What Happens When Your School Board Doesn’t Read Policy Before They Approve It?

by: ANDREA EGER World Staff Writer
3/18/2008

They say police are routinely called to the school — including last week when the school district’s director of alternative programs was assaulted by a student.

Superintendent Michael Zolkoski founded the Performance Training Program at Tulsa Academic Center in August, based on the example of boot camps in at least two of his former school districts.

The Tulsa Academic Center is located in the former Lindsey Elementary School facility at 2740 E. 41st St. North.

Zolkoski repeatedly has claimed at public events in February and early March that the Performance Training Program has been successful in having none of the 76 students who earned their way out of the program return.

“The program is working,” Zolkoski said at a Feb. 28 event. “I know it was an adjustment, . . . but it is working.”

Kenny Hawkins, a senior whose home school is Edison Preparatory, disagrees. Hawkins completed his first stint at the Performance Training Program in the fall and then was sent there a second time in February.

His second stint was cut short when a counselor called his father to tell him gang members at the school had threatened his child.

“They call it a ‘beat down,’ ” said Hawkins’ father, Kelly Hawkins. “Kids get up and walk out of their class and meet up and go into another class and beat someone up — in front of the teacher.

“This program was developed for dangerous kids, or kids who bring alcohol or drugs to school, but what’s happened is some good kids have been thrown in with a lot of really bad kids.”

Kenny Hawkins’ friend, Tyler Marshall, also left the Performance Training Program early because he had been threatened by a student with the gang tattoo “54.”

“They say you have to earn your way out of the program, but most of the kids don’t care if they get out of there or not,” Marshall said.

Both boys, who have grade point averages above 3.0, said physical fights among students are daily occurrences and that serious attacks on employees are frequent.

“One day in an algebra class, some students turned the lights out and started throwing stuff at the teacher, including a stapler. She ran out in the hall and called for help,” Hawkins said.

“It’s run by the kids. The teachers are afraid of being hurt,” Marshall interjected. “There’s no teaching. They give you a book and make you do work.”

Both boys said the “performance training” or physical exercise that Zolkoski promised is nonexistent.

“The drill instructors are supposed to lead P.T., but they don’t have enough staff to control all of the kids fighting, so we would just stand around,” Marshall said.

The students, as well as a current school employee, said Tulsa police are a routine sight there because of insufficient security.

Police confirmed that officers were called there at least twice last week.

On Thursday, a 15-year-old female student was arrested at the school. Alternative Programs Director Richard Palaz zo told officers the girl had punched him four to five times in the face after he took her to the office for fighting with another student.

On Friday, police were called about 11:40 a.m. to break up a fight among family members of two female students. Officer Jason Willingham said the girls had gotten into a fight in the school cafeteria and then phoned their families.

“The fight apparently carried over to family members. Eventually everybody was separated and two juveniles, who were not students, were given (municipal) citations for trespassing and assault and battery,” he said.

A teacher, who asked not to be named, described the environment at the school as “chaotic” and “insane.”

When teachers applied to work at the new school, they were told there would be about 160 students. Now, the teacher estimates that more than 400 students are on the rolls, with up to 25 new students being added each week.

The school opened with seven teachers, but three more have been added in recent months, the teacher said.

“Luckily, we only have about 35 percent attendance. The kids don’t want to show up. It’s an awful place,” the teacher said.

“Most parents like the idea that the schools can send a bunch of thugs to one place. It makes their school better,” the teacher said. “But when you put all the thugs in one place, they’re just going to fight. And it happens all the time, three to four fights a day, and these kids are brutal.

“The way they fight is unbelievable. They have no remorse. It’s like a jail,” the teacher said.

At a Performance Training Program faculty meeting in the fall, Principal Raushan Ashanti-Alexander told Zolkoski that the boot camp program he had been asked to duplicate had only 50 students in it, the teacher said.

“Zolkoski just sidestepped the question and said, ‘I don’t care if you have 800 kids in this program; you’re going to make it work,’ the teacher said. “He said, ‘This has got to work, It’s got to work. It’s my baby.’

“He told us if we quit, he would hold our (teaching) certificates for a year so we couldn’t teach anywhere else.”

Zolkoski also touts programs to teach students 16 critical social skills and an acceleration program to get them caught up in reading proficiency.

But the teacher said class sizes are too big and that student attendance from day to day is too low to make the Boys Town-model social-skills program successful.

“I think it’s a great program, and I think we could really do it if we had 15 students in a class, like we had at the previous alternative schools.”

As for the reading program, the teacher said, “We don’t have any program to bring their skills up.”

Reached by phone Monday, Zolkoski said he did not know how many teachers to hire for the program because he did not know how many students would come. “We knew in the spring we would have more than in the fall,” he said. “Whenever they’ve asked, we’ve added more staff.”

The program is expected to grow, he added, saying a portable classroom has been added at the Tulsa Academic Center campus.

“The program is working. Most of the students seem to be doing well when I go out there,” Zolkoski said.

He referred all questions about the school’s academic program and physical training to Palazzo, the director of alternative programs. But Palazzo referred all questions about the program to Zolkoski.

Meanwhile, the teacher and others on the faculty reportedly agreed to stay on another year at Ashanti-Alexander’s request.

Now that the principal has resigned, the teacher didn’t know how many faculty members would remain.