Parents want action to curb student fights
Commissioner: ‘We, as parents, are frustrated’
Bruce Miller scrolled through messages on his cellphone, stopping at a short video sent to him by a parent.
The video depicted an incident during the first days of the school year, with one boy cowering on the ground, trying to protect himself from another boy who was kicking him repeatedly.
“This is literally the front door of Marion-franklin High School,” Miller said.
Footage of such fights at the school on Koebel Road on the South Side, at Buckeye Middle School on Parsons Avenue
and at other Columbus City Schools have been surfacing online regularly this school year.
“I stopped counting at 64 videos,” Miller said.
And that’s part of the reason Miller, a Far South Columbus Area commissioner-elect, and others gathered Tuesday night at the Scioto Southland Community Center. Many are tired of the violence, of the continuing posting on social media of student fights and other destructive behavior, and of school officials they say aren’t doing enough to put a stop to the bad behavior.
“Our children are not feeling heard, and they certainly aren’t feeling safe,” said Becky Walcott, a Far South Columbus Area commissioner. “We, as parents, are frustrated.”
About 50 people, many parents or grandparents of children who attend Columbus City Schools, spoke for more than an hour, recounting fights they’ve witnessed and frustrating conversations they’ve had with school administrators. Why, parents asked, are kids who are readily identifiable in fight videos not being expelled by the school district?
“What are you doing to protect our children?” said Lynnette Williams, whose granddaughter attends Independence High School in the Eastland Area. “What is (the Columbus City Schools) staff doing to protect our children? This is out of control.”
Chris Nicholson has worked security at Independence High on Refugee Road on the Southeast Side for about three years. His first year on the job, he said, there might have been five violent incidents.
This school year alone, he said, there have been more than 20.
“About three or four times a week, it seems,” Nicholson said. “Some of us (in security) have gotten hurt. All of us probably have nicks and bruises (from breaking up fights).”
And Nicholson said every moment he and other security guards, teachers and school staff spend clamping down on student fights and disturbances is another moment of lost learning.
In an emailed statement Tuesday evening to The Dispatch, Jacqueline Bryant, spokeswoman for Columbus City Schools, said the district is “committed to working with civic leaders and the community to address the issue of youth violence. We are not alone, as districts across the state and nationwide have also been grappling with this challenge.”
Bryant added that fighting in schools "requires local solutions, which is why these conversations are so critical. We also need to engage our young people to understand the root cause of the problem and develop solutions that are student-led. We look forward to working with our community and our students to understand and address these issues.”
Columbus police event summaries obtained by The Dispatch show that between Sept. 5 and Nov. 11 police were called to Marion-franklin High School a total of 26 times, including for a halfdozen reported disturbances, two fights, several incidents involving shots fired, a person alleged to have a firearm at 2:42 p.m. on Nov. 11, and several domestic disputes.
However, the records show that 12 of the 26 calls were made after 4 p.m., including two runs involving reported firearms that came into dispatchers after 8 p.m. — not during the normal school day.
At Buckeye Middle School on Parsons Avenue, there were close to 50 police calls between September and Tuesday morning, police records show. Only four of the 47 calls from the middle school since September have come after 4 p.m. There have been 19 calls in November, including a report of a fight outside the school on Nov. 9.
There was broad agreement Tuesday night — and occasional ovations —when attendees urged more parental involvement and accountability for kids’ actions.
Most people in attendance also raised their hands when asked if they thought the number of security guards in Columbus City Schools should be increased and if they thought Columbus police resources officers should be stationed in some schools.
Sheila Eubanks, chairwoman of the Marion Franklin Area Civic Association and an organizers of Tuesday night’s meeting, said a steering committee is being formed to further develop ideas to address student violence and other issues, with an eye toward building a coalition involving parents, community members, schools, Columbus City Council, the city’s parks and recreation department and others.
“We are going to brainstorm,” Miller said. “We’re going to ask the community for their ideas, then take them to the schools, take them back to Council President (Shannon) Hardin, take them back to Parks and Rec, and try to develop a different approach.”
One idea suggested was an extension of the type of after-school programming already in place at the Scioto Southland Community Center, where students receive help with homework and access to other activities.
“A lot of parents are working multiples jobs, just because of the way the economy is,” Miller said. “Let’s see if we can get them some help. … Child care, because of COVID, has been disrupted. A lot of things, because of COVID, have been disrupted.”
Dispatch reporters Bethany Bruner and Megan Henry contributed to this story. mkovac@dispatch.com @Ohiocapitalblog