‘The Stuff of Nightmares’: Mayor Wu Speaks on Troubling Mission Hill School Allegations

Boston college officers are calling for an elementary and center college in Mission Hill to shut following allegations of sexual and bodily misconduct amongst college students.

Superintendent Brenda Cassellius advisable the everlasting closure of Mission Hill Okay-8 Faculty in Jamaica Plain on the finish of this tutorial yr.

Boston Public Faculties stated Wednesday {that a} report from legislation agency Hinckley Allen, which the district had commissioned, “outlined systematic and pervasive accounts of scholar on scholar sexual and bodily misconduct that started way back to 2014.”

Allegations of sexual and bodily misconduct between college students at Mission Hill Okay-8 Faculty have prompted Boston Public Faculties and Superintendent Brenda Cassellius to name for the varsity’s closure.

Throughout an look on GBH’s “Boston Public Radio” on Thursday, Mayor Michelle Wu known as the scenario “the stuff of nightmares.”

“Look, as a mother and somebody who will get up and will get my two children able to go to BPS day-after-day, that is the stuff of nightmares, of what dad and mom, households, caregivers fear about most, when it comes to sending your most treasured cargo off day-after-day and needing to belief and know that they’re going to have each useful resource and each assist, and naturally a baseline of security in school,” Wu stated. “It’s devastating. I’m simply appalled and simply deeply heartbroken for the households that needed to expertise this.”

She stated the investigation took longer than anticipated as a result of there was “an sudden outpouring of much more complaints and points” that unearthed issues that had been “lined up” for a while.

“It is an terrible resolution,” Wu stated of the advice to shut the varsity. “We all know that it’s deeply traumatic for any college neighborhood to seek out placements. We’re placing assets in place to verify younger individuals are related to high-quality open seats in that space.”

“Guaranteeing the protection, well being and wellbeing of all college students is crucial obligation a college district has,” Boston Public Faculties stated in its announcement. “Based mostly on the persistent sample of abuse confirmed on this unbiased report, the one viable possibility is to shut the varsity and assist college students of their transition to different colleges within the district. This motion signifies how critically the Superintendent takes this duty. BPS’ quick precedence is to work with every Mission Hill household to find out the place their youngster will proceed their training.”

The district stated 200 college students who attend the varsity will want new college assignments starting this fall, including that about 400 Okay-8 seats are anticipated to be obtainable at colleges inside a 1.5-mile radius of the Mission Hill Faculty.

In an Fairness Impression Assertion, the district stated Hinckley Allen’s investigation “paperwork hurt to kids and households over the previous decade,” including that “all makes an attempt at intervention haven’t garnered a suitable stage of progress.”

The legislation agency will proceed to research potential employees misconduct, “together with failure to report student-on-student incidents,” and what extra the district can do to maintain college students secure at all the district’s public colleges, the report stated.

See the complete report from Hinckley Allen under:

College students and employees arrived at Mission Hill Faculty on Thursday morning not sure of its future.

“I don’t suppose closing the varsity is an answer, in all probability the lecturers and the individuals who work right here, in all probability sit them down and work out what’s actually occurring,” stated Glory Acevedo, the mother or father of a Mission Hill scholar.

Acevedo stated she’s heard studies of bullying, which she introduced as much as lecturers. However she stated nothing was ever executed.

“I really feel like they do not actually care concerning the college students,” she stated.

Acevedo has a fifth grader on the college and a daughter who used to attend Mission Hill and each skilled bullying there.

“They need to have been taking motion a very long time in the past, as a result of my daughter used to return right here and she or he was truly jumped proper exterior the varsity,” she stated. “The varsity has plenty of points.”

The varsity district stated the employees members instantly associated to the allegations within the report are both not employed by the district or are on go away.

The Boston Faculty Committee is predicted to vote on closing the Mission Hill Faculty on the finish of the present college yr at its Might 6 assembly.