Citing confidentiality laws, LeMonds said the district cannot say whether those involved in the fight have been suspended or kicked out. The district works with the families of the students involved to determine the consequences following the district’s behavioral education plan.
This plan states that students who commit “any physical assault resulting in a serious injury”, such as a broken bone or requiring hospitalization, may be expelled.
Madison school officials have resisted working with law enforcement at least twice this school year. In September, East High School’s vice principal and current acting principal, Mikki Smith, told the parents of a boy who had been molested in class by two of his classmates that the boy’s molesters were not going to not be criminally charged. LeMonds said Smith’s comment was taken out of context and she only meant that the attackers would not be charged as adults.
Just over a month later, the co-director of the district school safety office, Gina Aguglia, abruptly stopped cooperating with police who were asking her for help in identifying several youths reported with firearms near from East High School, including some who were in a stolen car later involved in a police chase, according to police reports.
This is the first all-in-person school year following the school board‘s decision in June 2020 to withdraw police officers, known as school resource officers, from the four main secondary schools. The move came in the wake of the murder of George Floyd and after years of protests at school board meetings and other advocacy by local far-left group Freedom Inc.
