In an effort to increase attendance at last week’s San Benito High School forum over possible campus expansion – and a $39 million bond measure to help pay for it – administrators offered to cut detention hours for students if their parents showed up to the meeting.
The San Benito High School District organized the community forum held Wednesday to discuss ideas for expansion to the current campus, which holds around 2,900 enrolled students. The district plans to move ahead on a $78 million expansion project as opposed to building a second campus. Half of the planned cost would come from a bond, and school officials held the forum last week with a stated goal of narrowing community priorities for the project.
Interim Superintendent Mike Robustelli confirmed that school officials offered to “release” students’ detention hours – through phone and email messages – if those students’ parents came to the forum. Like most schools, San Benito holds detention every weekday, after school and on Saturdays, while teachers also can hold it individually and sign off on the hours. School leaders as of Friday said they had not counted the number of students affected by the incentive related to the two-hour forum, which drew more than 100 people, Robustelli said.
District leaders are considering placement of a bond measure on next year’s ballot that would raise $30 per $100,000 of assessed home value – or a total of $39 million – to raise money for the infrastructure improvements. Robustelli insisted the meeting was not about a potential bond, although Trustee Ray Rodriguez, the district’s primary presenter, spent part of his time at the forum talking about a prospective bond and how the district might spend the money.
“The bond is the wrong term,” Robustelli said about the meeting’s theme. “It’s exploring facilities. We used the technique of releasing hours for critical information.”
He said the goal was “to get the parents there.”
“We feel it’s very important for the community to be part of this process,” he said. “It had nothing to do with the election.”
San Benito High School has offered to release or clear detention hours in the past. Robustelli pointed to a bullying meeting that involved the detention-release practice, while Principal Krystal Lomanto responded to questions in an email and said parents have expressed appreciation for her willingness to clear detention hours.
She did not respond to a question about the correlation between eliminating student punishment if those students’ parents attended the forum about school expansion.
“The most important issue at hand is the General Obligation Bond,” she wrote, “and the excitement of the evening as our parents and community members were able to talk about their ideas/priorities with board members.”
Robustelli said the district held a similar workshop for staff members and that officials are “pretty much done” with public input forums on the matter.
