cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/26445083
Cartwright described for Rolling Stone a years-long struggle to keep kids safe at school. “Munitions and tear gas — we aren’t new to this,” she says. “We’d been next to the ICE building the whole time.” She emphasized that the school has coexisted “harmoniously with the protesters,” but adds: “Our issue is the chemical weapons being used against them that were impacting our space.”
But as the intensity of the conflict rose, it soon became clear that the school would have to make a dramatic change. “We were getting nightly reports that green gas was enveloping our garden — our edible garden — and all of the different chemicals were impacting our soil.” Cottonwood faced the costly prospect of constant testing and remediation, or being unable to use its outdoor spaces. When the bottom dropped out of enrollment, the school chose to relocate to a recently vacant middle-school campus where Cottonwood could take over the lease.
My children attended this school until recently, it was initially a very good environment for a less factory-learning structure, especially for less conformist children; we moved them before the protests and responses were an alleged driving factor for relocating. There was already an exodus in progress once the protests were in full swing due to alarming turnover rates among the teaching staff throughout the year as well as multiple issues with the now-removed principal and much of the board (spoiler: lots of turnover there too).
The board (old and new) has consistently tried to operate behind closed doors, stifle parental/community input at meetings, and actively ignores their bylaws/rules/policies as it suits their interests. The meetings leading up to their announcing the move barely pretended to hold to posted agendas or consider the limited input they allowed.
General consensus among most parents that attended/participated board meetings recently was that they (board) were actively trying to spin an excuse to lease from Lundquist (guy that owns the ICE building) with many questioning if one or more members had personal/financial ties to him. Other facilities not mentioned in the article were aggressively dismissed by the board during meetings leading up to the announcement for arbitrary reasons without exploring remedies or workarounds to their declared obstacles, seemingly to create their “we only have two options” narrative they pushed in the article.