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The Denver college board censured member John Youngquist Thursday after an unbiased investigation discovered he was seemingly “belittling, dismissive, and condescending” towards some Denver Public Colleges workers of shade, however that his conduct was not deliberate.
Earlier than censuring Youngquist in a 5-1 vote, a number of board members stated two issues could possibly be true on the similar time: that the longtime DPS educator and former principal of East Excessive Faculty had achieved good issues in his profession and that, as a board member, he handled some DPS workers poorly.
“Our college students, workers, and group are watching us,” board member Michelle Quattlebaum stated. “They should see that this board dares to confront bias, to study from it, and to develop by means of it.”
Board member Kimberlee Sia was the only real no vote however in any other case made no public assertion. Youngquist abstained. Quattlebaum voted for the censure together with board President Carrie Olson, Vice President Marlene De La Rosa, and members Xóchitl Gaytán and Scott Esserman.
Youngquist requested a number of technical questions earlier than the censure vote however didn’t make another feedback. Final month, he stated in a press release that the investigation was retaliatory and he intends “to take authorized motion on the acceptable time.”
In a press release launched after the vote, Youngquist stated there “is much more to this story than the general public has been made conscious of by means of the biased and restricted context of the investigation report.” He referred to as the investigation “a private {and professional} assault.”
A censure is a proper reprimand of a board member’s conduct. The board can’t take away certainly one of its members; solely voters can do this by means of a recall election. Youngquist was elected in 2023 to a four-year time period on the seven-member board.
Denver Superintendent Alex Marrero requested the board to censure Youngquist after elevating issues about Youngquist’s conduct earlier this yr.
The varsity board ordered an investigation into Youngquist’s conduct in Could and employed the Denver regulation agency Garnett Powell Maximon Barlow & Farbes to conduct it. A 29-page report, launched final month, says investigators discovered no proof of “overt racism.” Nevertheless, they concluded that Youngquist seemingly exhibited bias in interactions with some district leaders of shade.
The report notes that the 27 witnesses who had been interviewed had differing opinions about whether or not they had “skilled biased conduct from Mr. Youngquist.”
“We famous white workers members — even those that current on knowledge and points Mr. Youngquist has recognized as a precedence — largely didn’t really feel they obtained inappropriate or disrespectful pushback from Mr. Youngquist,” the report says. “In distinction, a number of workers members of shade … described feeling Mr. Youngquist handled them much less favorably than white workers members.”
Youngquist informed investigators that he feels it’s his accountability to ask powerful questions, the report says. Youngquist “described himself as fascinated about making certain transparency and fascinating critically at a stage that enables him as a board member to grasp what’s going on, query what outcomes imply, and never simply be ‘attentive to and led by the superintendent,’” it says.
The investigation was partly prompted by a letter that Marrero despatched to Olson in April, alleging that Youngquist “has constantly demonstrated a sample of hostility, coverage violations, racial insensitivity, and unethical conduct.”
Marrero wrote that Youngquist’s conduct “aligns with somebody who’s threatened by various management and equity-centered progress.” Marrero, who’s Afro-Latino, wrote that Youngquist, who’s white, has “an obsession” with eradicating him as superintendent.
Youngquist has stated that he doesn’t wish to be superintendent. He utilized as soon as, in 2021, however Marrero was employed as a substitute.
Youngquist stated in his assertion Thursday that Marrero’s curiosity has been “in damaging the robust and optimistic presence of my character, based mostly on 35 years of successfully serving the variety of youngsters” in Denver.
The board first mentioned the report’s findings at a public assembly final month. At that assembly, Youngquist stated that whereas he understands he has unconscious biases and might do higher, the accusations that he handled workers of shade poorly had been meant to wreck his credibility, partly as a result of he will likely be a witness in a minimum of one college safety-related lawsuit in opposition to Denver Public Colleges.
Youngquist stated he supplied to satisfy with two individuals who had been reportedly offended by his conduct, however he doesn’t know who else felt that approach as a result of the report doesn’t embrace names. For that cause, he stated, “a blanket stage of accountability is just not one thing that makes a substantial amount of sense to me.”
This text has been up to date to incorporate a press release from John Youngquist after the vote to censure him.
Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.
