By Lynn SHER

The Glendale Unified School District (GUSD) had its monthly public board of education meeting on Sept. 12. After completing preliminary tasks, like introducing board members,  performing roll call and reciting the pledge of allegiance, presentations began with Dr. Narineh Khemichian, GUSD’s student wellness director. September is recognized as Suicide Prevention Month and Suicide Prevention Week is Sept. 10-16. Dr. Khemichian spoke of how suicide is a leading cause of death in the United States with an estimated 48,000 people dying by suicide in 2021. The National Alliance of Mental Illness estimates that 20% of high school students have had thoughts of suicide and 9% of high school students have attempted suicide. She shared that the GUSD Crisis Team Responders “completed 350 threat assessments last year and as a result 40 students were assessed at hospitals.”

Two more presentations followed. Attendance Awareness Month and Hispanic Heritage Month is from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15.

Despite the board’s focus on students and its efforts to provide the best environment and resources to nurture and foster each student’s individual growth, comments from the community addressing the board were drenched in politics and unhinged emotions. These were often focusing on LGBTQ+ topics, which were not the focus of the meeting.

One woman, who was quite shaken, said she was physically attacked by another woman at the previous GUSD board meeting. She said that woman was present in the boardroom. She pleaded with the board, asking the members to take more measures to protect people at the meetings so that they could be active in their students’ education and feel safe in doing so.

“Eleven years in Glendale Unified District and never in my life have I felt so stressed out to come up to speak here,” she finished. “So I hope there is something that the board can do.”

Until that point the crowd was respectful and no one spoke out of turn. However, that changed when the woman took her seat. The person who had allegedly assaulted her heckled the woman, calling her a liar and demanding to see a video of the alleged assault.

During the closed portion of the meeting, there was a detailed presentation on how GUSD is responding to the challenges it is receiving from concerned parents about the books that are reportedly in the District’s libraries and what GUSD is doing to vet new books. The presenter stated, “We are not banning books.” He added the District is implementing “a standardized districtwide process … to ensure uniformity and adherence to District policies and regulations” when it comes to vetting new books.

If parents are uncomfortable and don’t want their children exposed to the books in the school’s library, they have the option to “opt out,” which would mean their children wouldn’t be allowed to check out library books. These students would have their own table in the library with universally accepted books designated just for them.