted in 2020 to remove police officers from Denver schools.

Luis Garcia, right in the red and white jersey, played on the East High School soccer team.

The murder of Luis, a talented soccer player whose father described him as “the happiness of our home,” remains unsolved without an arrest. Police have said it appeared the gunshots that hit Luis were fired from another car.

Luis’ father, Santos Garcia, said that if police had been inside East in February, with their patrol cars parked out front, “I think maybe my son would still be here with us today.”

When the family asked why there was no security at the school, Garcia said the police told them that the school board didn’t want officers arresting students or ticketing for things like drugs.

“They are taking care of those kids, but who is taking care of our kids?” Garcia said. “The kids that go to school, that they work, that they actually do sports. The good kids.

“Who takes care of them?”

In removing police from schools, the board cited a desire to disrupt the so-called school-to-prison pipeline, which disproportionately affects students of color. Black students were more likely than white students to be ticketed and arrested in Denver schools.

After the two deans were shot in March, the school board temporarily suspended its ban on police. East High and 12 other campuses have school resource officers through the end of the school year, and the board is expected to discuss soon whether to permanently lift the ban.

Garcia said his family would like to see the extra security remain.

“We don’t want 100, 200 policemen,” he said, “but we want some type of security so the students feel safe. We don’t want them to fear. We just want them to feel safe.”

Friday’s press conference was the latest in a series of weekly events hosted by Parents - Safety Advocacy Group, a group that formed in the wake of the March shooting. It was also the first time that many of Luis’ family members spoke publicly about his death.

Omar Bobadilla, 17-year-old cousin of Luis Garcia, speaks to the media Friday.

Several family members described Feb. 13, the day Luis was shot. Luis’ father recalled his last conversation with him that morning, in which he told his son to have a wonderful day.

Cousin Omar Bobadilla, 17, remembered speaking with Luis 20 minutes before he was shot. It was Omar’s birthday, and they were making plans to hang out later.

Luis’ sister Jovana recalled how DPS Superintendent Alex Marrero, who she called “a stranger to us,” came to the hospital and asked to see her brother.

“The entitlement he had to even ask, when not even his siblings were allowed to see him,” she said. “That was the last time I personally saw him show up for my brother.”

Luis’ 19-year-old brother, also named Santos Garcia, said he never wants another family to experience what his family has. “You feel lost,” he said. “You feel a hole. And I just want a change in who makes the decisions and for people to take accountability.”

Correction: A previous version of this story listed the wrong age for Luis’ brother Santos.

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Denver school board set to discuss ban on police in schools amid pushback on proposed rollback

2023-05-17T22:30:56+00:00

As the Denver school board prepares to discuss its policy banning police from schools, some students, educators, and advocacy groups are pushing back on a proposal to roll back the ban.

“There is no such thing as a good person with a gun, the same way there is no such thing as a good cop with a badge,” Veneno Quezada-Montoya, a sophomore at Denver’s North High School, told school board members at a public comment session Monday.

“Because behind that badge is centuries and centuries of oppression.”

On Thursday the board is set to discuss — and possibly revise — a policy that says the superintendent shall “not staff district schools with school resource officers or the consistent presence of security armed with guns or any other law enforcement personnel.”

The board adopted the policy, known officially as executive limitation 10.10, in 2021 after voting in 2020 to remove police known as school resource officers from schools.

The board temporarily suspended that policy in late March after a shooting inside East High School, which has sparked public outcry and a debate about Denver’s discipline policies.

Thirteen high school campuses have had police officers for the past month and a half. Those campuses will continue to have officers, known as SROs, until the last day of school on June 2.

Superintendent Alex Marrero has proposed that for next school year and beyond, each school would be able to decide whether or not to have a police officer on campus. But Marrero’s proposal would require the school board to reverse its ban.

Movimiento Poder, an advocacy group that campaigned for decades against police in schools, is pushing Denver Public Schools to keep the ban. In a report released Wednesday, Movimiento Poder, which was formerly called Padres & Jóvenes Unidos, called the ban “the most significant advance in racial equity within the city’s education system in decades.”

“The elimination of SROs has already been clearly and hugely beneficial to thousands of students and families,” the report says, “yet the superintendent’s proposal would send the district backwards, reviving the racism of its recent past in which school policing caused profound harm to students, families, and communities of color.”

Denver students were ticketed or arrested 4,929 times in the six school years from 2014 to 2020, according to the report, which attributes those statistics to the Colorado Department of Criminal Justice. The report says the vast majority — 87% — of those tickets and arrests affected students of color, who make up about 75% of all DPS students.

In the two full school years since SROs were removed from Denver schools, students have been ticketed or arrested just 175 times, which is a 90% reduction, the report says. One of those school years was partly remote due to the COVID pandemic.

When Chalkbeat asked Marrero about similar statistics back in January, he said he was proud of the reduction in the number of students involved with law enforcement. But just hours after the East shooting, in which a student shot and injured two deans, Marrero pledged to return police to schools, a move he acknowledged violated school board policy.

“I can no longer stand on the sidelines,” he wrote in a letter to school board members, who eventually endorsed the move by temporarily suspending the policy.

A survey of students, families, and staff conducted by DPS last month found that none of the three groups ranked SROs as the top solution to the problem of school violence. Only a third of DPS staff, 41% of students, and 48% of parents who responded to the survey said SROs would help. White parents were overrepresented among the respondents.

At Monday’s public comment session, several students and parents spoke against permanently reintroducing police in schools. Skye O’Toole, a student who serves on the superintendent’s student cabinet, urged the board to keep the ban.

“These policies are heavily reactionary and will do next to nothing to ensure we are truly safe in our hallways,” O’Toole said. “Every time I think about this issue I just can’t get over the fact that hiring school resource officers is effectively hiring staff with a license to kill our students.”

As part of her leadership role on the student cabinet, O’Toole said she’d spoken to hundreds of students across the district. “One of the most resounding strains I’ve heard is that we don’t want schools to be militarized,” O’Toole said. “We want to be students, not prisoners.”

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Denver Public Schools has lacked a safety chief for 6 months amid rising gun violence

2023-05-16T21:55:50+00:00

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news organization covering public education in communities across America. Sign up for Chalkbeat Colorado’s free daily newsletter to keep up with education news from Denver and around the state.

Denver Public Schools has lacked a safety chief for six months as the district grapples with rising youth gun violence and a shooting inside its largest high school.

The district attributed a delay in filling the position to several factors, including media coverage of the school board, whose infighting has been widely reported, and a desire to find a candidate who understands both safety and students’ social and emotional needs, according to a district document obtained by Chalkbeat.

The former chief of the DPS climate and safety department, Mike Eaton, left the district in November after more than a decade. The department has other vacancies as well. The interim safety chief, Robert Grossaint, is out on medical leave, according to a district spokesperson. And one of two deputy chiefs, Melissa Craven, left DPS last month.

The short staffing comes at a time when students, parents, and educators are particularly worried about school safety. Three shootings in and around East High School this school year have heightened those concerns, leading to student protests, the formation of a parent advocacy group, calls for the school board to resign, the reintroduction of school police officers, and the hastened development of a long-term safety plan for the entire district.

Two East High students died in shootings this year. Sixteen-year-old Luis Garcia was killed while sitting in his car outside the school in February, a crime that remains unsolved. And Austin Lyle, 17, took his own life in March after shooting and wounding two East High deans.

But Trena Marsal, the district’s chief of operations, said in an interview that despite the vacancies in the DPS safety department, Denver’s public schools are safe. Other staff members have been stepping in to fill the empty roles, she said.

“I want to make sure people understand that our buildings are safe,” Marsal said. “We have highly trained experts in the field of safety that are in place and continue to be in place.”

The district’s safety chief is responsible for setting a long-term vision for safety in DPS, overseeing investigations, leading the response to emergencies, coordinating with law enforcement, and other duties, according to the job listing.

Safety chief role is ‘a key player’

The vacancy came up at a school board meeting last month when Superintendent Alex Marrero was giving a brief update on the long-term safety plan the board directed him to develop in the wake of the March shooting at East.

Board member Michelle Quattlebaum said to Marrero: “A pressing question for me is centered around: You’re doing all of this work, and you’re missing a key player.”

Marrero promised to explain why it’s been difficult to hire a new safety chief, but he declined to do it publicly. “It’s best for you all to receive it in memo form,” he said to the board.

When Chalkbeat filed an open records request for that memo or any documents that explain the hiring difficulty, the district provided a two-page document that appears to have been last updated in late March.

It says the chief job was posted on Sept. 28, and 121 people had applied as of March 20. Twelve candidates were “brought forward,” the unsigned document says.

But five candidates withdrew and seven were eliminated after interviews. One candidate who made it to the second round of interviews backed out “after a student death in his current district” outside of Colorado, the document says.

“While we’ve interviewed numerous people for the role, we’ve had trouble finding a candidate that has both the safety and security chops in addition to a student-centric mindset — and in particular a person who understands the needs of communities and students of color,” the document says.

It notes that the district hasn’t had a shortage of candidates, but rather “a shortage of qualified candidates (based on both experience and mindset).”

About three-quarters of DPS students are students of color. The district’s approach to safety and discipline leans toward keeping students in school rather than suspending or expelling them — a philosophy that has come under scrutiny since the March shooting at East.

The document also says the salary DPS was offering “was initially a concern for many candidates,” but that a salary increase “has gotten us much closer.” The job posting currently lists the salary range as between $123,711 and $143,466.

