Nonprofit giving Nevada high school students a guide to adulting
It’s the final day of the legislative session. We will be keeping you posted on how things shake out, especially on the K-12 education front.
For now, here are some of the education bills that Gov. Joe Lombardo has already signed:
- SB161, which will speeds up teacher contract negotiations in the arbitration process and changes the definition of an illegal teacher strike
- SB444, which will require school districts adopt policies limiting students’ cellphone use in school
- AB48, which will allow a school board to transfer a perpetrator of bullying, cyberbullying or discrimination based on race to a different school at the request of the perpetrator’s parent(s) or guardian(s)
- SB445, which will establishes new parameters for archiving former students’ data
I want to hear from you! Send questions, comments or suggestions on what I should be covering to [email protected].
News briefs
Clark County schools providing summer meals — With the school year wrapped up, the Clark County School District is starting up its Summer Food Service Program to provide breakfast and lunch for students at select locations. The program funded by the Nevada Department of Agriculture feeds children during the summer when free and reduced-price school meals are typically unavailable. The free meals are available to children age 18 or younger. Adults with disabilities who also participate in a public or private nonprofit school program during the regular school year may also receive free meals.
The district said all meals must be consumed on-site because of the program’s regulations. The dates and times at each school site offering the meals vary. Find the list of schools and meal times here and menus here. Meals will not be offered during holiday observances on June 19 or July 4.
Students behind recent Reno High School vandalism being disciplined — Days after windows, TVs and trophy cases were smashed and obscenities including a swastika and a racial slur were spray painted the walls and floors of Reno High School, the Washoe County School District announced Thursday it has imposed disciplinary actions against the students involved.
The discipline includes suspension from classes for the remainder of the school year, which ends June 6, and a loss of privileges including the ability to participate in graduation. Because of federal privacy laws, the district could not share names or the number of students who had been disciplined.
On Thursday, the district also announced a new hate symbol was reported at Reno’s Billinghurst Middle School. Billinghurst Principal Kevin Arnold said in a statement that a student reported an antisemitic symbol being carved into the grass on school property. The symbol has been covered, but some students had already taken photos of it that are now circulating on social media. Superintendent Joe Ernst said in a statement the district is investigating and will apply the appropriate disciplinary action, including potential criminal violations.
School spotlight
Nonprofit providing graduating seniors with a cheat sheet for adulthood
Mike Kamer raised his voice and pounded against a desk loudly, acting out the role of an abusive partner during a dating violence simulation for a class of students at a Bonanza High School in late April.
Playing out in the school’s dim auditorium, the scenario is part of a section on domestic violence covered in the nonprofit Project REAL’s adulting 101 guide, “Government, Independence, & You.” It’s meant as a final life lesson for the students before they graduate and start their new adult lives after high school, with lessons on everything from how to get an apartment to how to apply for and use a credit card.
As the executive director of Project REAL (which stands for Relevant Education About Law), Kamer said he knows not all students will be interested in taking the program’s book with them, but he urges them to do so anyway.
“Our goal is to get this guide to every graduating senior in this state,” he said.
Kamer said Project REAL started as an effort to help prevent students from getting involved in serious crimes by engaging with them and educating them on the consequences of criminal behavior. It was founded 20 years ago by real estate developer Irwin Molasky and Sam Lionel, co-founder of a once prominent law firm, Lionel Sawyer & Collins, which included former Nevada Gov. Grant Sawyer.
In addition to the adulting guide, Project REAL takes students on field trips to courthouses and provides classroom resources on laws and democracy for educators teaching grades 3-12. They also present their relationship violence prevention section of the guide at schools throughout the academic year.
Kamer said it’s the only chapter of the guide covered during their school visits because it’s the section that they least expect students to read on their own.
According to data from a 2021 survey from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1 in 12 teens experienced physical dating violence and 1 in 10 experienced sexual dating violence. Female students experienced higher rates of physical and sexual dating violence than males; students who identified as gay, lesbian or bisexual experienced higher rates than their heterosexual counterparts.
Kamer added that some of the staff members who worked on the book experienced challenges themselves such as losing out on their security deposit, and their guidance on navigating through that is, in his opinion, more specific and better advice than anything they could find online. The guide is updated constantly with the latest laws.
“We’re not doing it for clicks, we’re not doing it for content, we’re not doing it for profit,” he said.
Kamer’s hope is to convince the students to take the book, even if they don’t read through it right away and it ends up shoved under a bed and forgotten about until they need some advice.
“I tell the kids, the people that wrote this all just want your lives to be easier to navigate and for you to have an easier time growing up than we did,” he said.
Have a student or staffer who we should feature in the next edition of School Spotlight? Share your nominations with me at [email protected].
Reading assignments
A 2017 law shifted more local control to Clark County School District schools, but two bills propose suspending or removing parts of the law altogether as part of broader school accountability efforts.
Extra credit
KNPR: Tribal Nations Sue U.S. Over Boarding School Funding
KNPR: Nevada’s trying to fix education—again. Will this time be different?
Reno Gazette-Journal: As legislative session winds down, WCSD waits to see how deep financial cuts may be
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Why can’t everyone get a summer break? Enjoy your down time teachers, and students (while you still can).
