BVA school director responds to criticism about underage drinking incident that involved daughter

Parents assembled at the Belle Vernon Area School Board meeting Monday to speak about an underage drinking incident that involved several high school students, including a board member’s daughter, earlier this month.
School board member Michelle Callaway-Rodriquez, the mother of one of eight BVA cheerleaders who were cited for underage drinking at the annual Relay for Life fundraiser at Charleroi Elementary School on May 3, faced sharp criticism when the public was allowed to make comments near the end of the meeting.
Several parents pointedly asked for Callaway-Rodriquez to resign, including Tricia Celaschi of Rostraver Township.
“The role of the school board is to ensure that the school districts are responsive to the values, the beliefs and the priorities of their community. With that being said, I would like to ask the question of how a certain board member can still remain on the board when she has active litigation against the district regarding our disciplinary policy,” said Celaschi, who turned to Callaway-Rodriquez and added, “I ask that you do the right thing and resign.”
The parents of the eight girls filed a lawsuit against the district after the board attempted to schedule an expulsion hearing. Westmoreland County Common Please Court Judge Harry Smail Jr. issued a preliminary injunction to prevent the expulsions from taking place. It is still unclear when the district will be able to present its case at an appeal hearing before the Commonwealth Court. In the meantime, the students have been permitted to return to school.
Although the students were not taking part in a school-sponsored activity when the drinking incident took place, they were participating in the Relay for Life event as part of a school project, said Superintendent Michele Dowell.
“We did not ask those students to do that at the time,” said Dowell. “They took it upon themselves.”
Solicitor Vic Kustra, who advised school board members to refrain from speaking about disciplinary action during the meeting, noted, “The purpose of that is not to withhold information from the public. The purpose of that is to protect the school board, the district and its ability to discipline students. As some of you may be aware, there is now ongoing litigation regarding that incident.”
Despite Kustra’s warning, Callaway-Rodriquez read from a prepared statement and said, “Generally speaking, board members are not tied to a decision of a staff or administration, and if a decision is wrong, the board should vote their conscience to correct.”
The board accepted the resignation of varsity cheerleading Head Coach Kari Horrell earlier in the meeting.
In other business, the board was asked by those in attendance why it has not yet released a preliminary budget for the 2019-20 school year.
School Board President Lou Rood said the board decided to hold off voting on the preliminary budget until it reconvenes for a special meeting at 7 p.m. Thursday. That meeting will be open to the public.
“With everything else that’s been going on, we felt it was best to postpone any action on the budget until we could concentrate on the budget alone,” said Rood. “Also, with three new board members, we wanted to explain how the budget process works. We are doing due diligence with this.”