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News
THEORACLE
Administration dismisses cheer team coaches after field trip violation Boot Bullwinkle and Rachel Lew
Managing Editor and Reporter
Cheer team coaches Dan Callanta and Andy Logan are no longer district employees following an incident at the cheer team’s national competition sponsored by the United Spirit Association (USA) in Southern California held from Mar. 15 to Mar. 17. During the course of the weekend, Callanta and Logan found cheer team members violating the school’s zero-tolerance alcohol policy during a field trip for a competition. But according to cheer team members, the coaches did not follow proper protocol at that time. According to the Student Behavior Expectations form, which is required for all district field trips and is signed by students and chaperones, possession or use of alcohol should result in the immediate return home of the student, accompanied by a chaperone via public transportation.
According to Callanta, the cheer coaches did not report the incident immediately because they did not want the rest of the team to be impacted. “I’m very passionate about the program, and I didn’t feel like the fact that [some] cheerleaders were drinking should affect the rest of the program,” he said. “We spent a lot of money, time and effort, so I waited to contact [the administration] until the day after we got back.” The cheer team members were allowed to stay on their field trip, compete in the finals of their competition, and ended up placing third. According to one of the cheer team members, as initial punishment Callanta told them not to leave their rooms or go to Disneyland. Although the incident happened during the weekend, Assistant Principal Trinity Klein did not hear of the issue until Tuesday, Mar. 19. A week and a half after the initial incident, Klein held a meeting with all members of the cheer team. “The purpose of the meeting was to inform the team that we are in
the process of finding replacements for the coaches, and that the coaches were no longer district employees,” Klein said. Students who the administration determined had violated the policy were suspended for two school days. In addition, Dean of Students James Lubbe supervised the dance team members during their USA Nationals competition on Mar. 29 and Mar. 30 in Callanta’s and Logan’s place. According to a member of the dance team, Callanta had indicated his dismissal from the job in a Facebook post to the private cheer team group the night before the announcement was officially made by Klein. Some cheer team members feel the coaches’ dismissals were appropriate. “I think it was right for them to be dismissed, because they did just as much wrong as the other members of the cheer team,” an anonymous cheer team member said. “I’m glad that it wasn’t as one-sided and that both [students and coaches] were punished equally.”
Federal resolution requires Gunn to conduct anti-bullying lesson Aayush Dubey Reporter
Due to the recent Office for Civil Rights (OCR) finding, Gunn will be conducting a school-wide lesson on discrimination-based harassment before the end of the school year. The OCR, which is an agency of the United States Department of Education, found that a PAUSD middle school did not follow the correct procedures concerning the bullying of a disabled student. According to the settlement, all students have to be instructed on the impact of bullying and the procedures to follow when encountering a bullying situation. Gunn, along with other schools in the district, is mandated by the settlement agreement to educate all students about discriminationbased harassment, including its definition,
its effects and how to report such incidents. According to Principal Katya Villalobos, the bullying lesson plan, which should be finalized after spring break, will meet the OCR requirement because it will focus extensively on raising students’ awareness of bullying on campus through educating them on the topic. In addition, Villalobos said that the lesson should make students feel more welcome in the school and encourage them to treat each other fairly. “Because a person is different, it should not make them a target of any kind of harassment or bullying,” Villalobos said. Villalobos believes that the idea of accepting everybody at Gunn is mostly already in existence and that students are generally very accepting others in this school. “We as a school already engage in a variety of ways to make sure that students feel connected and
feel welcomed,” Villalobos said, referencing Not In Our Schools Week as a key example. However, Assistant Principal Trinity Klein feels that students should know and acknowledge when a student crosses the line between joking and actually bullying, whether it is a face-to-face interaction or cyberbullying. “It’s so easy to say nasty things, especially in the electronic environment,” Klein said. According to Villalobos, the lesson serves to remind and teach students more about how unacceptable and inappropriate bullying is, and tell them how to formally report a bullying incident. “Students know that this is not part of our culture and climate,” Villalobos said. “It makes sure that the community would know how to report [bullying] if they see something like that.” Another plan that was considered ear-
lier this semester to address the settlement was an anti-bullying assembly. According to Klein, the assembly was not because there was no time available to fit an additional assembly in the Gunn schedule. The Student Executive Council is generally in charge of an assembly’s content and it ultimately elected to keep the election assembly instead of replacing it with the anti-bullying assembly. “It felt like it needed to be a studentbased decision,” Klein said. Villalobos stated that the lesson plan will provide a better experience and education on bullying than the assembly because it would incorporate more direct contact between students and teachers, and allow for a level of safety about the conversations. According to Klein and the Gunn calendar, the lesson will be conducted for 25 minutes in early May.
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