It has been two weeks since Tiyan High School and Simon Sanchez High School students, teachers and staff were displaced by the closure of the Tiyan campus. For Simon Sanchez students, however, being without a permanent home is nothing new.
Simon Sanchez High School senior Alyssa Anderson recalled entering high school with assurances that a new campus would be completed by the time her class reached their senior year.
Won Pat previously decided to co-locate Simon Sanchez High School students at Tiyan High School in an effort to end double-session schedules at John F. Kennedy High School. Although officials had maintained schools were ready for the start of the academic year, the Tiyan campus was closed three days into School Year 2026-27 after concerns about health and safety conditions emerged.
Education officials said students from both schools have now been displaced for 10 days.
“Changing the environment is not changing the situation,” Anderson told board members.
Earlier in the meeting, Won Pat said she hopes to return students from both schools to in-person learning by Aug. 31. However, several options presented to the board were met with opposition from dozens of students, teachers and community members in attendance.
The options include:
Continuing asynchronous learning through online instruction and hard-copy packets.
Returning to double-session schedules, with Tiyan High School students attending classes at George Washington High School and Simon Sanchez High School students attending Okkodo High School.
Implementing staggered attendance schedules with the possibility of reassigning some attendance areas.
Redistricting students and dissolving the Tiyan and Simon Sanchez student populations into other high schools.
As Won Pat discussed the redistricting option, audience members voiced their opposition, making it clear they did not support efforts to dissolve either school's student population.
Students and teachers who testified emphasized the importance of preserving each school's identity, traditions and achievements.
While concerns about conditions at Tiyan High School became public in recent weeks, teachers said many of the issues had been raised months earlier.
“These concerns are not sudden, and they did not just appear,” Tiyan High School teacher Dylan Taitano said. “In October 2025, at a town hall, Ms. Hernandez told you Tiyan High has problems with Core Tech maintaining our school.”
Taitano questioned whether sufficient inspections and assessments were conducted before the decision to co-locate students. “Urgency cannot replace research,” he said.
“Your decisions should be proactive, not reactive," he continued. “Before moving students or creating a shared campus, you should have checked classroom capacity, restrooms, water, electricity and HVAC systems.”
Tiyan High School teachers Hernandez and Marleen Quintanilla also called for greater transparency from the department.
“Students, teachers and communities deserve transparency before decisions are made, not excuses after decisions are made,” Hernandez said.
“Transparency means giving the community accurate information before decisions are finalized.”
Hernandez noted that GDOE's strategic plan identifies collaborative leadership as its top strategic goal and calls for stakeholder engagement to support student success.
“The community should be treated as a partner, not as an audience receiving announcements after decisions have been made,” she said.
The teachers also called for a public review of the events leading to the current situation at Tiyan High School, including questions about why previously identified deficiencies were not addressed sooner.
Quintanilla said accountability requires examining what went wrong.
“If we do not examine what happened at Tiyan, how can we be confident that the same problems will not happen to another school?” Quintanilla said.