Board turmoil is a concern for some candidates

Media coverage of the school board has also complicated the hiring process, the document says. The board has been plagued by infighting and power struggles for a year. Many media outlets have covered the turmoil, and newspaper editorials have decried the dysfunction.

“Some candidates researched the district, in particular the Board of Education, and declined to pursue the opportunity,” the document says. “In two specific cases, desired candidates withdrew applications due to the Board media coverage.”

Bill Good, a spokesperson for the board, said Tuesday that the board had no comment.

But at the meeting last month, Quattlebaum implored her fellow members to “focus on what’s important.” At that same meeting, President Xóchitl “Sochi” Gaytán had tried to get the board to discuss accusations of policy violations she’d levied against Vice President Auon’tai Anderson. But the other board members refused.

“Our community expects us to lead, not to be wrapped up in a title that we all hold,” Quattlebaum said. “And leading is staying focused on the task at hand.”

Marsal said the search for a new chief continues, and that DPS has hired two search firms to help find candidates. She said the district hopes to announce a hire in the next several weeks.

“We want someone aligned with DPS’s core values around students,” Marsal said. “We want a balanced leader — a leader that understands the needs of emergency management and safety, but also understands the needs of our students.

“We are a district. We’re here to educate kids. We have to make sure we’re creating safe learning spaces that are cognizant of all students.”

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Dean Wayne Mason says there were ‘red flags’ before East High shooting

2023-05-09T23:11:53+00:00

The moment Austin Lyle pulled the trigger and shot Wayne Mason inside Denver’s East High School on March 22, Mason said he forgave him.

“The regret I have right now is that he’s not here for me to tell him that,” said Mason, who was a dean at East when 17-year-old Lyle shot him and another dean. Lyle later took his own life.

Mason told his story publicly for the first time Monday at a weekly press conference held by a group called Parents - Safety Advocacy Group that formed in the wake of the shooting. The other dean who was shot, Eric Sinclair, hasn’t spoken publicly.

Mason also revealed new details about Lyle, including that another East student had reportedly seen Lyle with a gun in class a few weeks before the March shooting, and told East High staff. But when staff members tried to search Lyle, he ran out of the school, Mason said.

“That is the biggest red flag there,” Mason said, “and then he was allowed back into the school.”

Lyle had a previous weapons charge, had been expelled from another school district, and was supposed to be searched every day by East staff because of his past behavior — a protocol that was in place before another student reportedly spotted him with a gun, Mason said.

But Mason said he and Sinclair didn’t search Lyle that day. The Denver police and school district officials have said the shooting happened while the deans were searching Lyle for weapons.

On March 22, Mason said he was in the front office when Lyle came into school and asked for a specific assistant principal. Mason said he called for the assistant principal on the radio, but there was a school assembly going on and the assistant principal didn’t answer.

Sinclair offered to take Lyle into the deans’ office, Room 129, Mason said. Sinclair then tried calling for the assistant principal and for security officers. But still no one answered, Mason said.

“Shortly after that, Eric was yelling in the radio, ‘Wayne, Wayne, help me, help me!’” Mason said.

“I ran back to 129, opened the door. Eric and Austin were wrestling. I grabbed Austin, and Eric said, ‘Gun, gun!’ Austin fired off some shots, I think two or three shots.”

Mason said he saw Sinclair go down. Mason grabbed Lyle’s arm, he said, and then Lyle “turned his wrist toward me and he fired two shots and he hit me. Austin broke away from me and he stood there, staring at Eric and I, still pointing the gun at us. And then he ran out of the room.”

Sinclair was bleeding badly, Mason said. He grabbed some towels and began putting pressure on Sinclair’s wound. It was only after paramedics who happened to be at the school for an unrelated medical issue arrived that Mason told them he’d been shot too.

“I just started praying and I was holding Eric’s hand,” said Mason, who was shot in the chest.

“I’m sad that my friend had to go through that. There should have been procedures put in place that he did not have to be alone with Austin. But he was.”

Denver Public Schools spokesperson Scott Pribble said on Monday that the press conference was the first time he’d heard a different version of events and could not comment on whether Lyle had been spotted with a gun on campus several weeks before the shooting or why he was allowed back at East after that.

On Tuesday, Pribble confirmed that another student reported seeing Lyle with a gun in school about two and a half weeks before the shooting. But Pribble said that when school staff searched Lyle, they found nothing. That’s when Lyle fled the school, Pribble said. A followup investigation also found nothing, Pribble said, which is why Lyle was allowed back.

Mason said, “If that’s the case, then we should have had armed safety patrol every morning that Austin came into the school because we knew his history. … They should have met Austin at the door with a show of force and saying, ‘Okay, we’re going to search.’”

“Maybe, just maybe, that would have stopped that behavior.”

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Tennessee governor sets special legislative session for Aug. 21 after Nashville school shooting

2023-05-08T22:45:00+00:00

Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee announced Monday that he will call the legislature back Aug. 21 for a special session to address firearms and public safety concerns following a deadly school shooting in Nashville this spring.

“There is broad agreement that action is needed,” Lee said in a statement.

The goal, he said, is to “pursue thoughtful, practical measures that strengthen the safety of Tennesseans, preserve Second Amendment rights, prioritize due process protections, support law enforcement and address mental health.”

The governor also invited Tennesseans to provide input about the issues through an online form.

Lee’s announcement came just over two weeks after GOP lawmakers raced to complete their business early for the year while refusing to take up gun reform legislation from the Republican governor or their Democratic counterparts.

It was an anemic ending to a tumultuous session gripped by massive citizen protests after the shooting at The Covenant School left six victims and the gunman dead. The tragedy sparked calls for stricter gun laws and led to the ouster of two young Black lawmakers who took the protest to the House floor. Both men, Reps. Justin Jones of Nashville and Justin Pearson of Memphis, were quickly reinstated by local officials.

Meanwhile, gun violence continues to ravage communities across the nation, most recently in Texas where a gunman killed eight people and wounded seven others during a weekend shooting spree at a Dallas-area outlet mall.

In Tennessee this spring, lawmakers approved new policies and funding to further fortify school campuses, including at private schools like Nashville’s Covenant. Legislative discussions about limiting gun access mostly focused on people who are having a mental health crisis. Authorities said the Nashville shooter, who was later killed by police, was seeing a doctor for an “emotional order.”

Lee signed an executive order aimed at strengthening background checks on firearm purchases. He also proposed legislation that he said would help keep guns out of the hands of people deemed at risk of hurting themselves or others, his first embrace of a gun reform measure in one of the nation’s most gun-friendly states.

But his proposal hasn’t garnered much support from either side in the intense debate about gun access.

Joining forces with gun lobby groups, Republican leaders called Lee’s plan a “non-starter” and ended the session without taking up the measure. Groups advocating for gun control argued that Lee’s proposal — which allows three to five days before a court hearing would occur after law enforcement petitions for an order to seize firearms — doesn’t go far enough. That waiting period “could be the difference between life and death,” according to the group Everytown for Gun Safety.

Lee has avoided the phrase “red flag law” in describing his desire for new “order of protection” legislation.

“My proposal is not a red flag law,” he told reporters last week in Memphis. “It is unique to Tennessee (and) based on existing laws that we have in place.”

He continued: “We all believe that we should find a way to separate those who are of a dangerous mental condition who are a danger to themselves and others from having access to weapons. I have asked the General Assembly to look at multiple ways to do that. I’ve actually given a proposal to find a way forward to do that. We have to remember, too, that it is important that while we find a way to separate those that are a danger from weapons, we also have to protect the constitutional rights of every Tennessean. That is a balance that we have to find going forward.”

On Monday, Lee said he expects the General Assembly to bring forth its own ideas and pledged that discussions will take place throughout the summer before the session convenes.

Gov. Bill Lee delivers his 2023 state address to a joint session of the Tennessee General Assembly on Feb. 6.

But Doug Kufner, a spokesman for House Speaker Cameron Sexton, was cool about Sexton’s leadership in forging a workable solution.

“The speaker will continue his travel schedule throughout the state this summer and fall to assist members and meet with Tennesseans on a wide array of issues and policies,” Kufner said. “He is looking forward to those discussions as we all await Gov. Lee’s proposed legislative package for the announced special session.”

Democrats, by contrast, called the special session an opportunity to address the longstanding problem and growing threat of gun violence.

“The people demanding action have brought us to this moment,” said Sen. Raumesh Akbari of Memphis, “and now we need every Tennessean who cares about this issue to tell their elected leaders to show up in August and support legislation that truly addresses gun violence.”

Akbari, who is Senate minority leader, added: “Once we see the official call for the special session, we’ll know exactly what kind of legislation can be introduced. But we already know that broad majorities of voters, from all parts of the state and all political backgrounds, support common sense gun reforms, like extreme risk protection orders, waiting periods, and universal background checks.”

According to a recent Vanderbilt University poll, 82% of registered Tennessee voters support a so-called red flag law that would temporarily restrict access to guns for individuals who are at a high risk of harming themselves or others.

Two former governors, Republican Bill Haslam and Democrat Phil Bredesen, wrote recently that red flag laws are a good place to break through the impasse over gun reform.

And in an opinion piece published last week by Forbes, former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee, a Republican who is also a physician, wrote that lawmakers should not only pass a red flag law, but consider raising the legal age for purchasing guns and banning high-capacity magazines and assault-style weapons.

