The Atascadero Unified School District (AUSD) suspended its plans to discuss solutions for California Valley middle school students commuting 50-plus miles to school, thanks to a recent lawsuit filed by a Carrisa Plains Elementary School graduate.
“The district recommends the board consider pausing discussion regarding Carrisa Plains’ ACE program,” AUSD Superintendent Tom Bennett said during the Sept. 16 school board meeting. “As a result of uncertainty surrounding this litigation, it is prudent to pause next steps on a new program so that the court process may play out.”
During the school board’s Aug. 19 meeting, it approved looking at a pilot program that could offer students in sixth, seventh, and eighth grade the ability to access Atascadero Choices in Education (ACE) at Carrisa Plains Elementary School. Students participating in the independent study program would use ACE’s online curriculum and be able to complete schoolwork on campus with the support of Carrisa Plains teachers and staff.
Bennett asked the board to pull a study session on the issue from the Sept. 16 meeting agenda due to Gregory Nelson’s lawsuit against the district, which was filed on Aug. 26.
Nelson, who graduated from Carrisa Plains in 1988 and Atascadero High School in 1992, is requesting (among other things) an injunction that would force Atascadero Unified to reopen Carrisa Plains school to junior high students. In his 444-page petition, Nelson accuses the school board of violating the Brown Act and lists alleged issues dating back to 2008, when the district first discussed removing seventh and eighth grade from Carrisa Plains, calling the district’s “characterization of ‘community engagement’” “misleading.”
Carissa Plains now serves K-5 students, with rural students in sixth grade and up bused to Atascadero middle and high schools. Parents raised the issue at school board meetings in April and May, asking the district to hire a new teacher for Carrisa Plains who could support students until high school. In May, the district said there weren’t enough students to justify the expense of a new teacher.
Without an attorney, Nelson filed the lawsuit on his own. He told New Times that he wasn’t able to comment on the legal proceedings just yet.
The school district’s attorneys have asked the court to throw out several documents Nelson submitted as part of his case against the district, stating that they weren’t filed in accordance with the court’s legal standards.
Superintendent Bennett didn’t respond New Times questions before press time.
In a recent ruling denying Nelson’s request for a judicial determination that the school district board never took “lawful action” to reconfigure Carrisa Plains’ grade span and to bar the district from saying so in official records, communications, and litigation filings, SLO County Superior Court Judge Michael Kelley said that Nelson had “filed a plethora of confusing pleadings.”
“In light of the potential serious defects in petitioner’s claim on the merits, … the court is denying the request,” Kelley wrote.
The next hearing is scheduled for Dec. 16. ∆
This article appears in Oct 30 – Nov 9 2025.