DEARBORN HEIGHTS — Hamid Soueidan’s appointment onto the Crestwood School Board in August gave Arab American parents a new voice to rely on, after months of public outcry demanding that the district show some form of representation for Arab American students. But Soueidan’s relationship with Crestwood is nothing new, in fact, it traces back almost a decade to when he was class president at Crestwood High School for the class of 2004. Now Soueidan is hoping to extend his relationship with the district as he runs for an elected position onto the school board this November. 

Soueidan says he already has asked school board members some hard hitting questions, but he says it’s only because there are some questions that need to be answered.

Soueidan already had a busy career even before considering serving on the board. After he graduated from Crestwood, he received his Bachelors at Wayne State University in Speech Communications, before heading off to law school at Thomas Cooley Law in Lansing, where he graduated and recently took his bar exam.  Soueidan says it was public demand from parents that drew him to the school board in the first place. In a phone interview with The Arab American News, Soueidan says that the district needs to work on finding the proper resources to represent the entire student body as a whole. 

“When I had the opportunity to be appointed on the school board, I wasn’t sure at first. But then I realized the community was facing some tough issues that every kid deserves to have in a public educational system…from the right to receive a quality public education to the right to get proper nutrition. I felt so many people in the district, not just Arab Americans, were deprived from the old qualities of the educational experience,” Soueidan said.

Since working with the school board for the last few months, Soueidan has noticed many changes since his time as a student. He feels in many ways that the district has both progressed and fallen behind. During his days for example, both the student body as well as faculty and staff were well prepared and educated for a multi-cultural student body, especially in a post 9/11 era. But now according to Soueidan, somewhere over the past few years, that unity between the student body seems to have slowly faded.

“With regards to curriculum they are moving in the right direction, but recently attending the high school’s pep rally I noticed a huge difference that was a big shock to me. There was a big cultural divide with the student body. White kids and Arab kids were separated…it was never like that when I was there. There was always open dialogue, activities and educational seminars taking place. They handled the whole 9/11 era very well and I’m hoping there is room to continue to educate the student body to bring that environment back,” Soueidan added, 

Souiedan certainly isn’t the only one who might feel this way when it comes to how the district seems to be handling its diverse student body. For months now, Arab American parents at the district have flocked to board meetings, expressing their dismay at the school’s lack of resources towards programs such as ESL. After months of pressure, which also included an investigation from the U.S. Department of Justice, the school board had to finally address the issue. Now according to Souiedan, since his appointment, the proper resources have finally been allocated into the districts ESL program with the help of persistence from parents.

Soueidan says a major issue he wants to work on that he has brought to the district’s attention is wasteful spending. After reviewing the district’s budget plan, he noticed an air conditioning project that was estimated to have cost over $23,000. However according to Soueidan, he says from competitive bidding he was able to cut the cost down by half, so more funds could be allocated towards other projects within the district. 

While Soueidan has already had the opportunity to  serve the district for a short time during his appointment, he says he needs more time to address even bigger issues. One point of discussion he brought up was the poor conditions of some of the buildings in the district, in which he says have gotten old and out-dated because the school board isn’t taking advantage of collective bargaining and working on re-vamping the district as whole. He feels Crestwood High School in particular now looks out-dated compared to the other buildings in the district because of these practices. 

Nutrition is also another item on his agenda. Soueidan wants to work on the initiative of bringing Halal food back to the district, an option that was offered to students back when he was attending the school, but had to be cut due to budget concerns and lack of support from parents.  Soueidan says he hopes that Crestwood School Board candidate Zaineb Hussein is elected onto the school board because it could show that the Arab community in Dearborn Heights is persistent on having representation within the district.

“Even more important than me winning re-election is having Zaineb win the election. These people appointed me to the board, so it makes it a little difficult for me to speak out against them because they are expecting me to work with them. Even if I did get re-elected by the people, they might still feel that I was re-elected only because they gave me that opportunity.  But if Zaineb wins a position on the school board, it will show that when Arab Americans come together in this district, they can have a voice. More importantly it will show that this district does not care about race more-so than it cares about the issues,” Soueidan added.