Frist called firearm-related deaths “an official public health crisis.”

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Chalkbeat reporter Laura Testino contributed to this report from Memphis.

Denver teachers lack confidence in safety plan, want mental health support and smaller classes

2023-05-04T02:56:30+00:00

Reduce class sizes, hire more mental health workers, and make it clearer when schools can suspend or expel students.

Those are among the recommendations the Denver teachers union said it provided Wednesday to Denver Public Schools Superintendent Alex Marrero. The recommendations come two days after Marrero released a 48-page draft safety plan. The school board directed him to develop a long-term safety plan in the wake of a March shooting inside East High School.

The Denver Classroom Teachers Association surveyed its members about school safety, according to an email from the union. The findings include:

89% of respondents “expressed their lack of confidence in the district’s existing plan to address safety threats,” according to the union email.
72% of respondents said smaller class sizes and caseloads would make them “feel safe in schools.” In addition, 70% of respondents said more mental health support in schools would make them feel safe.
Only 42% of respondents said school resource officers — city police who are stationed inside schools — would make them feel safe. The school board voted in 2020 to remove police from schools but suspended that decision following the East shooting. For the past month, 13 high school campuses have had police officers.
Almost 50% of respondents “reported insufficient training on restorative practices and de-escalation techniques in schools,” the union email says. Restorative practices is a philosophy that focuses on repairing harm rather than punishing students.

School staff who responded to a separate safety survey from the district rated as most important improving discipline policies and practices, followed closely by better mental health support. Just a third ranked police in schools among their top three.

The union’s recommendations for the district’s long-term safety plan include:

Expanding mental health support for students in every school.

The draft safety plan Marrero released on Monday says DPS has more than 400 school social workers and psychologists for its 205 schools, exceeding the district’s minimum expectations of one full-time mental health worker per school.

But the union says that’s not enough. In response to the survey, many educators “stated that they believe the district provides less than half of the necessary support to address students’ mental health needs,” the union email says.

Reducing class sizes and caseloads.

Social workers, psychologists, counselors, speech pathologists, and other service providers who work for DPS have long expressed concerns that they have too many students on their caseloads.

Teachers feel the same about class sizes. “By reducing class sizes, educators can establish strong connections with students and foster a welcoming and supportive learning environment,” the union email says.

Reviewing the district’s discipline matrix.

The discipline matrix is a spreadsheet with rules for when schools can suspend or expel students. It was last revised in 2021 with an eye toward keeping more students in school.

DPS leaders have defended the matrix, even as some principals have spoken out about being unable to remove even students accused of violent crimes. The Denver principals union has also called for changes.

Providing staff with training on restorative practices and de-escalation techniques.

The union’s recommendations note that educators are “constantly being asked to be everything, everywhere, all at once without the time and resources to do so.”

Enforcing the part of the teachers union contract that deals with student discipline.

Article 18 of the contract says school principals should collaborate with teachers and parents on a school discipline plan, which should be reviewed annually.

But 70% of educators who responded to the union survey said they didn’t get any training about their school’s discipline plan. Only 5% said their school’s collaborative school committee, which includes teachers and parents, reviewed their plan for effectiveness.

Creating protocols for educators to address student safety needs.

The East High shooting happened when two deans were searching a student for weapons. The student, Austin Lyle, had a “safety plan” due to past behavior that required daily searches. Lyle later took his own life.

The union says educators want to play a bigger role in student behavior and support plans. About 45% said they are “rarely or never” involved in creating the plans, while more than 57% said they were unaware of the process altogether.

Allowing for school-based decisions on police.

Because opinions on police in schools vary, the union says it supports having each school decide whether they want an officer — which is what Marrero proposed.

But the union says DPS shouldn’t pay for it. The 14 officers currently stationed on 13 DPS campuses are being funded by the city. In the past, DPS split the cost.

The union also says police “should not ticket students for infractions that do not relate to physical safety within the school building.” Before police were removed in 2020, data showed Black students were ticketed and arrested at disproportionately high rates.

Marrero is expected to release a second draft of the safety plan by May 26 and a final version by June 23. The school board gave him a deadline of June 30.

“As the district moves forward with developing a safety plan, we will continue to gather feedback from members through various channels,” the union email says. “We ask the superintendent to take our recommendations seriously, and work collaboratively with us to achieve the shared vision of safe and supportive learning environments.”

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

Each Denver school would make its own decisions about police under draft safety plan

2023-05-02T01:33:28+00:00

Denver middle and high schools would make the choice each year whether to have a police officer stationed on campus under a draft school safety plan released Monday.

School leaders would need to reevaluate the decision annually and be required to involve the school community. The 48-page school safety plan also emphasizes the district’s focus over the years on mental health, social support, and equity.

Denver Public Schools released the plan Monday afternoon. It summarizes many of the district’s practices in school safety while adding in recommendations. More details of recommended changes will be highlighted in a second draft, a district spokeswoman said.

The school board tasked Superintendent Alex Marrero with drafting a plan a day after a student shot two East High School deans in March.

The shooting happened while the deans were searching the student for weapons, a practice that happens daily in some district high schools. Linking to a slide presentation given to deans districtwide, the draft plan implies deans will continue to conduct student searches, though it says an unarmed campus safety officer or an armed DPS mobile patrol officer should be involved “when you are searching for a firearm or dangerous weapon.”

The plan also calls for the district to retrain all employees in emergency response procedures.

The student who shot the deans at East had previously been expelled from the neighboring Cherry Creek School District. The draft plan says that when a student transfers from another district, “the school team should be requesting prior school records as part of the enrollment process,” including “any prior safety protocols.”

The district also is in the process of reviewing the physical safety of entrances and the interior of buildings, the plan says.

Two other shootings have also occurred near Denver’s largest high school campus this year, including one that led to the death of a student. And schools across the district have also dealt with violence on campus or in the community.

Marrero drafted the plan after he said he consulted with experts. The district also surveyed about 7,700 students, staff, and parents about safety concerns. The top concerns across groups included students bringing weapons on campus and student-on-student violence.

Next, but ranked at varying levels of priority, were the mental and emotional well-being of students, outsiders entering school buildings, and community violence.

Each group ranked potential solutions to school safety differently. More than half of students said more mental health support was important to school safety, followed by discipline policies and police in schools.

School staff also rated mental health support very highly, but put discipline policies first. Just a third ranked police in schools among their top three. Almost half of parents ranked police officers first, followed closely by discipline policies and student mental health.

As with most Denver Public Schools surveys, white parents were overrepresented, and families of color were underrepresented. Survey results were weighted to account for this.

According to his plan, Marrero will seek community feedback on the first draft. In an email to parents, Marrero encouraged them to talk to their school principal or email him directly with feedback. Two town halls are scheduled for later this month and the district will also gather feedback through a survey. His administration will then release a second version by May 26 that will also be available for community feedback.

Marrero will release a final version on June 23 that will be reviewed by the school board.

The school board tasked Marrero with coming up with a plan after a five-hour closed-door meeting. At that same meeting, the board suspended its 2020 policy that phased out police officers in schools.

Parents call for more transparency

When students returned from spring break, the district added a school resource officer at 13 campuses, with East High School getting two officers.

DPS previously removed police from schools and made other changes to its discipline policies because Black and brown students were more likely to be arrested, ticketed, suspended, and expelled than their white peers.

More recently, Denver principals and parents have criticized the district for allowing students accused of serious crimes to remain in the classroom. District officials have defended their approach.

Parents also have called for the school board and Marrero to be more transparent about safety decisions and communicate more with parents. Some parents also have called for the entire board to resign.

East High School parents have held weekly meetings calling for an end to the violence and for the district to do more. They’ve called on the board to work with families to make the district safer.

During Monday’s meeting of the East High School parents safety group, parent Steve Katsaros said he wants to see Denver schools commit to transparency and engagement of community and families. The plan was released during the group’s weekly meeting and he said he wasn’t able to review the plan.

But he said parents want transparency. He said he wants the district to detail whether the emailed survey reached parents as intended and how many families opened the email.

Short-term, he said he does not have confidence in the district or board. The city and community, however, will get this right in the long term, he said.

“Right now we are dealing with the same people that put us in this position,” Katsaros said. “We need to move fast so we have to work with the folks that we have, and we will see where we get.”

Report highlights existing plans, partnerships

Much of the plan is a recitation of things the district already does or policies it already has in place.

Examples include expecting schools to have the equivalent of one full-time mental health worker on staff, screening all students for emotional and behavioral concerns, and doing more in-depth reviews when a student is flagged for potentially hurting themselves or others. It highlights 20-minute daily lessons on social and emotional learning that happen in elementary schools.

The draft plan also talks about DPS’s existing summer school programs, its commitment to a curriculum that teaches Black, Indigenous, and Hispanic history, and its bullying prevention efforts.

It also includes a chart that shows the types of safety personnel in schools, including armed city police officers at some high schools, an armed DPS patrol unit that’s mobile and responds to calls that don’t require police, and unarmed security guards stationed inside schools.

Parents and others have questioned why students who are being searched daily for weapons are allowed to attend in-person school. The draft plan says, “as a district we strongly believe in-person learning is the best option for students because it allows us to support students developing resiliency, visions for their futures, and the skills needed to achieve their dreams,” which it calls “key components of youth violence prevention efforts.”

But the plan also says DPS is planning to expand its online school “based on an increase in demand.” The district’s online school, Denver Online, serves grades six through 12.

