Indignities that our children face.

[mbperrin]

17. You are absolutely correct, and the larger schools get, the more difficult it is to maintain a safe

environment. I teach at an urban high school of 3600 enrollment. The campus is spread over 8 city blocks in 4 buildings, the first built in 1938. 85% of our kids are on free or reduced lunch, and 80% are at risk for dropping out or failing. Those are official metrics.

We have 220 students who are 20-22 years of age. Texas allows non-graduated students to stay until the semester of their 22nd birthday. We have 360 more who are 18 or 19 years of age, which means they are repeating their senior year for the second or third time.

The school district has just gotten a bond issue passed to build more classrooms to increase our enrollment by sending 9th grade students here. That will take up to 5100 or so total enrollment. Faculty has been reduced from 229 to 189 from last year. One of our five assistant principal positions was eliminated as well. There are two uniformed officers on the entire campus.

I've been here teaching over the last three decades. I graduated from here as well. 3 years ago, a number of students asked to come during lunch for tutoring, which I certainly agreed to do. Turns out they really just wanted a safe place to be during lunch, and since then, I have close to 30 students who come daily to eat their lunch with me in my classroom.

Gangs and gang fights are common - nearly one every day so far this school year. All 36 exterior doors are being replaced with higher-security models that can't just be pried open at night at a cost of $137,000. We've had numerous break-ins, and the exterior windows on the cafeteria have been shot out 4 times so far this year.

And yet here we are, giving state-mandated tests 4 days this coming week, and final exams for the semester the week after, and wondering why our failure rate has doubled in the last five years. It's basic Maslow, and we're losing. Fewer faculty and staff and more kids are not the best mix.

I once thought that if someone got killed, that might shake things up, but a sophomore was stabbed to death 2 years ago, and nothing changed. It was like a giant, oh, well. Safety and order would be great here.