Last class at Forestville’s El Molino High School set to graduate

El Molino High School’s senior picnic Thursday had transformed the football field into a celebratory stage.

Near one end zone, a DJ booth and speakers blasted out music, a soundtrack for the 90 or so seniors playing games, talking and eating. Near the other end zone, two inflatable water slides offered a respite from the 80-degree heat.

Erik Dimond, 18, who was playing volleyball with friends around noon, had spent many an evening on that field, even before he was old enough to attend El Molino. He would head there as a kid with his family to watch the Lions play the Tigers of Analy High School in the annual Apple Game. Years later, he played outside linebacker and wide receiver for the football team.

But Dimond doesn’t expect to be able to return to his Forestville high school to watch gridiron games as an alumnus. El Molino is slated to consolidate with Analy High in Sebastopol by next fall. The consolidation is the school district board’s chosen remedy for a persistent, multimillion-dollar budget deficit after months of contentious discussion and even a special election failed to advance any fixes that district officials considered viable.

"It is sad,“ Dimond said. Coming back for future Apple Games, he said, ”was something I thought I would get. But now I realize that I won’t.“

El Molino’s class of 2021 had already persevered through multiple evacuations from wildfires and a historic flood before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic forced them out of their classrooms as juniors. While adjusting to distance- and then hybrid learning this year, the students have also witnessed and participated in their school district’s turbulent budget process, which culminated in the board’s decision in March to eliminate the school.

The 125 seniors who will walk at Thursday’s 6 p.m. graduation ceremony are poised to be the last graduating class from El Molino High, marking the end of a line of alumni stretching back to 1966. The school has been a fixture in Forestville since 1964, when it moved out of its first home, a few trailers on the Analy campus.

“All of us love being here. It’s like a family,” said Chaylee Tensfeldt. Graduating, she said, “feels really bittersweet” in light of the changes coming to the school in the next few months.

Years of challenges

Yasmin Sierra found herself breathing easier toward the end of her time as a student.

“It’s a relief to be over with,” she said. In years past, Sierra said, her classmates had to manage homework after evacuations from wildfire and flooding. She also struggled to stay motivated while taking classes from home.

“I can say, our experience has really helped us to be prepared for the real world,” Sierra said. “We’re ready.”

El Molino closed for a total of 19 days due to emergencies from 2017 through 2021, according to data provided by the Sonoma County Office of Education.

The 2017 firestorm forced five days of closure during the students’ freshman year. The following fire season, air quality issues from more distant wildfires prompted two days of closures.

In early 2019, flooding along the Russian River caused an estimated $155 million in damage in the region and displaced students and staff. The school was closed for three days.

Months later, El Molino families were among those affected by the Kincade fire, which displaced nearly 200,000 people in evacuation orders that stretched through west county to the coast. A week after returning to the classroom, a teacher strike began in the West Sonoma County Union School District. Though school was in session, it ran “on a skeleton crew” until the strike ended, said Principal Matt Dunkle.

“It’s an impressive group of young people to navigate four years of challenges, not to mention international issues that also affect us,” he said, listing the 2017 shooting at a Parkland, Florida high school as an example.

Through it all, the spirit of the small school has endured, Dunkle said, citing the role that staff and faculty’s relationships with students played in ensuring families had the support they needed to get through each crisis, Dunkle said.

“You know your students very well and there’s the level of comfort and confidence that you can have those types of conversations,” he said.

Seniors attested to feeling part of a tight-knit community as they reminisced about their own experiences during the last four years.

“This is our home,” said Kali Holdren, a senior. That’s why, she said, the decision to combine the high schools has affected her classmates deeply even as they prepare to graduate.

Disputed consolidation

Even now, some students still harbor a hope, one shared by others in the El Molino community, that the consolidation will not be completed. They stay up to date with the activities of Keep Our Lions Roaring, the group continuing to fight to preserve El Molino High for future generations.

Its efforts include an attempt to halt consolidation through an ongoing lawsuit, a proposed repeal on bond money passed by voters and a potential recall of board members who voted for consolidation.

District officials and community members for months explored other possibilities that could stave off consolidation for a year or more. In March, two ballot measures that would have provided bridge funding failed to garner the needed two-thirds majority from west county voters. Later that month, the school board voted to move forward with consolidation.

Superintendent Toni Beal created a “unity committee” around that time to offer a way for students, staff and parents to become involved with shaping the new combined campus’ culture and identity. A student-composed rebranding committee began working on a new name, mascot and colors to recommend to the school board.

About two months later, however, momentum to rebrand the consolidated Sebastopol campus ground to a halt. In early May, the West Sonoma County Union School District board unanimously decided to halt plans to choose a new permanent name and other branding efforts.

Board members said the district needed instead to prepare for potential costs in the coming months. For one example, the district will have to defend itself against the lawsuit brought by constituents. It could face costs upwards of $100,000 to pay for a special election if the recall efforts qualify for the ballot. The district is also preparing to transition next year from an at-large trustee model to a by-district board election process, which most recently was estimated to cost the school district $60,000.

"If we give money one place, we all know we have to take it from someplace else,“ said Kellie Noe, board president, during the May 5 meeting when the board voted to pause rebranding. ”We’re getting to the point where we’re having to make really awful decisions to keep our district afloat.“

Brooklynn Hayes, an El Molino senior, had been among the students on the district’s rebranding committee. The group had met several times before the school board halted progress.

“Rebranding was for us to come together and for us to finally come to peace with the fact that this is all happening,” she said. “Now it’s being taken away.”

On May 12, the board voted to move forward with a placeholder name until it decides to resume the permanent rebranding process. At the suggestion of the rebranding committee, the Sebastopol campus is set to be called West County High School next year.

The district will purchase new sports uniforms with that name, but the Analy campus will likely remain unchanged.

It’s unclear whether the board will take up any other rebranding efforts before the start of the next school year.

“I hope that they follow through with that commitment that they made,” Hayes said.

Call for student engagement

Jeanne Broome, who served as El Molino’s student representative to the school board throughout the 2021-2021 school year, said the decision to halt rebranding was “really disappointing.”

As a student representative, Broome had an unusually public role among her peers during the process leading up to and implementing consolidation. She spoke up in nearly every meeting on behalf of the broad swath of remote communities that attend El Molino, urging board members to consider any alternative that could delay consolidation by a year or more.

By the end of the year, Broome said other students have expressed to her a growing interest in the processes that shape their experience in the classroom. Several have asked her about how they can become a student representative for their school next year.

“I’m glad I’ve been able to encourage some kids to get involved on that level,” she said.

Broome’s experience also gave her a sense of career direction: she wants to work in education policy to try to solve problems passed to school districts by.

“It’s really shaped how I see myself going forward,” Broome said. “Being able to see a really raw, unfiltered view of how public schools are struggling. I want to try to improve student resources and uplift more student voices.”

As the class of 2021 prepares to step into the role of alumni, school officials are still fine-tuning avenues to keep them connected with their school community even after consolidation is complete, Dunkle said. El Molino’s legacy, he said, is far from threatened.

“We may not have a physical campus in the future but that doesn’t mean that El Molino doesn’t still exist,” he said. “We’re not going anywhere. We’ll always be El Molino.”

You can reach Staff Writer Kaylee Tornay at 707-521-5250 or kaylee.tornay@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @ka_tornay.