The report also highlights plans the school district has been working on with the city, including developing a pipeline of culturally responsive providers who can fill vacancies for school psychologists, social workers, and other mental health providers. The district would do that by recruiting current students to become entry-level restorative practices coordinators, recruiting paraprofessionals to become deans of culture, and recruiting deans to become psychologists and social workers.

Participants in the program would get tuition stipends and “access to educational opportunities” that would allow them to earn the proper certifications to move up while working full-time.

The district has done a version of this program that recruits paraprofessionals to become classroom teachers.

The district also is working with the city on “dissolving outdated policies that inadvertently perpetuate youth violence,” the draft plan says. That includes reviewing all of its policies related to youth violence prevention to make sure they’re working as intended — and to discontinue policies that are not.

The plan proposes developing more alternatives to citation and connecting students who commit offenses with supportive services more quickly.

The district also says it hopes to work with the city to develop a “central database powered by the latest technology” that will allow information sharing between schools, city agencies, and nonprofit organizations. The goal, the draft plan says, is “to support youth and ensure follow-up on referrals so no youth is left without the vital services they need.”

Read the full plan and see opportunities to provide feedback.

Release recording of closed-door Denver school board meeting, lawsuit demands

2023-04-28T23:59:10+00:00

Chalkbeat and six other media organizations are suing Denver Public Schools for the recording of a five-hour closed meeting board members held the day after a student shot two administrators at East High School.

When school board members emerged from the meeting, they voted unanimously to return police officers to Denver high schools — a major policy change — with no public discussion.

Colorado’s open meetings law declares that the “formation of public policy is public business and may not be conducted in secret.”

Colorado law requires public bodies to meet in the open, except under particular circumstances, such as discussing a student or employee or to receive legal advice. Before entering a closed meeting, elected officials have to announce the topics they’ll be discussing “in as much detail as possible without compromising the purpose for which the executive session is authorized,” along with the legal basis for entering a private meeting.

The complaint filed Friday alleges that the Denver school board’s March 23 meeting was not properly noticed. That could render the closed meeting unlawful.

The law also requires that policy decisions happen in public. The lawsuit alleges that the Denver school board made a policy decision behind closed doors that was merely rubber-stamped with a public vote.

“No public discussion, whatsoever, preceded the Board’s historic about-face concerning its policy of preventing armed ‘School Resource Officers’ inside the District’s high schools,” the lawsuit reads. “None.”

The March 23 board agenda said the purpose of the closed meeting was to discuss “matters required to be kept confidential by federal or state law or rules and regulations as a result of the incident that occurred on March 22,” security arrangements and investigations, and sensitive matters pertaining to individual students.

When board members emerged from the closed meeting, President Xóchitl “Sochi” Gaytán entered a memorandum into the record that suspended a previous board policy removing police from schools, called for police to be stationed at all district high schools, and directed Superintendent Alex Marrero to come up with a long-term safety plan by June 30.

The executive session notice made no mention that official safety policies would be discussed or that new safety policies would be proposed. Nor did the notice mention discussion of a potential executive order from Mayor Michael Hancock placing police in schools. Board Vice President Auon’tai Anderson said several days after the closed meeting that the possibility of an executive order influenced the board decision.

“You need to inform the public what you are going behind closed doors to discuss,” said attorney Steve Zansberg, who is representing the media organizations with attorney Rachael Johnson of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. “And even if it had been a properly convened executive session, they are not allowed to make a decision behind closed doors.”

Zanzberg said it was a clear-cut violation of the open meetings law.

“They adopted a policy without any public discussion. So clearly they discussed it and reached that decision and drafted that memo behind closed doors,” he said.

In addition to Chalkbeat, the plaintiffs are The Denver Post, Colorado Newsline, KDVR Fox 31, KUSA 9News, Colorado Politics, and The Denver Gazette. Each of the media organizations filed requests for the recording or for minutes of the meeting after the closed-door session. In each case, Denver Public Schools custodian of records Stacy Wheeler responded that the district has responsive records but would not release them because they are not subject to disclosure under the open meetings law.

The lawsuit asks a Denver district court judge to release the entire recording on grounds that the meeting was not properly noticed and was not a lawful closed meeting. If the judge won’t release the entire recording, the lawsuit asks that the judge listen to the recording and release a redacted version if the judge feels that certain portions should remain private.

A bill under consideration in the legislature would make it harder for the public to challenge closed meetings that are not properly announced to the public. The bill would allow elected officials to fix the way they announced the meeting after the fact and avoid a lawsuit.

Under current law, not properly announcing an executive session can render a closed meeting unlawful. Members of the public can seek the release of recordings of those meetings.

Jeff Roberts of Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition said the Denver case gets to the heart of why Colorado voters adopted the open meetings law in the first place. The law states that matters of public interest and public policy should be discussed in public, and there is significant public interest in how the board makes decisions about whether to have armed police in schools, he said.

Members of the public, in particular some parents at East High School, also have criticized the board’s use of executive sessions.

The school board responded to criticism of its closed meeting with an unsigned statement posted to the district website. “Due to the nature of an executive session we cannot disclose what was discussed,” the statement says. “However, the Board of Education is confident that it has conducted all meetings in accordance with applicable laws.”

But at an April 20 board meeting — after the board had learned of the media organizations’ intent to sue — some members balked at going into executive session, citing public criticism of past sessions.

“We’ve received a lot of feedback from the public and community members about meeting in public and staying in public unless there’s an absolute reason,” board member Scott Baldermann said. “And I think I am going to honor that.”

The agenda listed two items for private discussion: security arrangements at McAuliffe International School, where the principal has been critical of district leadership and announced plans to have parents help with security, and the superintendent’s contract.

Anderson said he believes the board has used closed session meetings appropriately, and public perception was stopping the board from discussing important issues.

“I am very concerned that if we have something about safety that we’re not willing to go into executive session for, what other matters will we start saying we cannot go into executive session for,” Anderson said at the meeting.

The board ultimately voted 4-3 not to enter executive session for either item.

“It’s not a bad thing for them to examine their use of closed-door meetings and whether they are doing more of that than they need to,” Roberts said.

Chalkbeat reporter Jason Gonzales contributed reporting.

Bureau Chief Erica Meltzer covers education policy and politics and oversees Chalkbeat Colorado’s education coverage. Contact Erica at emeltzer@chalkbeat.org.

Amid mental health concerns, new bill would allow NY students to opt out of lockdown drills

2023-04-26T18:50:46+00:00

New York lawmakers will seek to change the state’s school lockdown drill laws, as some parents argue the drills harm student mental health without clearly proven safety benefits.

Under state law, public schools must conduct lockdown drills at least four times each year. The new bill would drop the requirement to one, among other changes.

Though high-profile school shootings in Uvalde, Texas, and Nashville, Tennessee, have raised further alarm among parents, educators, and school communities, some parents worry about the damaging effect that repeatedly forcing students and teachers to simulate an active shooter scenario could have on their child.

Two dads with children at a Manhattan elementary school spent the past year and a half pushing to reduce the number of drills and for more guardrails in how they are conducted and communicated with families.

In late 2021, Marco Pupo, a Manhattan parent, was shocked to hear his then-5-year-old son say his class had to lock their windows and hide because “there was a bad guy trying to get us.”

“Kids at that age, they don’t know how to differentiate between what’s real and what’s not,” he said, adding other parents said their kids came home scared or asking what to do if bullets came through the window. “I don’t think there’s any research that needs to be done to say that this is traumatizing for kids.”

Pupo and Robert Murtfeld, another parent at the school, have since advocated for changing the state law.

A new bill introduced by state Senator Andrew Gounardes and Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon, both of Brooklyn, on Wednesday would do just that.

If passed, their bill would require officials use a “trauma-informed approach” in the creation of lockdown drills — including lowering the required number of annual drills to just one, notifying parents at least a week in advance, and allowing them to opt their children out of the drill. It would also offer accommodations to students with medical conditions, and require schools provide students with “an age-appropriate explanation” of the situation.

For young students, that might mean using codewords during drills — like announcing that a raccoon had entered the building and students needed to remain in their classrooms.

“These drills are incredibly traumatizing for students,” Gounardes said of the current system. “They don’t actually help keep students safe, or make them feel safe, which are both incredibly important.”

The bill would also aim to establish comprehensive training for schools and educators leading the drills, after Chalkbeat last year found teachers across New York City received little to no training before conducting them.

Without a standardized method, lockdown drills can vary in length and content from school to school, or even classroom to classroom. They might, for example, involve teachers locking the door, covering any windows to the hallway, shutting off the lights, and telling students to sit quietly in a corner.

Research inconclusive on lockdown drill benefits

The research on whether the drills help protect students in an active shooter scenario remains inconclusive. But the past five years have seen more than 150 school shootings that resulted in injury or death across the country, spurring cities and states to engage in precautionary measures.

Lockdown drills took place in 95% of American public schools as of 2016, with at least 40 states requiring them, according to Everytown for Gun Safety, a nonprofit that advocates against gun violence. But the organization advises against conducting them, citing the “collateral consequences to school communities’ mental health and wellbeing.”

New York State is among just a few states that mandate four or more lockdown drills per year — meaning students at its public schools may experience twice as many or more drills than students in other states, according to an analysis from the Trace.

“If you enter the school system as a 3-year-old, and you exit as an 18-year-old, you will have done 60 lockdown drills,” Murtfeld said. “This is not about making anyone less safe — this is about being smart about what is the best mediated solution.”

