Olympia School Board is failing to listen to community members

As a community member and OSD4ALL representative, I attended the Olympia School Board Summer Retreat at the North Mason School District office on August 10, hoping for several things based on the agenda. One was the presence of Superintendent Patrick Murphy. Until shortly before the event, an evaluation of the district superintendent was still on the agenda. The other was a debrief of the school consolidation effort over the 2023-24 school year. Perhaps the group would rally to solve this local and national crisis of school funding in the upcoming legislative session.

I was unexpectedly joined by a reporter from The JOLT, who thankfully recorded audio of the meeting and committed to reporting it. That reporter has covered much of what happened that day accurately, but how I experienced it was singular. Director Scott Cliffthorne said that Superintendent Patrick Murphy asked the board to close two schools prior to the 2023-24 school year. He also stated that only a lawsuit halted the process. For the amount of effort the community gave in being heard, it felt like there really was not a point, unless there was a legal misstep, which there was. But six weeks followed the court’s decision, where we remained in flux, being told that it might still be possible to close schools. It felt cruel to know that the board finally had an engaged community, but they were not going to listen, unless it was at the cost of legal repercussions.

Throughout the consolidation effort, one school board member consistently focused on solutions and community feedback, and that was Director Maria Flores. She visited both schools slated for closure within a month after the closure vote, and explained that her colleagues were not villains, but had different solutions in mind. And if we wanted to keep these schools open, we had to look at state revenue, early learning, and our overall instructional model. Director Flores was berated to the point of a PTSD attack during lunch, and somehow participated throughout the entire meeting without raising her voice or being defensive. 

Throughout the meeting, the public was not allowed to speak or move, apparently. Getting another view of the many Post-its from the alcove for the public, I was deemed ‘threatening’ and yelled at by Director Huffman and told sarcastically to ‘send her an email.’ I sent an email. I doubt I’ll get a response. Over and over Director Huffman said she had apologized enough for her ‘misstep’ with the N-word in 2022. Director Flores explained how it harmed the community, and that being the president at the time, she expected to be told. Both President Seidel and Director Tourtellotte-Palumbo agreed they wouldn’t have told anyone. The Student Representatives witnessed all of this.

But the real vitriol was at the community. We ‘weaponized communication unproductively’ according to President Seidel. We were ultimately a roadblock and getting in the way of the board’s work. We told Director Cliffthorne that our children were hurting and he got mad and retreated. Director Tourtellote-Palumbo was fully on board with the recommendation to close Madison Elementary (her own neighborhood school) and McKenny Elementary after running on not closing schools. By the end of the meeting, ‘Trigger Metrics’ for school closure were being developed and it was decided that those needed to be shown to Superintendent Murphy before the holidays.

Student Representatives were asked to come up with metrics to close the schools they may have attended, while I ate NERD Clusters nervously, and hid under a table to see more. Director Flores mostly came up with new measurable goals for the District Improvement Plan and a path to an equity assessment in our student distribution and services. President Seidel said those weren’t closure metrics, and I lost that Saturday entirely. I was holding back tears at the beginning of the meeting and collapsed in them after the hour-long ride home.

OSD4ALL meeting this Saturday

Moving forward, OSD4ALL is having an event on Saturday, August 24 at Three Magnets Brewing Co. in downtown Olympia. It includes information on enrollment, a guide to our district's neighborhood schools and programs, and a chance to help us prioritize our goals in advance of the school year and legislative session. We want to preserve the quality of education that Olympia children receive in every school in this district.

The school board will be meeting soon about policies, including the closure policy they failed to follow last year, in hopes of making required analysis less specific. They’d like to see enrollment as a base metric for student services, regardless of the school population. And they continue to give raises to the cabinet and superintendent at the district office, while cutting principal and librarian time. We would like to focus on how our student population can get the services and care they deserve, at every school, and we hope that eventually, they might consider listening.

          ~ Erika Lari, Olympia

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