Bobby Ardoin

Special to the Daily World

St. Landry Parish Schools Superintendent Patrick Jenkins said he's met privately with several people and board members who are concerned about administrative procedures at Beau Chene High.

A group called the Save Beau Chene movement say its complaints include administrative efforts to eliminate school fundraisers, ignoring parental and student requests to repair restrooms, the hiring of non-certified teachers and a growing lack of discipline, which they say resulted in several fights during the last school year.

Members say they favor replacing the current principal, Barbara Roberson.

The Save Beau Chene movement began after Richard Morales, the school’s athletic director and head football coach in 2018, announced that he was quitting the position and taking an assistant job at Central High in the Baton Rouge area.

Related:Beau Chene football coach, AD resigns

Morales, in a Daily World interview, said he decided to leave his position at Beau Chene after learning that he would for a second straight year, would not have an athletic physical education hour for his football team.

Roberson, Morales explained, decided to take away the athletic physical education class after promising in January that he and other coaches at the school would have the extra hour to coach their athletes.

About 45 people with the group gathered at Thursday's school board meeting. Several of them wore orange T-shirts that read "Save Beau Chene." Roberson, who was at the meeting while several Beau Chene students received academic awards, left when they arrived.

Ryan Dupre, one of several spokespeople for the group at Thursday's meeting, said a Facebook page detailing a list of complaints was created this week. On Friday, Boudreaux said the Facebook page has received more than 4,000 views.

Representatives from the group did not speak at Thursday’s meeting because the item concerning the school was not placed on the regular agenda.

Dupre said the Save Beau Chene group, which consists of parents, former students and school personnel, might eventually request permission to speak at a school board committee meeting or regular board meeting, if attempts to remove Roberson as principal are not addressed.

Dupre said in an interview that Roberson has created what he described as a “prison mentality” and stifled employee and student morale at Beau Chene. Dupre said Roberson has ordered the re-keying of all locks at the school, paid for an elaborate video monitoring system and has towed student vehicles.

Roberson, formerly the principal at Leonville Elementary, was appointed by Jenkins as the Beau Chene principal 14 months ago following the resignation of longtime principal Keith James.

Jenkins said he has been willing to hear the concerns of parents whose children attend Beau Chene.

“I am looking for input, and I have heard what the Beau Chene group has to say,” said Jenkins. “Right now, since this is a personnel issue, I have to speak about it in general terms. We are working on finding solutions for a number of the concerns and finding common ground to resolve them.”

Jenkins’ apparent willingness to listen to the complaints about conditions at Beau Chene were addressed at the end of Thursday’s meeting by board member Josh Boudreaux, whose election district includes the Leonville and Arnaudville areas.

Board approves hiring of resource officer

In a separate matter included as part of the meeting agenda, the board approved an Executive Committee recommendation to pay a school resource officer up to $40,000 this year for security and drug awareness mentoring at several Opelousas schools.

The resource officer hired for the Opelousas schools was not identified during discussion of the matter on Thursday.

Jenkins said whoever is chosen for the resource position will be a trained Opelousas police officer. The district, said Jenkins, will pay the officer’s salary, while the police department will pay for the insurance and other benefits associated with the hiring. In addition, Jenkins said the resource officer will have assistance from two other city police officers without school system cost.

The resource officers and the additional officers available will be responsible for monitoring the district’s alternative program for expelled and suspended students at Opelousas high schools and junior high schools, Jenkins said.

The city police department, Jenkins said, also will provide school board meeting security at no extra cost.