Instead of drills involving students, Everytown suggests schools use threat assessment programs, provide access to mental health professionals and social support, implement non-punitive disciplinary processes, and conduct emergency planning for teachers not involving students. Gounardes said the bill wouldn’t shut the door on the latter of these suggestions.

“Our bill doesn’t mandate or require that it has to be a student drill, or it has to be a live drill, or it has to be a simulated drill,” he said. “It very well could be that the collective wisdom of all of the relevant stakeholders is that the best way to do this is to have teacher-only drills… We’re not here prescribing that solution, we’re just saying that the [current] mandate is ineffective.”

Gounardes said he was optimistic about the bill finding support in Albany, adding it has backing from organizations like Moms Demand Action and New Yorkers Against Gun Violence.

National landscape divided on drills

Some states have also looked to change their approach, with lawmakers in Maine considering an opt-out policy for parents and legislators in Illinois passing a similar law in 2021. Others have taken a different approach. In Texas, lawmakers have proposed investing more heavily in armed campus security, including a $25,000 stipend that would be offered to school employees willing to get trained to carry guns.

Murtfeld and Pupo said they understood the fears over gun violence and why the New York lockdown law was initially put in place, but added it was “not the solution.”

“It’s a math we unfortunately have to do between something happening in schools and the risk of creating a culture of fear that is being infused in our kids and traumatizing them,” Pupo said. “We wish we were not in the position where we had to make those decisions, but right now, with the knowledge that we have, this is what we think is the right thing to do.”

Julian Shen-Berro is a reporter covering New York City. Contact him at jshen-berro@chalkbeat.org.

Tennessee legislature dismisses gun bills in rush to adjourn, defying protests after school shooting

2023-04-21T00:12:59+00:00

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news organization covering public education in communities across America. Sign up for our free Tennessee newsletter to keep up with the Shelby County public school system and state education policy.

Tennessee’s legislature raced Thursday to complete its business early for the year while refusing to take up gun reform legislation from Republican Gov. Bill Lee or Democratic lawmakers, three weeks after a mass shooting at a Nashville school.

The inaction on guns came despite weeks of daily peaceful protests by thousands of students, parents, and gun control advocates calling for new laws to restrict gun access.

From the Senate floor, Majority Leader Jack Johnson announced the legislature was on track to wrap up this year’s session by Friday after his chamber approved the state’s $56.2 billion budget for next year — the only measure it’s constitutionally required to pass. The House approved the spending plan a day earlier.

Several recent surveys of Tennessee parents and voters show strong support for gun safety measures such as background checks and so-called red flag laws to prevent people who may be experiencing a mental health crisis from having access to weapons. Authorities have said the Nashville shooter, who was shot and killed by police, had been under a doctor’s care for an undisclosed “emotional disorder” before killing six people at The Covenant School on March 27.

But with prospects for gun reform dimming this year, Tennesseans who have been raising their voices were aghast Thursday at the Republican supermajority’s unwillingness to look seriously at their concerns about lax gun laws.

“They are shrugging their shoulders at us and ending their session quickly. But we are not going to stop,” said Nashville mom Leeann Hewlett, who was among the first demonstrators to show up outside of a legislative office building on the day after the shooting.

“We are not going to forget the children and adults who died at The Covenant School. We’re not going to forget that guns are the leading cause of death for kids in Tennessee,” said Hewlett, who has an 8-year-old daughter.

Leeann Hewlett, a Nashville mom, speaks at a rally organized by Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America on March 28, 2023, the day after a shooter killed six people at a Nashville school.

Lee, whose wife was a close friend of one adult victim in the Nashville shooting, offered up his own proposal Wednesday after lawmakers ignored his call last week to bring him legislation that would help keep guns out of the hands of people deemed at risk of hurting themselves or others. Nineteen states have such a policy.

Meanwhile, the National Rifle Association mobilized its Tennessee members this week against any legislation that resembles a red flag law. And the House Republican caucus released a statement labeling any such proposal a “non-starter.”

In a last-ditch effort on Thursday, Sen. Jeff Yarbro delivered an impassioned speech on the Senate floor asking his colleagues to take up gun reform legislation stuck in a key committee that voted to defer action on any gun-related bills until next year.

Yarbro said his legislation is based on Florida’s red flag law, which passed with bipartisan support after a shooter killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland in 2018. The Nashville Democrat is also the sponsor of a so-called safe storage bill to require people to secure weapons left in vehicles and boats so they don’t fall into the hands of criminals.

“How do we not feel shame for failing to do anything?” asked Yarbro, noting that Nashville also has suffered mass shootings at a church and a Waffle House restaurant in recent years.

“We have the substance, we have the process, we have the time. The only question is whether we have the will,” said Yarbro, pleading for at least 17 of the Senate’s 33 members to support his request to call up his bill.

The Senate responded by voting 24-7 to table his motion, mostly along partisan lines.

Afterward, Yarbro tweeted that adjourning the session without voting on a single bill to limit gun access means the legislature is betting voters will “move on” to other issues when it reconvenes next January.

“Prove them wrong,” he said.

The developments came as the legislature has been under national scrutiny over the House’s expulsion of two young Black lawmakers, who have since been reinstated, over their demonstration on the House floor to highlight their body’s inaction on gun violence.

Still, lawmakers sent a bill to the governor this week to shield Tennessee gun and ammunition manufacturers and sellers from lawsuits. That measure had been in the works before the shooting.

Thursday also marked the 24th anniversary of the Columbine High School massacre in Littleton, Colorado, in which two students shot and killed 12 classmates and one teacher before taking their own lives.

From the Columbine shooting in Colorado to the Covenant shooting in Nashville, 175 people have died in 15 mass shootings connected to U.S. schools and colleges, according to a database compiled by The Associated Press, USA Today, and Northeastern University. (The database defines a mass shooting as resulting in the death of four or more people.)

Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.

Many Denver voters have unfavorable view of school board, survey finds

2023-04-20T12:30:00+00:00

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A new poll commissioned by a group of Denver business leaders finds many voters hold unfavorable views of the Denver school board and nearly 63% believe board members care more about their own political ambitions than about improving educational outcomes for children.

The survey by the Republican firm Cygnal and the Democratic firm Chism Strategies was conducted on April 11 and 12 among 410 likely voters in municipal and off-year elections and has a margin of error of 4.83%.

Mayor and City Council runoff elections are scheduled for June 6, while the school board election isn’t until November.

The group A Denver for Us All commissioned the poll, which also asked respondents about the mayor’s race and issues facing city government. The poll found a close race between Mike Johnston and Kelly Brough, with a slight lead for Johnston and many voters still undecided.

The poll found voters evenly divided between those who feel the city is going in the right direction and those who feel it’s going in the wrong direction.

But when it comes to the Denver school board, nearly 60% of voters had an unfavorable view and just 21% had a favorable view. College-educated respondents, women, and Republicans all were more likely to report unfavorable views of the board. Two-thirds of parents in the poll reported an unfavorable view, compared with 57% of non-parents.

Likely voters in off-year elections are more likely to be white and to have higher earnings than average Denver Public Schools parents. Seventy-three percent of poll respondents were white, while 75% of Denver students are not. This mismatch is common in school board elections.

Across questions, women over 50 years old were among the most concerned with safety and how Denver Public Schools is run, and men under 50 were more likely to report positive views.

The overall findings paint a discouraging picture for school board incumbents seeking re-election in November, but seven months out, it’s not clear what the field will look like or how voter concerns might shift.

Three seats on the seven-member board are open. Of those, only Vice President Auon’tai Anderson has declared his intention to seek re-election to the at-large seat. Asked whether they would re-elect Anderson or whether it’s “time for someone new,” more than half opted for someone new, and just 9% said they planned to vote for Anderson. More than a third of respondents were undecided.

The Denver school board has not yet finalized new district maps that will determine the boundaries of Districts 1 and 5, the other open seats. Kwame Spearman, a former mayoral candidate and recent CEO of the Tattered Cover bookstore, has said he’s considering a run for school board.

The seven-person Denver school board is made up entirely of members who were backed by the Denver Classroom Teachers Association, the teachers union, but the last two years have been marked by infighting and personality conflicts, in particular between Anderson and board President Xóchitl “Sochi” Gaytán.

The school board has grappled with school closure recommendations and budget challenges related to declining enrollment, as well as how to respond to rising community violence.

On March 22, a student whose history required him to undergo daily patdowns shot and wounded two administrators at East High School. The 17-year-old died by suicide later that day. The next day after a lengthy closed session, the Denver school board reversed a 2020 policy and approved stationing armed police officers in Denver high schools.

The Denver district has a low expulsion rate and emphasizes keeping students in school, even when those students have been accused of serious crimes. Principals have said district administrators reject their requests to remove students from the classroom and called for the discipline matrix to be revised, but so far the board and superintendent have defended their policies.

Some parents have called for the entire Denver school board to resign.

The poll tested public opinion on many of these issues, with questions that prompted respondents to see the Denver school board as responsible for recent violence.

“Following the failure of Denver Public Schools (DPS) to prevent the East High tragedy, some have been calling for the entire school board to resign. Would you support the resignations of all the school board members?” the poll asked.

Nearly 39% of respondents said yes, while a third said no, and 28% were undecided or chose neither option. Respondents earning more than $100,000 a year were more likely to support resignation than did those earning less. Men under 50 were the most likely to oppose resignation.

