More than one dozen students amplify voices with signs at school board meeting

By Lauren Young

Staff writer

The recent J-D Board of Education meeting was packed with attendees — including over one dozen students holding up signs — who continued to demand answers and transparency from the board and the district administration. The meeting came on the heels of three board members resignations within a one-month period, and the return to work of embattled J-D High School choral director Beth Quackenbush on Nov. 19 after being out on paid leave since September after being accused of bullying and verbally abusing students.

In response to parents’ and students’ demands for better communication and board transparency, the board refused, again, to answer questions in public session, refused to discuss “traumatic” issues in public session and discussed how to fill board vacancies in executive session away from the public.

More than 60 people attended the Nov. 19 board meeting, during which the resignation of board president Mark Schulman and member Patrick Brown was announced. Potential candidates were discussed during executive session that night, and the board will disclose how the vacancies will be filled at its next meeting, said Superintendent Alice Kendrick. (Click here for related story)

“Verbal abuse is abuse”

As two board members leave, one teacher returns — though some students and parents in the district are not happy with the decision, consistently discussed at every board meeting for the past several months, and allegedly an even larger issue endured for the last several years.

According to a letter sent home to students of the choral department on Friday, Nov. 16, the choral program “has been strong and successful for many years, and Mrs. Quackenbush looks forward to continuing that tradition with our very talented students,” wrote Principal Paul Gasparini.

The letter thanked Ms. Annie Parks for her work filling in for Quackenbush during the first quarter, and directed further questions to the school’s guidance counselor.

Quackenbush’s paid leave resulted from accusations by more than 15 students and parents at the board’s Aug. 27 meeting, accusations including “lying” to students and the administration, “inappropriate standards of perfection” and “ostracizing” students. About the same number of community members expressed positive experiences they had with Quackenbush, defending her character and intentions.

Since then, parents and students have consistently voiced their concerns to the board at every meeting, including high school senior Nancy O’Connor, who said the district embodies a “culture of verbal abuse,” and “hasn’t gotten better.”

While her decision to step forward has been met with disapproval, it has also been met with support, she said.

“I feel like I’m a mouthpiece for people in those situations who are afraid to speak up,” she said.

After dropping the choral program last year, O’Connor is spending her senior year taking college-level classes in the mornings. The school’s climate, she said, is “incredibly tense and divided,” but being less involved with its atmosphere has been “helpful.”

“I just focus on the day-to-day, and do what needs to be done,” she said.

O’Connor has been to every board meeting since last August and is one of many students to have voiced concern with their experiences with the choral program and the board’s alleged lack of transparency.

“We’ve been told all our lives that if we have a problem to go to an adult, and we don’t feel like going to an adult helps in this solution at all,” she said. “In a lot of cases, it makes it worse.”

“The fight is not over”

Although O’Connor, along with multiple parents and students, said these issues have stirred for several years, they were going to wait until after graduation next spring before making their concerns public.

“We were going to speak at the end of last year, but we were afraid of the repercussions,” she said, as some students were leaning on teacher recommendations for colleges. After planning to speak at the board’s first meeting in August, students were told that “they didn’t need to” by the principal, as students had already contacted the proper channels and were discouraged from reiterating their points.

“So we didn’t, but now I regret that a lot,” sad O’Connor.

When tragedy struck the community late August with a student suicide, O’Connor said the “grief gave us the courage to speak, but it certainly wasn’t the beginning of us wanting to speak.”

By allowing the continuation of this alleged bullying, O’Connor said the rights of J-D students have been “violated” — and they are supporting their evidence from the district’s own Code of Conduct and Student Handbook.

Speaking on behalf of “student rights” and accompanied by nearly 40 of her peers, several holding signs quoting from the district’s Code of Conduct and Student Handbook, O’Connor told the board on Nov. 19 that “students are in situations where there have been numerous racist incidents and belittlement based on religion and disability,” which is “unacceptable,” and “verbal abuse is abuse.”

Of the 14 signs students held up, some read:

• “We do not tolerate bullying in any form … verbal or physical harassment … or any other demeaning or insulting behavior” — from the handbook and Code of Conduct.
• “Students have the right to be treated with courtesy, respect, honesty and fairness” — from the handbook and Code of Conduct.
• “Students have the right to learn in a safe, orderly, supportive environment” — from the Code of Conduct.
• “All teachers are expected to: address personal biases that may prevent equal treatment of all students in the school or classroom setting” — from the Code of Conduct.

“Our very own J-D handbook states that, ‘We do not tolerate bullying in any form’ … If our school believes so strongly in this, why are students being given almost no notice and being put in a previously abusive situation, when many students’ mental and emotional health is already stretched so thinly?” said O’Connor.

This problem, extending several years, has resulted in students removing themselves from these situations by either changing schools, taking college classes, dropping classes or their passions, said O’Connor.

“To the administration: I am thoroughly disappointed. You led my friends and me to believe you cared about students, and your inaction makes it clear that you do not care that we have been abused,” she said. “To my fellow students — do not give up on achieving a school without abuse — the fight is not over.”

Her speech, which received over 30 seconds of applause, prompted Murphy to say that she appreciated O’Connor’s comments and asked others to email their comments to the board.

Parents back students

But students were not the only ones who urged for transparency — their parents spoke up as well.

Parent Jim Truefrost said he recognized the difficulty of being an elected official, but also the necessity of communicating to the community that voted them into their positions. One question he sought an answer for was, simply, “how to be heard.”

“As parents, we’ve been asking for a long time, and none of the avenues we’ve taken to communicate some very grave concerns about policies, about our voices, participation and your responsiveness to them … have been heard or answered,” he said.

When Truefrost asked the board how community members can amplify their voices, Murphy said it was “not the opportunity for the board to engage in discussion or conversation, but emails are always welcome.”

“It’s not that we don’t want to engage in conversation, it’s that we can’t answer one person’s question and not another’s, so the practice is to not respond,” said Murphy.

Parent Rachel Wagner said the last board meeting left a lot of parents feeling “confused,” and hearing “teachers feeling unsupported” “broke” her heart.

“True educational excellence should be measured in the way we treat our most vulnerable children and families,” she said. “Wanting equitable treatment is not an attack on teachers — it is a challenge to the status quo.”

In response to the accusations against her mother, student Hayley Quackenbush expressed her “gratitude” to the Jamesville-DeWitt staff, as the last three months had been “traumatic” for her family.

However, she, along with her brother and sister, felt “incredibly supported” by their teachers, counselors, coaches and teammates, and “not a day went by when we didn’t have someone reach out to us to see if we were ok or if we needed anything,” said Quackenbush.

“The staff in our district go above and beyond on a daily basis, making it possible for kids at J-D to be successful students, musicians and athletes,” she said.

The next board of education meeting will be held on Monday, Dec. 3 at Jamesville-DeWitt High School.