More than two years have passed since the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission made findings that the Crestwood School District (CSD) discriminated against Arab Americans in hiring and recruitment.  

Last year, the CSD reached a settlement agreement with the civil rights division of the Department of Justice to improve educational services for students who are English Language Learners, establish a system for recruiting and hiring faculty and staff and ensure individuals who complain about discrimination do not face unlawful retaliation. 

Terms of the settlement agreement are still being carried out. The Arab American News  reached out to CSD Superintendent  Dr. Laurine VanValkenburg for comment numerous times about the changes taking place.  She has not replied.

VanValkenburg could show accountability and respond; instead, she continues to ignore this paper— despite the fact that more than 65 percent of the district’s student body is comprised of Arab Americans. 

Terms of the settlement are important to Arab students in the district and their families.  

VanValkenburg’s behavior is not surprising. When Arab parents attended Board of Education meetings in 2012 to voice concern about only one certified ELL teacher and a few para-pros serving 351 ELL students in the district, she and the board ignored them. 

VanValkenburg once told The Arab American News the district never denied ELL students services, that the state of Michigan had standard performance levels set in place for ELL students to meet and that the district was actually exceeding them. She and the Board of Education claimed at one point they didn’t have the funding available to hire more than one certified ELL teacher. To VanVulkenberg, having only one certified ELL teacher in the entire district was acceptable. 

Today, the district has more than one certified ELL teacher and hired more Arab American staff; but it is not because it decided to stop ignoring the concerns of  Arabs or because it cares about the quality of education ELL students receive. The district has no other choice than to comply with the federal government and terms in the settlement agreement.  

VanValkenburg can learn from the example of the Dearborn Public School District, which has been at the forefront of ELL education for years. 

That district’s new superintendent, Dr. Glenn Maleyko, recently said there is room for improvement. According to Maleyko, ELL students comprise 49 percent of students in the district and ELL-certified teachers account for 25 percent of the staff. To better serve the needs of those students, he wants to work with the union to increase the number of certified ELL teachers in the district to 49 percent. 

In an email that VanValkenburg chose to ignore, The Arab American News asked how many certified ELL teachers the district now has and whether more para-pros have been hired; whether the district is still working cooperatively with the U.S. attorney’s office and the Department of Justice to monitor its compliance with the agreement and for how long; if the district is posting information about jobs that are available through Arab American organizations and whether CSD staff ever received any cultural sensitivity training as a result of the agreement.  

Under the settlement agreement, the school district was supposed to work with the Department of Justice Community Relations Service to improve parental outreach and community engagement by establishing a community advisory panel and implement training on cultural competency. As a result, the Crestwood School District Advisory Board was created. Its members include Arab American community leaders and activists. 

VanValkenburg also ignored questions about the new group’s purpose and future initiatives. It is uncertain whether the district ever issued a statement on the findings, but this paper did take the initiative to ask her. 

Today, we ask Dr. VanValkenburg “don’t the Arab Americans who rallied in support of changes at board of education meetings, Arab students in the district and the Arab community as a whole deserve to know about the changes taking place and the discrimination findings made by the federal government?”

This newspaper and the community are still waiting for an answer to this question and those posed in the email. VanValkenburg ignored the Arab community’s concerns once. It is not surprising that she is doing it again. We know the findings are embarrassing and show poor leadership on her part, but she can’t keep sweeping this issue under the rug.