HHS closes campus for lunch

School board votes to close campus for safety, accountability
After months of deliberation, the Healdsburg Unified School District Board of Trustees voted 5-0 in favor of closing the Healdsburg High School Campus during lunchtime. Student trustee Chiara Nicastro — whose vote is unofficial — was the only one against the decision.
The new rule to close the campus at lunch will not be implemented until the fall of 2014 but for the upcoming school year beginning in August, seniors will still have the privilege to leave campus at lunchtime.
“I appreciated how intentional the school board was throughout the process. Over a few months time, they met with several student and parent groups and just listened to their ideas and desires. In the end, there wasn’t a stakeholder group who had not been heard and the decision was thoughtfully made. While I understand students may not be happy about the change, we have to ensure student safety and closing the campus at lunch time helps us do that,” Healdsburg High School Principal Chris Vanden Heuvel said.
Currently juniors and seniors are allowed to leave campus during their lunch period but it was proposed several months ago to close the campus to all students following many other districts in the county.
“I think part of it (the decision to close the campus) was based on a lot of the parents that felt this way even though the kids felt differently but the overwhelming consensus we heard as a board from the parents was that they wanted to drop their kids off at school and know that they are safe and staying at school,” said HUSD Board President Vince Dougherty.
In November of last year, the conversation sparked a massive pushback by students who came to the fall board meetings to voice their dissatisfaction with the idea. Board members discussed the issue during open session and decided to further research the pros and cons before taking a vote.
Trustees Judy Velasquez and Donna del Rey were appointed to a sub-committee and spent time setting up meetings and talking to all the stakeholders including parents, students and staff before coming back to the board with a recommendation.
“We gathered input from many groups, parents, students, staff, administration, and yes most of the students wanted to keep it open, but parents, not all, wanted to close the campus for safety and accountability reasons,” said Trustee Donna del Rey, who noted that at first she was not convinced it should be closed until after her research when she realized that it was unsafe for students to be rushing off campus in the short amount of time.
“Why students are going out at lunch is to look for a nice place to be together and we need to create that on campus and that is what we are looking to do, to create a culture on campus that they will enjoy,” del Rey said.
One of the arguments students made against closing the campus was that the food served at the school cafeteria was not what they wanted, was unhealthy or that there wasn’t enough food or seating to serve the student body. Board members looked to administration for more information on the accusations and to offer solutions if they voted in favor of a closed campus.  
“One consistent theme that came out of through the process, was the need to improve our facilities and food choices. The district has already begun the process of addressing those issues and we are confident that very positive changes will be in place next year, when the closed campus policy takes effect,” Vanden Heuvel said.
Both board members and district officials said that they have started the conversation and outreach to better the food quality and eating areas.
“We need to have the ability to serve the student body so that’s why we are taking a year before things changes. We have gone out to solicit bids to hire a company to consult with us on our lunch program and to help with process,” Dougherty said.