CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (WINA) – There were no classes at Charlottesville High School on Monday, November 21, but there were plenty of community members in the auditorium that same evening.
That to take part in a “listening session” hosted by Charlottesville United for Public Education. The meeting was arranged in the wake of a teacher sickout on Friday, November 17. Fights inside CHS have become frequent, but after a series of fights the day before, one of which included police intervention, teachers had had enough.
“Business as usual was not going to happen this time,” said teacher Holly Faulconer, a member of a five-teacher panel that took questions from attendees. “We’re tired. We do not want to have business as usual.”
Several people voiced frustration over minimal information from the district about what happened last week.
“We don’t know what the problem is,” said one person who came to the microphone. “We don’t know how deep the problem is because the school system is not being forthright with us.”
Tina Vasquez was also on the panel. She said the pandemic is part of the problem.
“A lot of this definitely stems from covid. There’s not enough discussion of the damage that was done during covid to our adolescents. The developmental loss, not just the academic loss. This all happened during middle school. That’s a time of clinical social development.”
Classes at CHS were cancelled on Monday and Tuesday to allow teachers and administrators to meet and ‘reset’ school policies, procedures, and culture.
Former CHS principal Kenneth Leatherman has been appointed interim principal and will start immediately following Thanksgiving break.
