Fights were a regular feature of life at Tucson High over the first couple of months of the school year as students returned from the pandemic year away.
Every few days a couple of kids would square off, students would whip out their phones to take video, and school monitors would step in before long. The frequency was worrisome, but it didnโt disrupt the day for most students in the massive high school at North Euclid Avenue and East Sixth Street.
Then, sometime in October or November, things calmed down, and school settled into a routine without regular fights, students told me. That relative calm lasted until May 3.
The near-riot that erupted that day shocked many students, parents and staff members, in part because it involved dozens of students and a parent, but also because it shattered the calm. The violent videos that spread throughout the world, featured even on news sites such as the England-based Daily Mail, showed the school in a bad light that many parents and students say it doesnโt deserve.
Then, on Wednesday, a Tucson High counselor who resigned last week was arrested on a charge of sexual conduct with a minor. Tucson police announced the arrest Friday afternoon as I was writing this column. The hits just keep coming.
While many outsiders view Tucson High Magnet School as a rough school to be avoided, students and parents tend to think of it as a place with some problems that donโt overwhelm its good qualities.
In that sense, Tucson High is a lot like Tucson itself. It has a rough reputation that, truth be told, is based in reality, but that misses the good features of the place that keep us attached to it.
I speak from experience, as a parent of a Tucson High student, but Iโve been checking around for more than a week now and finding that my own experience is a lot like that of others. People appreciate the magnet programs in STEM and performing arts, the many career and technical education programs, such as automotive and graphic design, and the sheer variety of options that come with such a sprawling school.
โI feel like these negative, violent things get blasted out more than the good of the school,โ said Gisela Contreras, a senior who is vice president of the student body. โI still feel safe here, despite all the fights that happened. It was like a lapse of judgment in the school. Tucson High is a really good school.โ
Her classmate Zakaria Odr, also a class officer as treasurer, added: โThat was 100% an outlier.โ
Not all agree, of course. Three students and a teacher made statements at the Tucson Unified School District board meeting last week asking officials to do more to ensure safety at the school.
Fights were unusually violent
The way police and school officials tell it, two brothers had been in a fight with other students at Tucson High on Monday, May 2. Social media squabbling ensued after school, and when those brothers arrived at Tucson High the next day, school officials called their father to come pick them up.
When he was to leave with his sons, school officials asked him to go out a side door so as not to go out into the courtyard where hundreds of students were having lunch. The man went with his sons into the courtyard anyway, and quickly ended up in fisticuffs with the same students his children had fought with before.
Students whipped out their cameras, of course, and the fights that ensued were unusually violent. Students and the parent were hit in the head and struck while on the ground, and the father put his hands on a prone studentโs throat. Security officers sprayed pepper gel, and Tucson police flooded campus, some carrying long, threatening-looking less-lethal weapons.
The way Odr saw it, it looked like students who had unrelated conflicts took advantage of the moment to start fighting, which spread the violence.
In the aftermath, many parents and students complained about the use of pepper spray, which of course didnโt just affect the fighters.
Maria Luna told me her ninth grade son was at lunch with other baseball players, preparing to leave school for a game, when the fighting broke out. The crowd spilled toward them.
โEverything came their way. Thatโs how he got pepper-sprayed and trampled on,โ she said.
His iPhone and airpods got broken, he had a scraped elbow and knees, and she took him to an urgent care about the pepper spray in his eyes. He was prescribed eye drops.
โI love the school, I love the staff,โ she said. โI donโt blame the teachers. I blame the parents.โ
Endangering others
The parent most directly involved, Willie Smith, has taken the brunt of the blame in news reports. He was accused of a felony โ interference or disruption of an education institution. And in the complaint, police said that he engaged in the fight deliberately, that he said before going into the courtyard: โIf itโs going down, itโs going down here.โ
But while officials blamed Smithโs decision, his sister and many others argued that Smith was defending children who had been bullied. This version, spread by social media posts, alleged that one of Smithโs sons has special needs, the other son had been defending him, and Smith was defending them both.
The sister, Rosalina Martinez, told me Friday that she couldnโt speak about the situation anymore because of the court case, and she passed on questions to Smith. I did not hear back from him. Across social media, though, parents argued Smith did right by defending his children, even if it got physical. They used a familiar phrase for a hashtag: #FreeWillie.
As a Tucson High parent, I have to disagree. I can imagine a self-interested logic to his actions, but by going out into the courtyard against instructions and fighting, he involved the whole school in his beef, endangering everyone outside, sending the school into a lockdown, effectively ending learning for the day, and smearing the schoolโs reputation.
But itโs not only that: School officials say the social media story explaining his involvement is just a retroactive justification.
โThis has nothing to do with bullying,โ Superintendent Gabriel Trujillo said at a parent meeting. โI understand this gentleman needs a certain narrative to excuse his bad behavior and his poor decision making, but Iโm here to tell you itโs not true.โ
School is more than its flaws
I donโt want to excuse Smith or the school, the district or the students involved. Something is obviously wrong when the mere appearance of a man and his two kids at lunchtime can set off a series of fights.
I want to know why the other combatants were free to roam and confront Smith and his sons. In the new case, I wonder how school officials missed that a counselor was, according to authorities, living and having a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old. Overall, I question if itโs really smart to put 3,000 students in one high school in a district where most high schools are under-enrolled.
Iโm also shocked when I look at Tucson Highโs test scores and see that last year only 22% of students scored as proficient or highly proficient in English Language Arts.
So yes, something is wrong, especially so in school that day. But that also reflects something wrong in society, in the labor market and in Arizonaโs educational system. Teachers, increasingly disrespected along with their low pay, are quitting. Schools find it hard to hire and keep staff. And all this is happening when our society is emerging angry from the pandemic, with some adults modeling outrageous behavior.
Noah Sensibar, who is on Tucson Highโs site council, has ridden the waves at Tucson High School while sending three children to school there over nine different years, including one now.
โThere are an awful lot of kids who show up every day, go to class, get good grades, do their homework, pursue the variety of educational opportunities a school of that type offers and come away with an amazing educational experience,โ he said.
As to the brawl, he said, โItโs too bad thatโs what people see and focus on instead of the amazing arts, the amazing sciences and the amazing vo-tech stuff that Tucson high has.โ
Not everybody will like Tucson High, a sprawling school that has flashed its worst qualities the last couple of weeks. Thatโs OK. But the day after the brawl, I went to a great concert at the schoolโs beautiful auditorium, filled with parents and even alumni, and I still felt good about the place, despite its evident flaws.
