School board responds to CB vandalism

On Aug. 2, around 7:30 pm, a vandalism incident occurred on the newly constructed sports field outside of the Crested Butte Community School. The school district worked with the town marshals to determine that two high school-aged boys were responsible, one a student at CBCS and another his friend from Durango. The boys used their feet to scuff the images of a swastika and a penis into the gravel base of the field, raising a number of concerns with the school district — from implications or delays to the completion of the field construction to how to appropriately discipline those involved, as well as how to prevent more incidents like this in the future.

“We were concerned that the impact would be significant, but it was more minor than we initially thought,” said Gunnison Watershed School District Superintendent Leslie Nichols “[The derogatory images] were raked over within an hour the next morning and the total damage was around $300, so luckily it did not end up slowing anything down.” 

Since the vandalism did not significantly set back the timeline of construction on the new field, sports activities and outdoor education programming at CBCS will commence as usual for the school year, without interference or delay. 

Though the effort and costs required to repair the physical damages to the field have been less than originally anticipated, the vandalism incident has sparked concern in the community and school board about how to address this type of issue. 

The use of the swastika prompted the school board to request that the district attorney’s office consider hate crime charges against the juveniles. However the district was informed that statutory requirements for the incident to qualify as a hate crime were not met due to the fact that the symbol was not directed at a specific person. Charges for criminal mischief and trespassing are still pending with the DA.

“We want people to know that the district took this very seriously,” said Nichols. “The student of ours had the consequence of a suspension, which was the maximum for non-violent behavior. There will also be a follow-up with a full educational piece that’s part of our restorative disciplinary system. We will be working in partnership with juvenile services on a restorative process regarding deep reflection and communication. We also plan on calling in members of the community who felt an impact from seeing a swastika on the field so that students can see how these actions affect people.”

The District has programs across all schools that focus on teaching children positive behaviors like kindness, empathy, perseverance, listening and respecting differences of all kinds. These programs include “Seek the Peak” at CBSS, Titan Traits at Crested Butte Elementary School, RIDE for the Brand at Gunnison High School, GMS Mustang Way at Gunnison Middle School, Mustang Way at Gunnison Elementary School and the Pyramid Model at Lake School.

“We will continue to work through and improve all of these important curricula,” said Nichols. 

“A lot [of the follow-up] depends on the outcomes of the conversations we have with the students as we learn more about [their] current understanding and motivations. It’s a complicated process. Hopefully we can collectively grow and heal from this experience.” 

For more, see Nichol’s guest commentary on page 6 in this week’s edition of the Times. 

(Gia Wright can be contacted at gia@gunnisontimes.com.)