Parents, students say civil rights investigation a long time coming for New Hanover High

Adam Ericson said his classroom at New Hanover High School was “sweltering” for the first month of school last year.

A month filled with hot September days, Ericson, who used to teach an exceptional students’ class at the high school, said it felt like it was 95 degrees in the room after the window air conditioning unit broke.

“It just makes it difficult to keep kids interested when there’s so many elements working against them to begin with,” he said.

Ericson said he wasn’t surprised to learn the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights had opened an investigation into the equities of facilities in the New Hanover school district. He had two children graduate from New Hanover, and was a lacrosse coach and teacher there for years, and he said it had become a running joke among staff and students that the school’s building was “just decrepit.”

The investigation was opened last month after a parent complained to the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) that the district was providing state of the art facilities to its predominantly white schools, while allegedly leaving with its majority Black and Hispanic high school with less than ideal conditions.

“I was just glad that someone is finally paying attention and doing something that our county leadership has not,” Ericson said.

Now, the OCR will work toward a decision on whether the school district violated students’ rights protected by Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, which addresses racial discrimination.

New Hanover High School’s student body is 44% white and 31% Black, according to US Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics data from the 2020-21 school year. The other three schools have student bodies that are at least 60% white and less than 20% Black.

While the reaction to the investigation has been mixed throughout the New Hanover County community, parents and students tell the StarNews it’s been a long time coming.

A 'decrepit' facility

Air conditioning wasn’t the only issue Ericson noted while working at New Hanover. He said his classroom was infested with ants and cockroaches, and often it would take weeks or months for maintenance requests to be completed.

“They (county leadership) have not been proactive in fixing the facilities and making them modern, modernized and has not been a priority. It's always the concern about money,” he said.

New Hanover High School sophomore Cleo Daschbach said she and her teammates on the cheerleading team were shocked walking into a bathroom at Hoggard High School during a basketball game last year.

“All of our jaws just literally went to the floor,” she said, “over a regular, clean bathroom.”

For Daschbach, the student bathrooms at New Hanover High School are the pieces of the facility that are in most need of renovation. She said many look like they haven’t been updated in decades, and there’s no way for custodians to keep every corner of the old facilities looking clean.

Daschbach said many bathrooms don’t have mirrors and stalls often don’t have locks. During her freshman year, one of the girls’ bathrooms was decorated with heavy-duty string lights, she described, because the entire light fixture blew out.

She also said while she’s never seen rats in the school, she’s heard stories from staff and students of rodents running through the cafeteria. She said some students have named the rats they see frequently in the school.

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Daschbach said she knew the school needed updates, but she never expected anyone to actually do anything about it. She said she and her classmates had accepted their school “just is how it is.”

“We are definitely the least privileged school,” she said. “It’s average in a lot of ways, but then there’s certain things where you’re like, ‘oh yeah, this is not the same.’”

With Brogden Hall under construction to replace its floor, Daschbach and the junior varsity cheer team nearly always practice in the courtyard outside the high school while other teams use the Princess Street gym. Her mother, Gina Daschbach, said it's common for the team to have practice canceled because of unsafe heat or rain.

Wildcat pride

For parents like Ericson and Gina Daschbach, it's frustrating that students have accepted their school as the “poor school” and refer to others, like Hoggard, as the “rich school.”

Gina Daschbach said while students act like it doesn’t bother them, she sees the reactions of amazement when they see the facilities available to students at other schools in the county.

“I think that’s when they kind of joke around and try to be extra tough about it,” she said.

Ericson said while he was coaching, he wanted to do what he could so his athletes continued feeling pride in their team and school. But that was difficult, he said, when other schools had brand new facilities while New Hanover’s were falling apart.

“You’re always trying to do the old adages, ‘coaches do more with less,’ but it got to a ridiculous level,” he said. “Trying to (get kids) feeling good about who they are and what they’re doing, when they know that the adults are not looking out for them.”

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But Cleo Daschbach said despite the state of the school, she wouldn’t want to go anywhere else. She said not only is there Wildcat Pride with the school’s successful athletics programs, but the community in the school is positive, friendly and supportive.

Cleo Daschbach said she chose to transfer into New Hanover instead of attending Laney, where she was districted to attend, and she hasn’t regretted her decision once.

“I would genuinely say that Hanover is a great school,” she said. “There’s a good community, good teachers, and a great support system.”

Contact reporter Sydney Hoover at shoover@gannett.com or on Twitter @sydneymhoover. Join the Education Issues in Southeastern North Carolina Facebook group to stay up-to-date on education news.

This article originally appeared on Wilmington StarNews: New Hanover parents, students: High school's facilities are 'decrepit'