The poll found nearly three-quarters of respondents supported returning police to schools in light of the shooting at East and opposed allowing what the survey described as “students previously known to be troubled and potentially dangerous to others” to return to school.

The poll did not ask respondents about measures like adding more social workers and mental health support or installing metal detectors.

On the open-ended question of what grade respondents would give Denver Public Schools for keeping students safe, 27% of all respondents — and more than a third of parents — gave the district an F, while just 14% gave it an A or a B.

Find complete poll results here.

Bureau Chief Erica Meltzer covers education policy and politics and oversees Chalkbeat Colorado’s education coverage. Contact Erica at emeltzer@chalkbeat.org.

Protesters call for Denver board to resign, Marrero promises public input on safety plan

2023-04-18T04:11:31+00:00

Amid calls for more transparency and accountability, Denver Superintendent Alex Marrero promised that educators, students, and community members will have the chance to weigh in on two draft versions of a new safety plan before a final version is released on June 26.

Marrero detailed the timeline for the plan during a Monday board meeting — the same night a few dozen protesters outside called for board members to resign for failing to keep students safe. They cited the recent East High shootings and other incidents of violence.

Many of the parents wore maroon shirts that read “DPS Board Resign!”

“We need a fresh start,” Becky Nemec, a parent of two Denver school children, told the board. “But while we wait to have the opportunity to vote you out of office, I beg you to listen to the concerned students and parents.”

Other parents and students also called for the board and Marrero to work collaboratively, urgently, and transparently to fix safety issues.

Megan Zeiger, a Denver parent, said parents want the school district to work better with families and are ready to help.

She said parents have been concerned for a long time, “but with the recent events of East High School, we no longer feel we can rely on other people to figure out how to solve this problem.”

Each call for the board to resign was met with audience applause.

The board tasked Marrero with coming up with a way to improve safety a day after the March 22 East High shooting that injured two administrators. Since the board lifted its ban on police officers in schools, the district has posted 14 officers at 13 schools, including two at East High.

Parents asked the board why it didn’t act after the killing of student Luis Garcia outside the East High in February. Others said the district’s policies have kept too many students with violent histories in schools that aren’t equipped to help them.

For instance, some parents pointed to a recent incident at McAuliffe Middle School where the district allowed a student who had been charged with attempted murder to stay in school over the objections of the principal.

At a press conference earlier Monday held by Parents-Safety Advisory Group, Nemec told reporters she was startled to learn that her children are attending McAuliffe with a student who had been accused of a serious violent crime.

She said her son describes students cussing out teachers and vaping throughout the school day without consequences because teachers don’t feel they have the tools to discipline them.

“We’ve really handcuffed our teachers and our principals from being able to address those problems in school,” she said. “And it becomes kind of a culture, and then all of a sudden, it kind of breeds itself.”

Marrero said he will draft a safety plan by May 1 with input from safety and security experts, students and community members.

Marrero last week had seemed to downplay the importance of community input, telling board members that “there’s been a request for a community-led process. And I want to say this very carefully and respectfully: “This is where we need the experts, first and foremost.”

On Monday, he said there would be community input throughout the process but wanted experts to weigh in on current and future issues the district could face. He said he would consider including more student representation after board Vice President Auon’tai Anderson questioned whether one student could represent the entire district of 87,000 students.

Board members also wanted to ensure the district hears from Black and Latino communities most affected by gun violence.

The district will hold virtual and phone-in town hall meetings to gather input on Marrero’s draft. He plans to release a second version by May 26 and a final version a month later.

The board and Marrero have come under increased scrutiny for their actions.

Some parents have said the district isn’t acting transparently and communicating well with families. Some people objected to the board retreating to a five-hour closed session when it decided to add school resource officers back to school.

Axios reported that Denver City Council members were frustrated that Marrero skipped a meeting Monday with council members to discuss cooperation between the district and the city. Instead, he sent staff members.

Many parents said Monday they’re fed up.

East parent Dorian Warren said the board has focused more on its own spats than on keeping students safe. She said the board needs “some adults in the room,” who can focus on creating policies that benefit students. She said the board has failed.

Bruce Randolph School student Angela Hurtado, 16, said she’s felt scared too many times at school and her family has worried too much. Parents shouldn’t have to bury their children, she said.

“The only time parents should cry is at their graduation, and not at their funeral,” Hurtado said.

Expulsions are low in Denver, and that’s how it should be, district officials say

2023-04-14T23:24:10+00:00

Over the past decade, Denver Public Schools’ approach to discipline has swung decidedly toward keeping students in school rather than kicking them out.

Safety begins with positive relationships between staff and students and a positive school climate, the district’s discipline policy says. Bringing a gun to school is the only offense that automatically results in an expulsion hearing for a student. Even students facing serious criminal charges can stay in school as long as they are not behind bars.

Last month’s shooting of two East High School deans by a student who was being searched for weapons has placed renewed scrutiny on discipline in Colorado’s largest school district.

But so far, Denver Public Schools has held firm to its approach.

“We are a welcoming environment,” DPS Deputy Chief of Staff Deborah Staten said in an interview this week. “We really want students to be in their school environment.”

The debate now playing out in Denver — with some saying the pendulum has swung too far toward tolerance and others fearful of a return to policies that harm marginalized students — illustrates the difficulty of striking the right balance on discipline amidst rising gun violence.

“There’s just no discipline, there’s no accountability, there’s no structure,” said Heather Weldon, whose daughter is an eighth grader at McAuliffe International School, where the principal spoke out about DPS denying his request to expel a student charged with attempted murder.

“Right now, there’s no consequences, it feels like,” Weldon said.

She and other parents say there has to be a better way — some middle ground between anything-goes and zero-tolerance. The Denver principals union has called for changes too, including revisions to the district’s discipline guide and a new process for deciding on appropriate school placements for students who might harm others.

But advocates who have worked for years to keep young people out of the criminal justice system worry that the shooting at East — a high-profile school where the city’s power brokers send their children — will tip the scales back toward punitive punishment that disproportionately affects Black and Latino students.

A day after the shooting, the school board lifted its policy banning armed police on campus.

“It terrifies me,” said Elie Zwiebel, a Denver attorney who represents kids in school expulsion hearings and juvenile court — kids who he said in past decades might have been unfairly painted as violent and hardened criminals. “The ultimate problem is that everyone is buying into the myth again and forgetting that we’re talking about children.”

Denver approach to discipline keeps kids in school

On March 22, East High student Austin Lyle shot two deans who were searching him as part of a safety plan that was in place due to his past behavior. The deans survived. Lyle, who was 17, later died by suicide. He was on probation for a weapons charge, according to media reports, and had been expelled from the suburban Cherry Creek School District.

But expulsions aren’t forever. By the time Lyle transferred to East mid-year, his Cherry Creek expulsion had expired. He was living in the East boundary and that’s why he enrolled there, Staten said.

That a student with a weapons charge, who was being searched daily by school staff for guns, was able to enroll in and remain at a traditional public high school has put heightened focus on DPS’s discipline matrix. The matrix is a guide for school staff about when they should or should not call the police and when they can suspend or expel a student.

The matrix was last amended in the fall of 2021. At that time, DPS added bright red letters at the top. “You make a difference in breaking historical patterns of inequity,” it says. “Disrupt bias, fight disproportionality, and apply the discipline matrix in an anti-racist and trauma-informed manner.”

Under the matrix, the only offense that automatically results in an expulsion hearing is bringing a gun to school. Everything else, including sexual assault and selling drugs, is up to district administrators.

The number of expulsions in Denver has fallen over the past decade. In the 2011-12 school year, Denver expelled 63 students, according to state data. In 2021-22, it expelled just 21.

Compare that to Cherry Creek, a smaller district that suspended 142 students last school year.

The language and tone in the two districts’ policies could not read more differently.

Denver: “School safety and academic success are formed and strengthened when all school staff and personnel build positive relationships with students and are actively engaged in their lives and learning. … Effective discipline is built on consistent and effective classroom management, and is supported by a positive school climate.”

Cherry Creek: “The administration has the right to expect full cooperation of employees in the planning and execution of discipline and control procedures including support for removing students who persistently or flagrantly misbehave.”

Cherry Creek officials declined an interview request for this story.

Denver and Cherry Creek differ on expulsion

The districts’ differing philosophies were clear at a legislative hearing at the state Capitol on March 2, just three weeks before the East shooting. Both districts testified on a bill that would have given students more rights in expulsion hearings and made it harder to expel students for nonviolent offenses or for behavior that occurred off school property.

Denver was the only district to testify in favor. Denver Public Schools attorney Elise Logemann said during testimony that the district already does much of what the bill would have mandated, including requiring there be a “direct and substantial nexus between the student’s alleged conduct committed off school grounds and the risk of physical harm to other students or school personnel.”

Denver students and current and former staff members testified in favor too.

“Many people thought I was a bad kid and that I was a bully, but my anger was actually sadness,” said Lorenzo Gomez, a 16-year-old student at AUL Denver who told lawmakers he frequently got into fights before going to AUL, a small charter school for students who’ve struggled elsewhere.

“All kids deserve a second chance and a supportive place to go to school,” he said.

Cherry Creek joined the Harrison and Fountain-Fort Carson districts in Colorado Springs, along with the Colorado Association of School Executives, the Colorado Association of School Boards, and the Colorado Rural Schools Alliance, in opposing the bill.

