Parents at San Benito Elementary School are calling for action following months of alleged safety concerns that they say stem from insufficient staffing and behavioral support for a student with significant needs.
“Many of us have been deeply concerned about the ongoing safety issues at San Benito, especially with repeated physical and verbal incidents involving the same student,” parent Katrina Bolduc wrote in a Dec. 4 post on the Everything Atascadero Facebook page. “Several children have been hurt, many have witnessed these incidents, and even staff have been impacted.”
The post received more than 340 comments. Bolduc organized a one-day school absence on Dec. 5 in protest and later spoke publicly alongside other parents at the Dec. 16 Atascadero Unified School District (AUSD) board meeting.
“No child—disabled or not—should ever be placed in a position where their needs are unmet,” Bolduc said in a subsequent post. “And no child—yours or mine—should be in an unsafe environment because systems and adults have failed them.”
At the board meeting, Bolduc told trustees her child had been physically assaulted three times on campus.
“These are not rumors or exaggerations. It’s lived experience,” she told administrators. “Children are witnessing assaults, experiencing major dysregulation in their classrooms, and in some cases being told to ignore what is happening so that learning can continue.”
“This is not a failure of children. This is not a failure of families. It’s a system failure,” she added.
Several other parents echoed similar concerns. Jen Pence-Murphy, a parent and teacher in the district, said her 6-year-old son had been physically harmed multiple times this school year.
“He’s been punched in the face, … thrown down off the play structure, … and hit in the head so hard he had a headache for the rest of the day,” she said. “At a minimum, school is supposed to be a safe place, but that is not the case at San Benito Elementary.”
Another parent pointed to staffing shortages and lack of training.
“We are only as strong as our weakest link, she said. “It is not fair to expect our already over-worked teachers to pick up the slack.”
In response, administrators acknowledged the concerns and thanked the parents for showing up.
“We recognize the needs and the issues that we need to be able to address,” Atascadero Unified Superintendent Tom Bennett said. “We hear you.”
San Benito Principal Kat Holmes sent emails in October and December to families outlining existing safety procedures, including staff training in nonviolent crisis intervention, on-campus behavioral support staff, and response protocols. The message also noted that student privacy laws limit what information can be shared.
A parent of the child at the center of many alleged incidents responded anonymously to the original Facebook post: “This is not an issue with a 6-year-old bully, but an underserved disabled child with autism whose plan has been out of compliance … for two school years now.”
The parent said inadequate staffing and support were to blame, adding, “The problem is not the child. The problem is a school district that scapegoats disabled children to avoid accountability.”
New Times reached out to the district and San Benito for additional comment but did not receive a response before publication. ∆
This article appears in 2025 Year in Review.