Why Rochester students walked out of classes: 'We will be the voice for our schools'

Hundreds of students across the Rochester City School District protested the recent proposed layoffs of more than 200 district employees Monday.

World of Inquiry junior Maya Waller, one of two students who organized the protest at the school, was among more than 100 teens who walked from World of Inquiry at Scio and University to the district office on West Broad Street.

"We care about our teachers," she said while walking on Main Street Monday morning. "It's not right that their mismanagement of money is negatively impacting teachers, staff and students (who) weren't there to make the decision anyway."

Several teachers accompanied the chanting teens as they walked on sidewalks through downtown Monday morning.

"We are showing our district, we're showing our teachers that no matter what, we will be the voice for our schools," she said. "We're showing them what we want, and we know we're the most powerful voices our district has."

Waller said she was pleased to see so many students "making their voices heard."

More than 500 East High School students, roughly half the student body, also voiced their concerns about the proposed layoffs on Monday morning.

Some teens marched a double loop through neighborhoods near the school, located at East Main Street and Culver Road on Monday, as others gathered outside the school, which houses middle and high school students.

Madison Smith, a senior at East High who organized the school's protest with eighth-grader Sarah Adams, said when she saw teachers crying about the news in school last week, she knew it was time to take action to try to change district officials' minds about the proposed cuts.

"Stay away from the classrooms and cut from the higher-ups," she said. "Take cuts from somewhere else ... not our teachers (who) we need."

Smith said she hopes the students support will make a difference.

Adams said she didn't expect such a large turnout. "Fight for our teachers, because they fight for us," she said.

Waller said she and others at World of Inquiry plan to coordinate with students from other City School District schools, including East High and School of the Arts, before upcoming school board meetings regarding the proposed layoffs.

What they're protesting

Notices went out last week to 152 teachers and 218 district employees in all, effective Dec. 31. Of those, the union counted 112 teachers at district elementary schools. 

The layoffs are part of district efforts to address $30 million in overspending last year, and an equal or greater projected shortfall in the current year. Combined with the elimination of dozens of vacant positions, the district expects to save $10.4 million, and avoid $3.7 million in potential costs from new hires.

East High School Superintendent Shaun Nelms said at least eight East High teachers last week received letters of notifications that their jobs were in jeopardy. Many of the teachers are new to the building and are dedicated educators, he said. There were a lot of tears and frustration as they talked about what's next.

But, Nelms said, "until the school board votes on Dec. 19, none of the cuts are permanent." However, "at the end of the day, the budget deficit has to be addressed."

Nelms said he learned of Monday's protest through social media as well as the student organizers.

"I'm very proud of the students for taking charge," he said. "Hopefully the students have learned  valuable lesson about using their voice to make change, and that they have a democratic responsibility for advocating for themselves and others. And they are doing that."

Deb MacPherson, mother of an East High student and a teacher at the Leadership Academy for Young Men in Charlotte, said she was in awe of the student protesters.

"It takes children who are affected by trauma and who live in trauma and makes it all worse," she said. "Sometimes school is the only place for them — the only safe place, the only place they feel loved, and you have destroyed that. We're going to feel it for a very long time."

Iman Abid, director of the Genesee Valley chapter of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said Monday's protests were the direct result of the district's "decision that the jobs of teachers and education of our children are not of significant concern."

"Funding cuts should not target the very people who are the backbone of our public school system and ensure that students go on to have bright futures, especially not when the district sees fit to spend millions on police in schools," she said. "At a time when we should be investing in our education system, this decision takes us incredibly backward." 

VFREILE@Gannett.com

TYEE@Gannett.com

Includes reporting by staff writer Brian Sharp.

More:RCSD layoffs hit elementary teachers hardest; district to detail school-by-school impact this week