Omaha Public Schools families call for more action by district following ICE raid

Monica Arroyo, one of 10 people who spoke about the topic at Monday night’s school board meeting, said her mother was deported when she was in second grade.

“That moment shattered my sense of safety and left me carrying a trauma that no child should have to bear,” she said. “It breaks my heart that so many years later, I have to see the children of my community face the same trauma themselves.”

Arroyo, president of Jackson Elementary’s parent-teacher organization, said a parent of a student at the school was detained after the raid at Glenn Valley Foods. On June 10, more than 70 people were taken into custody at the meatpacking plant. Court filings show the raid came after a federal audit found that most of the plant’s employees were suspected of working with either fraudulent or inadequate documentation.

Jackson Elementary is a dual-language school where all students spend half the day learning in English and half the day in Spanish. The school’s student population was 69% Hispanic as of the most recent school year.

OPS sent a letter after the raid to staff and families involved in Next Level Learning, the district’s summer school program. That letter from Lisa Utterback, chief officer of student and community services, provided information about a resolution passed in 2017 that lays out how the district handles immigration status information and contact with federal immigration officers.

The letter also said the district will continue to check in on students and families and directed families who need extra support to reach out to their schools, who would be able to connect them with community resources.

“We care so incredibly much about every student we serve,” Utterback said in the letter. “We are committed to fostering a welcoming and supportive environment for young people. We know and understand that community disruptions impact our families.”

In an interview Tuesday, Arroyo said she received no direct communication from Jackson Elementary, which two of her children attend, or the district, beyond that letter. She said she was also disappointed to not see the district issue a public statement.

“It makes me really upset and really angry, because had this been any other sort of traumatic event, I know OPS is well equipped to handle those,” she said. “So just them sitting back and being silent, it really said a lot. Silence says a lot.”

Superintendent Matt Ray started Monday’s meeting with comments about the district’s work behind the scenes to respond to the news of the raid.

“If my lack of public comment has caused concern, I hear that. That is not my intent,” he said.

Ray said the district worked with designated staff and community partners to provide a reminder of protocols, shared updates with families involved in summer school, and visited summer school and family sites.

Jane Erdenberger, OPS school board president, said she and Vice President Kimara Snipes were given regular updates from Ray as the situation was unfolding, describing the interactions he was having at summer school sites, meetings with political leaders and attempts to get names of people who were detained.

Arroyo and others who spoke at Monday’s meeting asked for OPS to take actions such as forming partnerships with organizations like the Center for Immigrant and Refugee Advancement, training teachers on how to respond to situations like a raid, creating a rapid response plan for such situations and clearly communicating the district’s support for immigrant communities.

Arroyo said she also would like to see OPS further evaluate the impact of immigration enforcement on students and families, as she knows parents have been detained by ICE at times other than last week’s raid.

Ray said OPS has been preparing for activity like an ICE raid since the school board passed the district’s immigration resolution in 2017.

Under the resolution, OPS will not turn over information on a student’s or family’s immigration status to federal authorities unless compelled by a court order or law or with permission from the family. If ICE requests entry to district property, the superintendent and general counsel will be notified and proper written authority for agents to enter district property will be requested, the resolution states.

The resolution states that the school district seeks to “assure all students and families that disruptions to the educational environment that Immigration and Customs Enforcement actions may create shall not be tolerated.”

District officials reiterated the resolution in January as fears about possible deportations rose following President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

School board member Viridiana Almanza spoke at Monday’s meeting about the potential for fear of ICE activity to lead to increased absences, drops in academic performance and disengagement from families and the community as a whole.

“This is not OK,” Almanza said. “I want to be very clear, nobody deserves to live in fear, especially not our children.”

Veronica Amaya, whose daughter is in first grade at Jackson Elementary, said during the meeting there were only three children in her daughter’s class when she went to pick her up from Next Level Learning last week. Arroyo said she had also noticed an attendance decline, especially the day after the raid, and had heard other schools were seeing similar patterns.

“Children and their families and communities need transparency, especially on issues like immigration,” Amaya said

Some speakers at Monday’s meeting said they understood why the district might be afraid to take a clear stance in support of immigrants, but Arroyo said that’s not an excuse.

“The idea that staying quiet might somehow protect our schools from being a target is no longer relevant,” she said. “The damage has been done.”