Despite an outcry of complaints from the PAC Tribe, community, and their allies and no specific justification for the decision, the School Board voted 6-3 to close the School.

- Parents, community members, Tribal leaders, and allies gathered to protest against the final vote to close Pointe-Aux-Chênes Elementary, Terrebonne Parish School Board, April 13, 2021.

Will McGrew, CEO & Editor in Chief, Télé-Louisiane

The Terrebonne Parish School Board voted 6-3 to close the Pointe-Aux-Chênes Elementary School, a decades-only community school serving students predominantly from the Pointe-au-Chien Indian Tribe and other Cajun and Indian French speaking families in one of the five bayous of Terrebonne Parish. The School Board members did not provide any specific financial or numerical reasoning for their decision despite the outpouring of concern from community members, researchers, and state officials on the potential economic, cultural, and educational harms of the decision, which now makes Pointe-Aux-Chênes the only bayou in the parish without a school.

In public comments before the April 13 vote, community members argued that the closure decision is the most recent chapter in the School Board’s long history of neglect and discrimination in dealing with the Pointe-au-Chien Indian Tribe as well other Indian-French-speaking Tribes in the Parish, pointing out that Cajun French families have also faced denigration of their language and culture in the region. The Pointe-au-Chien and other Native Americans in the area were initially prohibited from attending Pointe-Aux-Chênes, and following integration, they were banned from speaking their native Indian French language. Chief Shirell Parfait-Dardar of the Grand Caillou/Dulac Band of Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw confirmed her community’s shared historical struggles as well as their support for access to Indian French immersion programs for all Native students in the parish.

- Community member Andy Metzger reads the LA State House Resolution urging the Terrebonne Parish School Board to save Pointe-Aux-Chênes, Terrebonne Parish School Board, April 13, 2021.

In recent years, the Pointe-Aux-Chênes school has been the site of ongoing efforts to keep the unique bayou community’s heritage alive. Parents and community members are heavily involved in focusing the educational and social experience of the school on the town’s unique Louisiana, Cajun, and Indian French culture and community, participating in the Indian Education Program and twice petitioning for the opening of a French immersion program at the school under the requirements of state law. The School Board failed to meet its legal requirements to open a program both times, providing no reason for this abdication of its duty.

While School Board members made general references to fiscal sustainability, community members and allies believe that the closure decision will actually engender a loss of both public funding and economic activity in the Pointe-aux-Chênes community and the broader parish. Indeed, Pointe-au-Chien Tribal Council Member Geneva LeBoeuf and other parents emphasized that a transition to immersion usually increases enrollment and thus funding and likewise comes with a package of additional funding from the State and international governments. These facts were confirmed by Peggy Feehan, the Executive Director of CODOFIL (the Council for the Development of French in Louisiana), who had received direction from Lieutenant Governor Billy Nungesser to work with the School Board to keep Pointe-aux-Chênes open and turn it into a French immersion school. Nungesser likewise sent a formal letter urging the School Board to reconsider its closure decision.

On a broader scale, former state Senator Reggie Dupree, born and raised in Pointe-aux-Chênes, explained that the federal and state governments have just begun investing millions of dollars to protect the bayous around Pointe-aux-Chênes, specifically including the community around the school, notably the Morganza-to-the-Gulf Hurricane Protection System which received its first funding in January. Pointe-aux-Chênes, resident and Pointe-aux-Chênes Elementary grandmother Sheri Neil noted on the other hand that the local recreation department and the State Department of Wildlife and Fisheries have also invested greatly to make the community more livable and attractive in recent years. Dupree argued that a decision to close the school and preemptively forsake the Pointe-Aux-Chênes residential community would endanger future efforts to gain desperately needed federal support to protect Terrebonne Parish’s many coastal communities.

- The final vote to close Pointe-Aux-Chênes Elementary School is recorded, Terrebonne Parish School Board, April 13, 2021.

Community members feel that in voting to close Pointe-Aux-Chênes without feeling the need to justify their decision, the School Board has essentially sanctioned the ongoing deterioration of the social and economic fabric of the Pointe-aux-Chênes community. As Neil argued—and as was confirmed by several scholarly experts who spoke in defense of the Tribe—a school is a key pillar in maintaining a safe, healthy, and vibrant small town community. While Ford and Dehart critiqued the hastiness of the decision, its devastating community impact, and the numerous possibilities for saving the School, School Board members LaGarde, Harding, Benoit, Solet, Hamner, and Trahan voted to support school closure, seemingly unconcerned wtih the dramatic implications of removing this cultural, educational, and economic pillar of the Pointe-Aux-Chênes community.

Before voting to close the school, Vice President MayBelle N. Trahan offered a few words in Louisiana French, her native language, without indicating whether the School Board had any imminent plans to prevent the language’s likely death by teaching it to the next generation. In a similar vein, Voisin asked that his colleagues seriously consider an immersion program now that the decision has been made to close the School. Such commitments have been offered to the Parish’s Indian, Cajun French, and Creole speaking residents numerous times over the years, but as in the past, no specifics were provided. Télé-Louisiane live-streamed the portion of the School Board Meeting agenda devoted to the Superintendent’s proposal to consolidate Pointe-Aux-Chênes with Montegut Elementary.

Just before the School Board vote, at the urging of Speaker Pro Tempore Tanner Magee, a representative from the area, the Louisiana State House had unanimously passed a resolution urging the School Board to save Pointe-Aux-Chênes—at the potential risk of losing COVID-19 relief funds. While this resolution was insufficient for convincing the School Board, the Tribe and community members stated they will exhaust their legislative, legal, and other remedies to ensure Pointe-Aux-Chênes Elementary’s building continues to be used by and for their community and secure access to Indian French immersion for their students.

Will McGrew, CEO, Télé-Louisiane with reporting from correspondent Sara Guillot