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Mountain View Whisman School District leaders are reaffirming their stance against cooperating with immigration enforcement officers, despite a mix-up in policy language that stoked fears that the district might have been lessening protections for students.
Proposed changes to the district’s policy governing interactions with immigration enforcement officers prompted public outcry last week, but district officials stressed that there was no intention of weakening existing protocols.
The school board ultimately voted 5-0 last week to approve an updated policy, with an amendment to adjust one piece of language that had sparked community concerns.
School boards routinely make updates to the language of their policies, often in keeping with guidance from the California School Boards Association. However, at a time when the Trump administration is attempting to carry out mass deportations, changing the policy on immigration enforcement drew particular scrutiny.
The agenda for a Thursday, April 24, meeting included a recommendation that the school board adopt a new version of its “Response to Immigration Enforcement” policy.
One of the proposed changes was to shift from saying that “teachers, school administrators, and other school staff shall receive training regarding immigration issues” to “the superintendent or designee may provide training to staff regarding immigration issues.”
The change from “shall” to “may” led some to worry that the school district was backing away from its efforts to protect immigrant students.
Superintendent Jeff Baier stressed at Thursday’s meeting that this was not the case and that the district’s procedures to protect students would not change.
Baier told the board that CSBA had recommended the new language with the goal of moving from passive phrasing about staff receiving training to active phrasing in which the superintendent provides the training.
When the district’s board policy committee reviewed the updated language, Baier said that they had overlooked the change from “shall” to “may.” He recommended that the board tweak the language to say that the superintendent “shall” train staff.
“It was not the intent of the policy committee to reduce any obligation to train our staff,” Baier said. With the “shall” adjustment made, the board unanimously approved the new policy.
Board member Lisa Henry, who serves on the policy committee, said that the changes overall were meant to align the district with the updated guidance from California Attorney General Rob Bonta. Charles DiFazio, who also serves on the policy committee, similarly said that the changes were meant to provide greater protections for families and that the district’s stance on immigration enforcement at schools hasn’t changed.
“The intent here is to strengthen, (to) make sure that every one of our students feels safe, and families feel safe,” DiFazio said.
One of the changes in the new policy removed language stating that district staff wouldn’t “provide assistance with immigration enforcement at district schools, except as may be required by state and federal law.”
Asked why this language was deleted, Baier told the Voice that it was based on CSBA’s recommendation, and added that he surmised the statement wasn’t needed because the district has an existing administrative regulation that spells out the specifics of how school staff should handle interactions with immigration enforcement officials. Administrative regulations often accompany board policies and lay out the details of how a policy will be implemented.
DiFazio added that the deletion from the board policy allowed the paragraph in question to focus on how the district handles student records. He and Henry both said that they would continue to review the policy and potentially bring it back for further consideration by the board.
Mountain View Whisman has previously made clear that, when possible, it intends to avoid cooperating with immigration authorities.
In February, the school board passed a resolution stating that the district will not allow immigration enforcement officers on campuses unless they have a signed judicial warrant or can demonstrate that exigent circumstances exist. The district also won’t share a student’s personal information for immigration enforcement purposes without a court order or judicial subpoena, and won’t collect information about students’ citizenship status, the resolution said.
The February resolution states that school staff “will assert the right to refuse collaboration with immigration-enforcement officers to the fullest extent allowed by law.”
Baier told the Voice last week that none of that would be changing.
“This does not increase the number of circumstances in which district staff will help with immigration enforcement,” Baier said in an email. “California law remains the same and we will and must comply.”
