For too long, I have watched as the district stands idly by as our schools suffer. If you have seen the meme with the dog in the burning house, saying “This is fine,” then you understand the district's position on getting involved. For years my friends and I have joked that the district is incompetent. What’s really funny, is that we were right from the start. As a student of Mesquite ISD, I am quite disgusted by the schools, the district, and Dr. Vroonland.

 As the Delta variant spreads, cases are on the rise, and our schools have seen little to no change. They have mandated masks, but mostly because they are legally required to. They have made it so that when we walk through the halls, we barely have six inches of space between each other, much less six feet. There has also been a dramatic increase in the number of fights this year. You could ask, “what is the district doing about it?” Look at you, asking questions, trying to be informed. They certainly weren’t going to inform you. And the answer? Nothing.

Just last week, they decided that the solution to the problem was to have all of the students enter into the cafeteria through one door. Because everyone knows that squeezing 500 students through a single door during a pandemic is going to make us less tempted to hit each other. And ask yourself, “Is it right that 100 students who act like middle schoolers are deciding the daily school life for 3,200 other students. Recently they have started forcing us to watch conflict resolution videos in advisory. And i’m going to challenge your expectations here, and concede that this would be a good move, IF, and i mean if, they had done it properly. The videos they show are in no way good representations of students, their conflicts, or reactions we would have. They are so cringe worthy that we make fun of them, and after watching one, I observed my classmates looking up the videos to leave comments trashing it. It just goes to show that they don’t understand us or our problems. 

Part of the problem is that we have old white people in office, making rules for a young and diverse crowd. And yes, I’m white, but I’m not in power. Because I’m not best suited for it. I digress. I am on KEOM, the Mesquite Schools Radio, and we had the task of interviewing Dr. Vroonland. We gathered students from all over MISD to talk about our collective problems and concerns. Dr. Vroonland decided that, instead of speaking to student issues and rights, he would talk about the budget, and his “expert” management. He chose to be a politician, when he could have been a positive figure for positive change. 

The district doesn’t care about its students enough to acknowledge their problems, or their needs. I propose a meeting between a select few students from around the district, and the district leaders, and Dr. Vroonland. We will discuss ways that students can be more involved with their district directly. This will help us have better communication channels, and have healthier and properly acknowledged student needs and rights.