SCHOOLS

attending Douglas County High School, also shared during an April school board meeting that she was called racial slurs regularly and was asked by a teacher to debate in favor of Jim Crow Laws during a class activity.

Superintendent Erin Kane made a statement at a May 23 meeting addressing the Ganzy family.

“Racism in any form is unacceptable at DCSD and a direct policy violation,” Kane said.

e complaint sheds further light on the racism the Ganzys experienced, as well as two other students of Castle Rock Middle School.

e complaint alleges all four students were frequently called the n-word and “cotton pickers.” e three middle school students also were compared to monkeys by their class- of the options were ideal, and we are committed to continuing our driver and assistant recruiting e orts over the course of this year,” Hans said in an email. mates numerous times. One student allegedly had a photo taken of them using the bathroom that was posted to the internet. e students’ reports were not shared with their parents and the schools did not communicate to the parents what was happening. e harassment reached a point where one student switched schools and two others moved to online classes. e complaint says only one student involved in the group chat was e Cherry Creek School District starts bus drivers at $23.18 per hour and assistants start at $17.74 per hour.

Hans said the district’s transportation team will email families in advance to notify them of which routes will be canceled. roughout the school year, each route will run for four weeks and then be o for one week.

Transportation sta ng is down 104 bus drivers and 32 transportation education assistants, who are responsible for monitoring special education students with moderate to severe needs and challenging or emotional di culties on school buses.

Hans said that even with rolling cancellations, some routes may still experience day-of cancellations.

“In the case where drivers or assistants are out, we will rst do our best to cover any vacant routes with internal sta prior to moving forward with a cancellation,” she said.

“Peers and teachers subjected Plainti s to abuse and harassment that was so severe, pervasive, and objectively o ensive that it deprived Plainti s of access to educational opportunities or bene ts provided by the School District,” the complaint says.

According to the o cial complaint, each student reported what they were experiencing to teachers or administrators, alleging district sta either didn’t respond at all or didn’t take the reports seriously.

Already, the district has consolidated 30% of its bus routes, increased the outsourcing of special education routes to third-party transportation providers and reduced daytime eld trips to keep sta available.

Hans added that families who paid for an annual bus pass will receive a partial refund to o set the cancellations.

Compared to surrounding districts, Douglas County’s transportation pay is one of the lowest in the metro area. Douglas County starts bus drivers with commercial driver’s licenses at $22.86 per hour and transportation assistants start at $17.62 per hour.

Lauren Snell, a spokesperson for Cherry Creek schools, said the district is working to ll 30 open bus driver positions and isn’t facing the same transportation challenges as disciplined and sta did not follow through on creating safety plans for the minority students to return to in-person learning. It also notes that the district hasn’t implemented antidiscrimination training for sta or students.

Citing the contention around the district’s equity policy and rhetoric used in the 2021 campaign, the complaint alleges Peterson, Winegar, Myers and Williams oppose educational equity for minority students and “foment hate,” which emboldened students to harass minorities.

“To this day, Majority Board Members employ rhetoric harmful to minority students, and DCSD has failed to implement antidiscrimination trainings,” the complaint says. “Black and biracial students and parents, and discussions about racism against historically marginalized communities, continue to be portrayed as a problem and dismissed, resulting in an environment ripe for racial harassment and abuse of students.” e school board will be voting on whether to put a $66 million mill levy override and $484 million bond on the 2023 ballot to pay more competitive salaries for sta and build new schools at the Aug. 8 meeting.

Douglas County.

However, Snell said hiring transportation sta isn’t particularly challenging.

“Right now, people want to come work for Cherry Creek,” she said.

Snell said no routes will be canceled this year and cancellations weren’t an issue last year either.

In an email to families, Kane said it’s hard for Douglas County to offer competitive pay because of limited district funding. Currently, the district is offering paid training and $1,000 sign-on bonuses for select positions to try entice employees.

“While this is a challenge a ecting school districts across the country, our funding situation makes the challenge more acute for our district,” she said.

In an interview with Colorado Community Media, Ganzy said the district’s response has been unacceptable and she hopes the complaint prompts them to take action, like de ning the di erence between bullying and a hate crime in district policies.

“I’m disappointed we couldn’t reach any sort of resolution before making it to the state that we’re in today,” she said. “I never received any kind of conversation with (Superintendent) Kane or anyone from the school district who said they would reach out.”

Ganzy’s family has since moved out of Castle Rock and switched school districts, but she said she wants to prevent what happened to her children from happening to others.

“I’m hoping that by getting at the one thing that makes Douglas County move at all, which is money, that maybe we’ll get some resolution for the kids behind my son, because they de nitely failed him,” she said.

Castle Rock