School board hears complaints about students’ safety

At the Sept. 26 regular meeting of the Van Buren Public Schools Board of Education, two parents and one grandparent addressed the board one by one on their students’ being unsafe under the district’s care.
David Shall said he takes his 10-year-old daughter to the bus stop at Belleville Road and Harmony Lane, which he said is very dangerous. He said his daughter almost got run over that morning.
He said a teacher from Bethany passed his truck and when she saw the bus was trying to turn in, backed up as his daughter was crossing the street to get to the bus. He said he jumped out of his truck and smacked the car to alert the driver or his daughter would have been run over.
“It’s unsafe and we’ve been treated as though this is an inconvenience,” he said, noting that officials from the transportation department said they will be there on Tuesday. “I’m going to be there on Tuesday because they will be there,” he said. He said otherwise, he would be gone.
Kristine Hickman lives in West Willow and her 10-year-old son was chased home by seven kids after getting off the bus. She said he also has been bullied on the bus and she complained about it. Finally, the bus driver said her son could sit in the front seat, but then one day when he got on the bus to go home, the driver made him sit in the back of the bus next to one of the bullies and gave the front seat to the driver’s daughter.
She said she believed it was because she is white, her son is black and the girl who got the seat is white. She said her son took a toy gun to school one day because he was afraid and got expelled and suspended. She said he was bullied on the bus for three straight years and called “nigger” and heard things said about his mother.
Hickman said she has removed her son from the school district and now he rides an hour and a half to get to school on a bus and two hours to get home.
“I live in West Willow, a rough neighborhood,” she said, adding marijuana is plentiful there. She said her child was told by school officials to lay in a ball until an adult comes to rescue him. She said her children are terrified to go to school.
She said she was told to go deal with the parent and when she did a gun was pulled on her.
The next speaker on student safety was Reg Ion, whose grandson attends Belleville High School. School Board president Amy Pearson was insistent he fill out a card before he could speak and he did. She said it is the school board policy.
Ion said his heart hurt when he heard Hickman’s story. He said his younger son went through some bullying at the high school, as well. But this is about his grandson, who is a freshman and got on the freshman football team.
Ion said last Friday his grandson came out of the gym and was putting a dollar in the pop machine to get a soda when another football player grabbed the dollar and handed it off to a third person who stuck it in his pocket. The student then grabbed at another dollar his grandson was ready to put in the machine and tore it in half. Then he tried to take his grandson’s wallet and his grandson punched him.
Ion said his grandson got eight days suspension for defending his wallet. The other student, who was stealing the money, got eight days and the one who put the money in his pocket got nothing.
Ion said this is strong-arm robbery, a felony, and students need to learn they are not above the law. The school should call the police, he said. He said he didn’t know if the school resource officer was available. Someone needed to talk to the boys, he said, so they would learn that you can’t take someone’s wallet because if they aren’t taught that they could try taking someone else’s wallet and end up having a Go Fund Me page.
Ion said that’s why the school needs metal detectors. He said when he and his wife were at the Farmer’s Market last week, a kid who had just come from the school dropped a knife on the cement. He said the district isn’t supposed to hide crimes.
Ion said he was head custodian of the old BHS for 28 years and the pop machine shouldn’t be turned on between classes. He said last week only two custodians were available to clean the high school. He said the machine should be off when school is in session because they don’t have custodians to clean up the spills that always occur. Then they couldn’t have strong-armed robberies at the pop machine, he said.
“I talked to Mr. Ion about this today and I will talk with him intimately,” said School Supt. Pete Kudlak.
Also at Monday’s meeting, the board:
• Approved the resignations of teachers Erica Johnson of Owen after five years of service as of Sept. 29 and Kareen Dillard-Biggs of Belleville High School after one year of service as of Sept. 16;
• Approved the employment of Taylor Baugh as a GSFP teacher at the Early Childhood Center as of Sept. 12 and Kelsey Frederick as a GSFP teacher at the ECC as of Sept. 19; Brooklyn Isbell as a social worker at Owen Intermediate as of Sept. 13 and David Jablinsky as a fifth-grade teacher at Owen as of Oct. 3;
• Approved the resignations of Amy Loggie of the Transportation Department as of Sept. 8; Shaton Campbell of Transportation as of Sept. 14, Charles Johnson of Building and Grounds as of Sept. 26. All had less than one year of service; and
• Held a closed-door session at the end of the meeting to consider student discipline and then went into regular session to approve the student’s reinstatement with conditions. He had been expelled during the 2021-22 school year and was labeled Student 21-22-034. He will be reinstated for the 2022-23 school year.