Hudson City School District on WAMC

I've heard this story on WAMC twice so far today, at noon and again at 2:00 p.m., but so far a link to it does not appear on the WAMC website. The piece begins with the announcement that a large crowd is expected at tonight's school board meeting to discuss the problems of bullying and fights in the school. It soon segues to Mayor Kamal Johnson stating his intention to talk with students, "grade level by grade level," to find out how they think the problem should be addressed. He remarks that the solutions adults come up with may not be the most effective. He says he plans to be present at tonight's meeting and identifies himself as "a parent, the mayor, and an alumni (sic)" of the Hudson City School District.  

If the recording of the story ever appears on the WAMC website, Gossips will provide the link.

Some of the work of finding out how students would solve the problems was already been done. Last December, a subcommittee of the Student Council created a survey that was distributed by email to students in Grades 9 to 12--high school students. They had one week to respond to the survey, and 214 of them did. That's a fairly strong response rate. (According to Public High School Review, there are 463 students in Grades 9 to 12.) The findings of the survey are not surprising: 64.3 percent of students responding indicated they felt uncomfortable or very uncomfortable in the bathrooms; 42 percent thought the hallway climate was negative or very negative; and only 21 percent thought the school climate was positive or really positive. Based on the survey, the subcommittee made these recommendations regarding solutions:

The visuals from the presentation about the survey made to the Board of Education on January 10, 2023, can be found here.