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Page 10 The Skanner August 22, 2018 News By Sally Ho Associated Press hen San Beni- to, Texas, school leaders learned of an influx of children to a migrant shelter in their small town near the U.S.-Mexico border, they felt obliged to help. The superintendent reached out and agreed to send 19 bilingual teachers, mobile class- rooms and hundreds of computers to make the learning environment resemble one of his schools. While a government contractor bears respon- sibility for educating children at the highly guarded center, local of- W ficials say they stepped up partly because of a law that calls on school systems to educate any child, anywhere within their district. “This is not a political issue. This is not a racial issue. This is a moral ob- ligation, and actually our legal obligation,” said Mi- chael Vargas, who leads the board of the San Beni- to Consolidated Indepen- dent School District. San Benito is one of a small number of U.S. school systems that are preparing for the first day of school on both their public campuses and in new classrooms set up at nearby federal youth migrant shelters. In neighboring Browns- ville, Texas, the super- intendent is working on an agreement to deploy teachers and services to help educate 800 chil- dren housed in federal facilities in her district. The school systems pitched in amid an out- cry over the separation of children from their parents at the U.S.-Mex- ico border under the Trump administration’s zero-tolerance policy for illegal immigration. Sev- eral hundred children remain separated from their parents, but most of the thousands of young people held in federal shelters across the U.S. are unaccompanied mi- nors who arrived in the country without their families. The Associated Press Black Teenager Assaulted in Linn County After Criticizing Confederate Flag Police seek information about assault, which may qualify as a hate crime The Associated Press BROWNSVILLE, Ore. — Linn Coun- ty authorities say a Black teenager was assaulted at a country music fes- tival after he criticized a Confederate flag three men were waving. Sheriff Jim Yon said Monday that the men were driving through the camping area of the Willamette Coun- try Music Festival in Brownsville waving the flag from a newer-model black Ford truck when the 18-year-old victim spoke out. One of the men got out and hit the victim several times before fleeing. He has not been found. The victim was treated for non-life threatening injuries. Linn County Lt. Michelle Duncan says authorities are investigating whether the incident qualifies as a hate crime. The suspect had dark hair and was wearing jeans, a black muscle shirt with the sides cut, brown boots and a black cowboy hat. Those with in- formation are urged to call Sergeant Mike Harmon at (541) 967-3950. MIGUEL ROBERTS/THE BROWNSVILLE HERALD VIA AP, FILE US School Districts Weigh Duty to Youth Migrant Shelters In this June 18, 2018, file photo, dignitaries take a tour of Southwest Key Programs Casa Padre, a U.S. immigration facility in Brownsville, Texas, where children are detained. When school leaders in San Benito, Texas, learned of an influx of children to a migrant shelter in town, they felt obliged to help. The superintendent reached out and agreed to send 19 bilingual teachers and hundreds of computers to make the learning environment as similar as possible to one of his schools. inquired with public school districts in 61 cit- ies nationwide where shelters are known to ex- ist within their boundar- ies. Among the 50 that re- sponded, most said they had no contact with the shelter or federal pro- gram authorities. Some outside the border states, including Camden, New Jersey, said they only re- cently discovered the ex- istence of migrant shel- ters in their community. Many noted they would educate all children re- gardless of immigration status, as required by law, if their families or legal guardians sought enrollment on their cam- puses. “Until this becomes a real-time issue for us, we have no official position,” said Superintendent Dennis Blauser of the Oracle, Arizona, school district. In Texas, some districts already had longstand- ing agreements to run classrooms with public school teachers at mi- grant shelters. By law, the federal con- tractors that operate the shelters are required to have a “care provider” give children six hours a day of structured learn- ing time. Southwest Key, the largest contractor op- erating such facilities, has agreements with two school districts, in- cluding San Benito. It is also working to create partnerships with the Brownsville Indepen- dent School District and with a charter school network run separately by Southwest Key’s par- ent organization. Salvador Cavazos, Southwest Key’s vice president of educational services, said the non- profit shelter operator has for years offered great basic services but is now welcoming more help from outside school systems as an enhance- ment as the number of children in its care grows. He said Southwest Key gets appreciative feed- back from families after the average 30- to 45-day stay for each child, and most students leave with some level of academic gain. He said the children do “a lot of good work” studying through a proj- ect-based curriculum that is aligned with state standards. “They do history proj- ects. They do class pre- sentations. They do read- alouds with the books and novels that they’re reading,” said Cavazos, a former school teacher and administrator. The districts’ role is largely limited to their regular school year, though the shelters also provide supplemental curriculum during sum- mer months. Browns- ville Superintendent Esperanza Zendejas said she felt obligated to hon- or a 1982 Supreme Court ruling on children’s right to education. Read the rest of this story at TheSkanner.com