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- 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

“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.

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Yo-Yo Ma decided to play Edward Elgar’s Cello Concerto, a composition written in the aftermath of World War I. As the Colorado Symphony’s longest tenured member with 62 seasons under her belt, the performance after 9/11 is Hoeppner’s most powerful, moving memory as a part of the orchestra.

“Ma’s performance brought the audience and the orchestra a sense of solace and some comfort during that terribly di cult time. For me it was a sense that life will go on and that we will recover from this horrible tragedy,” said Hoeppner. “Because of the beauty of his performance, it gave us all hope. It gave me hope that we would survive and that this is something we would recover from.” 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.”

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.

Season Yo-Yo play same concert-goers Ma orado 5 Denver formances Symphony ebrating music season must-see Audra and, Ma. ter patrons teeming ming, revered son Season, will with 15-17. highlight Symphony,” doing will will are with History history its Orchestra, to fessional Denver, the Helen

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