Cherry Creek doesn’t require a connection to school to expel a student for off-campus behavior. Sonja McKenzie, an attorney for the district, said requiring one would prevent Cherry Creek from expelling potentially dangerous students.

She gave an example she said happened this year: A Cherry Creek student shot another teenager in a park. The victim attended a neighboring school district. Under the bill, she said, there would have been no grounds to expel the shooter because the victim didn’t go to Cherry Creek.

“But you tell me, would you want your child attending that school with that child who had a gun — and maybe had that gun on school grounds and we just didn’t know it?” McKenzie said.

More people testified in support of the bill than against it. But after the East shooting, state lawmakers killed the bill and introduced a scaled-back version instead.

Students have repeatedly flooded the Colorado State Capitol this year to call for stricter gun control in response to shootings. Some Denver parents, meanwhile, are calling for changes to district discipline policies.

Educators struggle to balance safety, learning

Attorney Lindsay Brown said she’s seen Denver’s approach to discipline change over time. Ten years ago, she said DPS was more punitive. She remembers representing a student athlete with a supportive family who was expelled for bringing brass knuckles to school.

While Brown said that would still happen in many suburban districts, she has for years now felt like Denver is more likely to give students a fair hearing.

“Denver has historically been a place where you can go in and speak to the hearts and minds of teachers and administrators,” Brown said. “I’ve always felt like they were really trying to do the right thing.”

She worries that the recent violence will change that.

“I am concerned that schools are going to start to wash their hands of quote-unquote problem kids using this umbrella of, ‘Well, these things happen, so we can’t be too safe,’” she said.

Elsa Bañuelos-Lindsay has the same fears. She’s executive director of Movimiento Poder, a Denver community organization formerly known as Padres & Jóvenes Unidos that for years led the fight to reduce suspensions and expulsions in DPS and statewide. She said putting police officers back into Denver schools is a sign that DPS is going in the wrong direction.

“It’s going to harm more of our students, especially students of color,” Bañuelos-Lindsay said.

Rob Gould, president of the Denver Classroom Teachers Association, is somewhere in the middle. Asked if the pendulum had swung too far toward keeping students in school, he said yes and no. If given the choice of smaller class sizes or more metal detectors because of limited funding, educators would choose the former, he said.

“We’re still trying to figure this out,” Gould said.

But attorney Igor Raykin, who also represents students in expulsion proceedings, said he thinks that after the racial justice protests of 2020, Denver and other urban districts “overcorrected and began to be tolerant of behaviors they shouldn’t be tolerant of.”

While he believes expulsion is disruptive to a student’s life and should be used sparingly, he said that needs to be balanced with keeping other students and teachers safe. Expelling a student just means they can’t go back to their current school. It doesn’t mean they can’t access an education, Raykin said, even if that’s through remote learning online.

Former DPS principal Kimberly Grayson said she moved students to remote or hybrid learning — over the objections of the district — if she felt their presence put other students at risk.

Last school year, after one of her students at Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Early College was killed by gunfire on a weekend and police arrested another student on suspicion of the crime, Grayson said she and her staff figured out which of their classmates were involved in the rivalry.

Each was handed a computer and a message: “You’re going to finish this year out at home on your Chromebook. It’s dangerous for you to be here. For you and for everybody else here,” Grayson recently told activist and podcast host brother jeff Fard.

“The district told me I couldn’t do it,” Grayson said. “Oh yes, I am. We’re going to support them with their education. We’re going to give them a Chromebook.”

Grayson said she thinks DPS’s approach to discipline shifted too far over the years.

“They went from zero tolerance to complete tolerance,” she said in an interview. “I realize you want numbers [of suspensions and expulsions] to decrease for Black and brown kids. However, there still needs to be some consequences for some actions.”

Staten, the deputy chief of staff for DPS, said the district’s position is that a student can be in their regular public school — even if they’re facing criminal charges — as long as a judge has decided that the student can be out in the community and not behind bars.

“There are times where we may need to talk to probation to see what the terms and conditions are,” Staten said. “But if somebody in the judicial system has deemed that it’s OK for the student to be in the community, it’s OK for the student to be in a school setting.”

Superintendent Alex Marrero and Denver school board members address the media after deciding to return armed police officers to Denver high school campuses.

New plans and policies in the works

Ultimately, the responsibility for district discipline policy lies with the elected school board. But Denver board members are more hands-off now due to a new governance model that emphasizes letting the superintendent run the district’s day-to-day operations.

When school board members asked for a safety update at a recent meeting, Superintendent Alex Marrero gave little information.

“Yes, we will engage the community, and I appreciate the invitations to assist,” Marrero said. “But this is where I have to lean on the experts.”

Back in 2020, when the board voted to remove police from schools, it also directed the then-superintendent to “redefine school safety” in DPS, clarify the role law enforcement should play, and create a monthly school discipline report that would show the number of students ticketed and arrested, and the number of times police were called to schools.

But pandemic recovery and turnover in the superintendent role stymied some of that work. As of two weeks ago, a spokesman for the Denver Police Department said the department did not have an updated intergovernmental agreement with DPS, even as police return to schools. And Staten said the monthly school discipline reports were never created because of COVID.

The East shooting seems to have reignited the work. The board has directed the superintendent to develop a long-term safety plan by June 30. The district is also reviewing the discipline matrix — a review that was planned before the shooting at East, Staten said.

“Regardless of this behavioral incident at East, that was on the calendar to do this,” Staten said. “East has nothing to do with it. East has nothing to do with the overall district discipline.”

Though the board doesn’t vote on revisions to the discipline matrix, they do review it, she said. Several board members did not return messages for this story or declined to comment.

But Vice President Auon’tai Anderson, who worked as a restorative practices coordinator at a DPS high school before getting elected to the board in 2019, said he still believes that the district’s philosophy of erring toward keeping students in school is the right one.

“We’re a restorative practice district,” he said. “We’re not in the business of kicking kids out for a mistake. Because people have bad days. We can’t say you’re not worthy of an education here.”

Melanie Asmar is a senior reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado, covering Denver Public Schools. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.

‘I need a plan.’ As NRA convention begins, Indianapolis teens share fears about gun violence.

2023-04-14T16:59:48+00:00

Raina Maiga looked out her school’s windows from the second floor on Thursday, trying to imagine what she would do in a school shooting.

“I’m hopeless. I can’t jump out the window,” said Maiga, a sophomore at Purdue Polytechnic High School’s Englewood campus on Indianapolis’ east side. “There’s nothing to do. Our school is exposed with windows. If someone walked in here with a gun, I mean, it’s over.”

These are the conversations that Raina and her classmates have on an almost weekly basis.

But this week, those conversations are happening with the backdrop of the National Rifle Association’s three-day annual convention, which is expected to bring tens of thousands of attendees to downtown Indianapolis beginning Friday.

The convention for the powerful lobbying organization — and the warm reception from some Indiana lawmakers — feels tone deaf to Indianapolis-area teens who say gun violence in their schools and communities is their reality and fills them with anxiety on a regular basis.

Ryan Evans, a Purdue Polytechnic junior, remembers the day in 2013 that his sister survived the Arapahoe High School shooting in Colorado. His classmate Huma Moghul recalls the night she heard gunfire in her neighborhood and woke up to a bullet hole in her living room wall. And they all remember the lockdowns they have experienced this year — anxious moments that they try to ease with dark humor about whether they’d survive if a shooter was outside their door.

So far this year, eight people age 18 and under in Indianapolis have been killed by a firearm, per the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department. Sixteen people age 18 and under in the city died by firearms in 2022, up from 14 in 2021.

Among those who died was a 17-year-old Purdue Polytechnic High School student James Johnson III, who was killed in February.

“Nobody ever thinks that it’s going to happen to them,” said Evans. “And I definitely think that James Johnson didn’t think that as well. Because it’s not a thought that somebody should have.”

Students prepare for school shootings

The NRA annual meeting comes roughly three weeks after a person shot and killed three children and three adults at a private Christian school in Nashville. Their deaths sparked outrage during Tennessee’s legislative session, and students rallied for tougher gun laws at the Tennessee State Capitol.

Indiana lawmakers are considering a bill to provide state funding for firearms training for teachers. Rep. Jim Lucas, a Republican from Seymour and the bill’s author, said in February his legislation is a response to mass school shootings across the U.S., according to the Indiana Capital Chronicle.

But to students like Evans and Maiga, that legislation is not the solution. Instead, they say, legislators should stop and think about how the situation is affecting students in schools.

And the onus should not be on schools to arm teachers, or transform buildings into iron fortresses, some students argue.

“We shouldn’t have to be wanding children into schools to prevent guns from entering schools or teaching them how to evacuate to mobile bomb shelters that can be built in schools,” said Evans.

(The convention also starts on the same day that dozens of Indiana school districts received a bomb threat, prompting the closure of school buildings.)

Katie Bolduc, a freshman at Westfield High School, said she’s only known a world with gun violence in schools, where active shooter drills are as commonplace as fire and tornado drills.

“There’s a lot of complacency, it’s something that’s normal and accepted that you have to prepare for,” she said.

But it leaves her feeling unsafe.

“There are weapons that can cause mass casualties in a few minutes, and all I have is a pencil pouch or a water bottle to throw at the shooter, best-case scenario,” Bolduc said.

Lucy Rutter, a junior at Burris Laboratory School in Muncie, said she first started to hear about school shootings in middle school. At that time, it seemed like it wouldn’t happen to her. That’s changed.

