After the Valentine’s Day fight at South, administrators are looking to move forward and create a better environment inside the school. Their first initiative was to organize classroom processing discussions the monday after the incident.

Principal Saddler started the process of recovery by meeting with a team that was formed at the district level. “Our team was looking to help improve the schools mental, physical, social, and emotional during this debriefing session.”

Saddler explained that one way the District Team decided to facilitate moving forward was by allowing students to discuss the incident in their homerooms. They provided two questions for students to openly discuss.

“Some students felt the questions were too broad and didn’t capture the true feelings that day, though in general the feedback we got was that we needed to find real long term solutions,” Saddler explained about the response to the classroom discussions. “It’s unfortunate that this is what it took to start really taking a look at South from the inside out.”

One solution proposed to keep advancing South was to offer cultural classes during the day. “We already have many diverse classes like Somali, Ojibwe, and African Art separate our school from many others,” Saddler said, “though offering cultural awareness classes could help us become more culturally aware and help the school climate.”

Besides this proposal, many students and community leaders have met with Administration following the event. “We learned that we really need to increase communication, we haven’t been communicating enough and that will change.” Saddler stated.

Saddler expressed her sympathies to the students, teachers, and families impacted by this event, but said she felt hopeful for the future. “Administration and students will come together, things won’t just be business as usual.”