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Family seeks transparency from school following fight

Thomas O'Neil-White

A physical altercation last month at Tapestry Charter School has the parents one of the students involved questioning the school's disciplinary process.

“I don’t want to speak for my daughter because she isn’t here and I wouldn’t dare have her here in this situation because she’s already been through enough. But she started crying during that hearing and she said, ‘My father don’t even touch me like that.’ And for me as a mother, that was too much,” said Christina Clark-Conerly, the mother of a former Tapestry student involved in a physical altercation in March.

Clark-Conerly said the fight stemmed from a pattern of bullying towards her daughter. Both students were suspended for five days and the other student returned to school, but Clark-Conerly’s daughter had to go through an expulsion hearing.

Family Advocate Samuel Radford believes Tapestry’s conduct was mired in inconsistency.

“We believe they should go through with a full investigation and make a determination whether the hearing was legal. Even the recommendation for expulsion, whether that was appropriate,” Radford said, at a news conference Monday.

Radford said there needs to be a full review of the school’s disciplinary guidelines and whether those guidelines were followed in this case.

In a statement released Tuesday, Tapestry Charter School defended their procedures, calling the accusations against the school, "without merit."

Born in Louisville, Kentucky, Thomas moved to Western New York at the age of 14. A graduate of Buffalo State College, he majored in Communications Studies and was part of the sports staff for WBNY. When not following his beloved University of Kentucky Wildcats and Boston Red Sox, Thomas enjoys coaching youth basketball, reading Tolkien novels and seeing live music.