“The more I see it, the more I feel like it is going to happen to me, and I need a plan,” she said. “It’s so hard to hear about it in the news every day and feel like I can’t do anything about it.”

NRA convention in town prompts disappointment from students

Having the NRA convention in their backyard only exacerbates the disconnect between lawmakers and the students who spoke to us.

“I do wonder what the conversations are like when talking about actually caring about the lives of people, but then choosing to be a public face at this convention,” said Maiga, who lamented the scheduled presence of Gov. Eric Holcomb and former Vice President Mike Pence at the convention.

Students said that having the convention so close to home is a reminder of how tense and politically charged the topic of gun violence prevention is — and of the sway of organizations like the NRA.

Salsabil Qaddoura, a North Central High School sophomore, leads her school’s chapter of Students Demand Action, a national group of high school and college students that aims to end gun violence and is affiliated with Everytown for Gun Safety and Moms Demand Action.

She said the NRA convention has her thinking about gun industry accountability, and how it can profit off of young people. The access to guns is there, she said.

“It’s disgusting and insensitive,” she said of the NRA coming to Indianapolis.

The NRA did not respond to a request for comment.

Students consider how to change views on guns

Being a high schooler means having pressures to fit a certain standard, Qaddoura said. That means students are influenced by what they surround themselves with, and there’s a thought of “if you have guns you have that tough-person persona,” she said.

Students said they want to shift the narrative around guns with their classmates to make having a gun less of a status symbol, and to know that it’s OK to ask for help and to talk about gun-violence prevention.

In all the years of doing active shooter drills, “I don’t think I’ve ever had a teacher or school officer talk about how we feel, get under the desk and find what you’re going to throw and prepare,” Bolduc said.

She hopes to start a Students Demand Action chapter to change that.

As leaders of their own Students Demand Action chapters, Qaddoura and Rutter have worked to start a discussion about gun violence. They’ve registered voters, signed petitions, and attended protests and other events.

“A lot of people assume that my only goal is to ban guns, but there are so many other solutions besides banning guns outright,” Rutter said, listing gun safety education, safe storage, background checks, and red flag laws.

Students at Purdue Polytechnic, meanwhile, are organizing a walkout for April 20, the 24th anniversary of the Columbine High School shooting.

Students said they know change can be slow.

“I always hear that change is gradual,” Qaddoura said. But she added that when it comes to gun violence prevention, “We can’t wait.”

Amelia Pak-Harvey covers Indianapolis and Marion County schools for Chalkbeat Indiana. Contact Amelia at apak-harvey@chalkbeat.org.

MJ Slaby oversees Chalkbeat Indiana’s coverage as bureau chief and covers higher education. Contact MJ at mslaby@chalkbeat.org.

I survived a school shooting. Here’s why you probably haven’t heard about it.

2023-04-13T19:30:00+00:00

“It wasn’t a school shooting,” my Algebra 3 teacher said nonchalantly as he passed around the bag of “Great Mills Strong” bracelets someone had donated to us. “It was just a shooting in a school.”

His words sounded ridiculous to me, but this was a sentiment shared by many in and beyond our community.

Mollie Davis

Two weeks earlier, 16-year-old Jaelynn Willey was shot dead by her 17-year-old ex-boyfriend on a Tuesday morning inside Great Mills High School, where in 2018 I was a senior. The boy died, too, of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, as the school’s student resource officer responded to the incident.

But all this happened a month after the massacre at a high school in Parkland, Florida, where 17 were killed. What happened at our school seemed minuscule by contrast. The gun-control advocates forgot us and the gun-rights advocates pushed out a video claiming us as a victory for the side of “good guys with guns.” Never mind that the events of that rainy Tuesday morning left Jaelynn dead and traumatized us Great Mills students. Meanwhile, we were told that what we experienced wasn’t really a “school shooting,” so we were fearful of being seen as dramatic. The message: Be grateful that it wasn’t worse.

If I was testifying under oath, I’d have to say I’m not sure if I heard the gunshot. The doors of our school slammed loudly by default, people dropped things, and I think I may have heard it without recognizing what it was. Either way, what alerted me that something was wrong was the screaming. There was screaming and my head turned to a boy running past the open door of our classroom in black basketball shorts with a white stripe up the side. Two of my classmates went to the stair landing to see if they could see what was going on. They came back inside reporting that people were screaming someone had a gun, and sat back down.

We all sat at our desks with the lights on, the screaming reverberating off of the walls below us. Someone said their friend told them that someone popped a balloon behind a girl’s head and told her to drop. What a jerk, he’s in trouble, my mother texted when I relayed that information to her. I chuckled as my hands shook and the intercom crackled to life. Something about how there was no immediate threat but to go on lockdown.

I tweeted a plea for prayer that went viral; when CNN asked if I was available, I turned them down. But they found someone who said yes, someone who went on national television and said seven people were dead.

I tweeted a plea for prayer that went viral.

Thankfully that wasn’t true. Thankfully, only one girl was shot in the head; thankfully, the bullet that went through her head only hit someone else in the leg; thankfully, the only other casualty was the shooter. The word “thankfully” has been rotting on my tongue for the past five years, but I can’t spit it out because that would be rude to the people who worked overtime to make it palatable.

The shooting took place around 7:55 a.m., and I didn’t leave the reunification center until close to 4 p.m. As we pulled out of the parking lot, my chest started hurting so bad I couldn’t sit up. So I hunched into a ball in my dad’s passenger seat until we got home and I stumbled into the house to hug my mom. I forced myself up the stairs and into the bathroom before I collapsed, my eyes falling to the piece of white masking tape on my sleeve. We all got one when checking into the reunification center for reasons that I’ve never understood. Ripping it off, I slammed it against the wall and turned the water on so my family wouldn’t hear me as I let out an earnest sob from the depths of my being. I crawled into the shower, curled up in a ball, and willed myself to wake up from what was surely just a vivid nightmare.

But it wasn’t a nightmare, and the short list of dead and injured wasn’t some “get out of trauma free” card for me or my peers.

Smaller school shootings get lost in the shuffle of too-frequent violence with higher death tolls. You can tell me to be thankful that it wasn’t worse. But what happened at my school five years ago remains an open wound.

Mollie Davis is a 23-year-old writer residing in Denver with the Colorado Episcopal Service Corps. In the fall, Davis will be a 1L.

Expelled Memphis lawmaker credits student activists as he wins reappointment to Tennessee House

2023-04-13T00:48:56+00:00

Memphis high schooler Carolina Calvo skipped school Wednesday, joined hundreds of marchers, and took pictures as local officials made the historic vote to reappoint a state lawmaker to his seat.

Just a week earlier, the GOP-controlled Tennessee House voted to expel Rep. Justin Pearson of Memphis, as well as another Democrat, Justin Jones of Nashville, saying they violated chamber rules by amplifying many protesters’ calls for gun reform in the wake of the deadly mass shooting at Nashville’s Covenant School. A third Democrat, Gloria Johnson of Knoxville, narrowly survived an expulsion resolution.

For Carolina and her older sister Anna Calvo, the expulsion hearings, culminating in the ouster of the House’s two youngest Black members, represented hopelessness and defeat.

Now both lawmakers have regained their positions — Jones reappointed on Monday by Nashville’s Metro Council, and Pearson voted in 7-0 by the Shelby County Commission, as demonstrators in the chamber cheered. Pearson is expected to be back in his legislative seat on Thursday, rejoining Johnson and Jones.

“Today, there’s just a lot more hope in the room,” Carolina said Wednesday after the vote on Pearson.

Reappointed Rep. Justin Pearson entered the Shelby County Commission from a march of hundreds than began at the National Civil Rights Museum.

Pearson, who became a student activist at age 15 in the quest for a proper textbook, said student activism continues to play a role in his career, right up to his reappointment.

“Students and young people lead all movements,” he told Chalkbeat after his reappointment. “This movement is no different, and the movement to end gun violence and the justice that we will have will be because of young people and students and college students who say that the status quo must change.”

Carolina, a 16-year-old sophomore, and Anna, an 18-year-old senior, were among student organizers at Memphis’ Crosstown High School who walked out of class in support of gun reform earlier this month. Anna joined youth protesters at the Tennessee Capitol building, and witnessed part of Jones’ expulsion hearing.

Both want Tennessee to adopt red-flag laws, like 19 other states have, to let law enforcement take guns away from people who threaten harm to themselves or others.

On Tuesday, Gov. Bill Lee called for legislators to develop and pass what he called “order of protection” legislation that would do the same thing, subject to a judge’s order.

The sisters especially want Tennessee lawmakers to halt steps toward arming certain teachers with concealed weapons, as one bill that advanced last week in the House would do.

“School shootings are already scary in itself, but just making (guns) accessible for people to reach them is really awful to think about,” Carolina said.

Both students — daughters of former school board candidate and Latino activist Mauricio Calvo — have been encouraged to be politically active. But as they’ve gotten older, the stakes have increased, they said.

“Now that I can vote, it does feel different,” Anna said.

Even students who can’t vote can still make a difference, Carolina said, by protesting and using social media to amplify their voices.

“I remember being 11 and doing the Women’s March,” Carolina said. “That was really powerful and stuff, but I was 11. And now I’m a lot older … . You just realize how it’s going to impact you more.”

Laura Testino covers Memphis-Shelby County Schools for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Reach Laura at LTestino@chalkbeat.org.