Star Tribune
Meet the candidates for St. Cloud, Minnesota, school board
What are the top issues facing the school district? Improving student and staff safety while reducing classroom disruptions. The needed renovations at Apollo High School, including bringing career and technical spaces up to industry standards, improving science labs, installing a permanent safe and secure entrance, and adding a state-mandated storm shelter. We also need to do a better job of sharing the district’s countless success stories. The internet and social media have made it too easy for anonymous degradation from people with no investment in, or knowledge of, our school community. The work we do is critical to the future socioeconomic and employment needs of this community, and we need to find a better and louder way to communicate our incredible story.
What are your plans to address those issues? Create a focus group to look into stronger policies for safety and classroom disruptions. Ask the community to support a bond referendum to upgrade Apollo. And better share our story: Our district is home to an extraordinary group of experienced educators and unmatched programming. We offer exceptional talent development at the elementary level and the area’s largest selection of Advanced Placement courses. We integrate with four local colleges, provide three unique immersion programs and offer extensive career and technical education supported by local employers. As a regional center, we also provide phenomenal support to students with diverse needs, including a high number of special education students and English learners. Additionally, we face high levels of poverty, homelessness and student turnover, which often mask the incredible achievements we deliver.
City of residence: St. Cloud
Educational background: Bachelor’s degree in biotechnology; master’s degrees in plant breeding and genetics, and in interdisciplinary teacher preparation and leadership
Occupation: Associate professor of education at College of St. Benedict and St. John’s University
Nearly a dozen University of Minnesota students were arrested Monday night after trying to occupy Morrill Hall, which holds the Twin Cities campus’ administrative offices, to push the U to divest from companies with ties to Israel.
Several hundred pro-Palestine protestors gathered at the Minneapolis building as Students for a Democratic Society tied up patio furniture into giant barricades, covering the building’s large front windows.
The administration has “failed to divest from genocide,” said Ryan Mattson, a sophomore, adding that the U has also passed policies restricting their First Amendment rights to protest. “We will stay here until the university meets our demands or makes us leave.”
Shortly after, university police and Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office deputies entered and arrested protesters, citing property damage. At least 11 students were arrested.
It was the first time students have broken into and attempted to occupy the building after organizing encampments last school year to call on the U to divest from companies with ties to Israel.
Pro-Palestine protesters block Morrill Hall at the University of Minnesota on Monday. (Erin Adler)
The students said they chose Morrill Hall because of its history with student activism. In 1969, 70 Black students occupied the building in a peaceful 24-hour protest of institutional racism.
Before the arrests, students covered windows and staircases with mailers and green tarps. Students said they escorted administrators out of the building earlier so it didn’t appear any administrators were in the building when they blocked the entrances.
Complaints of antisemitism and Islamophobia have risen at the U and other college campuses since Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas launched a surprise attack on Israel that killed an estimated 1,200 people and resulted in hundreds being taken hostage. Israel responded by invading the Gaza Strip, where the Palestinian death toll has surpassed 40,000, according to statistics released by the United Nations.
The situation didn’t reach crisis levels, however, until the costs of the school’s 2022 expansion into Burnsville wiped out STEP’s financial reserves. Its fund balance, the most critical indicator of a charter school’s financial health, fell from $2.7 million in 2022 to $54,461 in 2023, state records show. This year, the school is operating at a deficit of nearly $800,000.
In response to Ibrahim’s allegations, IQS said in a statement that its repeated interventions were aimed at ensuring the school operates within state guidelines and lives up to the promises made in its contract with the nonprofit.
“It is unfortunate that Dr. Ibrahim has made unfounded claims of racial bias,” IQS Board Chair Steve Kelley said in a statement. “He is wrong. IQS and its leadership team have acted professionally and impartially.”
Star Tribune
40-year term for ‘unprovoked’ shooting that killed new high school grad at Brooklyn Park party
A Bayport man received a 40-year term Monday for shooting and killing a new high school graduate at a party in Brooklyn Park last year.
Daniel Martez Walker, 32, was sentenced in Hennepin County District Court after jurors convicted him last month of second-degree intentional murder and being a felon in possession of a gun in connection with the death of Reese Crenshaw, 19, of Roseville, on June 2, 2023.
“This was a callous act of unprovoked violence,” a post-sentencing statement from County Attorney Mary Moriarty read.
With credit for time in jail since his arrest, Walker is expected to serve nearly 26 years in prison and the balance on supervised release.
According to Minnesota court records, Walker has a lengthy criminal history that includes five convictions for burglary, and one each for robbery, weapons possession and disorderly conduct.
According to the charges:
Crenshaw was freestyle rapping at a card table with Walker and others. Walker stood up without provocation and shot Crenshaw with a handgun. Walker fled the scene, and two witnesses took Crenshaw to the hospital. Another witness said Crenshaw was “just sitting there, not even talking,” before he was shot, the charges read.
