Student walkout raises questions

By Emily Richmond

Friday, March 3, 2006 | 7:45 a.m.

Students at Green Valley High School staged a peaceful walkout Thursday to protest what they claim is unfair treatment of minorities by the campus administration.

The protest was motivated in part by an incident earlier in the week in which a school police officer used pepper spray to break up a fight between minority students.

Green Valley Principal Jeff Horn was a central target of the criticism.

"Mr. Horn says his door's always open, but really, his door's always closed," said Marlee Sanchez, a freshman at Green Valley who took part in Thursday's demonstration. "They only care about the white kids, they don't care about no other color."

Several students said they participated in the walkout to show solidarity with their minority peers, rather than out of a sense of personal dissatisfaction with the school.

Sanchez said she believes the school police officer would not have used pepper spray had the student been white, a remark echoed by other protest participants.

Green Valley's minority students account for 32 percent of the enrollment, compared with the district average of nearly 60 percent.

Of Green Valley's 3,000 students, all but 300 arrive on foot or via their own transportation. The neighborhoods included in Green Valley's attendance zones range from million-dollar homes to subsidized apartments.

"They expect too much from us," said Lizeth Murillo, a ninth grader at Green Valley who took part in the walkout. "We don't have all the money in the world to buy what we need. They want money for our gym outfits, $20 for the computer class. It's messed up."

Horn said Thursday he was saddened by the perceptions held by some students.

"It hurts," Horn said. "I've been here since this school opened. It's important to a lot of us. I have never, ever turned away a kid who wanted to walk in my door."

Horn spent several hours after the protest talking with individuals who had participated and said he planned to continue doing so.

"Some of our students feel like they're disenfranchised, and we have to deal with that," Horn said.

The protest began at 10 a.m. when about 100 students streamed outside the school on Arroyo Grande Parkway at Warm Springs Road for the pre-arranged event.

Television camera crews, alerted ahead of time by participants, were on hand.

Within 15 minutes, most of the students had returned to their classes. Students who did not return will be written up for unexcused absences from the classes they missed, Horn said.

Students were not prevented from participating, school police spokesman Darnell Couthen said.

"Our primary goal was to prevent it (the protest)," Couthen said. "If we couldn't do that, the next job was to at least make sure it was peaceful."

The fight that precipitated the student walkout took place between two black students, Couthen said. After the school police officer had escorted the students, who had scuffled with each other in the past, to an administrator's office for mediation, a fight quickly broke out, he said.

It is unusual for school police to use pepper spray, Couthen said. The students' ethnicity played no part in the officer's decision, he said.

"The officer first attempted to verbally stop the fight and then tried to physically separate them," Couthen said. "The officer was physically struck. To ensure the combatants' safety as well as his own safety, the officer used the means necessary."

Some students contend they have noticed a pattern in which minority students are more quickly targeted for disciplinary action than their white peers.

"You can see a bunch of white kids walking around with bandanas hanging out of their pockets, and they (the school administrators) don't say anything," freshman Crissy Deschine said. "If it's a minority (student), they get in trouble right away."

Her mother, Laura Deschine, urged people - including her own daughter - not to jump to conclusions.

"You don't know all the facts, I don't know all the facts," Deschine said while picking her daughter up from school Thursday. "You can't make those kinds of statements without all the information. I don't approve of racism in any shape or form. But I'm going to be careful before I accuse someone of being racist."

Sophomore Chris McDonald disagreed with claims that minorities are subjected to stricter disciplinary measures than white students.

"They always say, 'It's because of my race,' " McDonald said. "And I say 'No, it's because you're fighting and acting like an idiot.' "

Emily Richmond can be reached at 259-8829 or at emily@lasvegassun.