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OGDEN — Nine students were suspended this week from Highland Junior High School in Ogden while school district administrators investigate a scuffle between a student and a staff member.
Ninth-grade student Briana Jimenez saw the incident first hand. On Wednesday one of her classmates dropped a milk carton on the floor during lunch, and a school staff member told him to pick it up.
When the student refused to obey, Briana said, the staff member got angry. She said the staff member began "grabbing (the student) and stuff, and throwing him against the lockers and all that other stuff."
"That's not OK," Briana said Friday.
Ogden School District spokeswoman Donna Corby admits an altercation happened but said "who did what to whom" and who did it first is still being investigated.
"There are a lot of rumors out there," Corby said. "When we have all the information, then we'll have the truth."
Those eight other students were also suspended, Corby said, because they incited the altercation and didn't follow school discipline code to alert an adult right away.
But Brianna's mother, Tarra Jimenez, said those eight students were just sticking up for their friend when they felt he was being unfairly treated.
"I would like to see the staff trained to treat our kids better," Jimenez said. "I want to know my kids are safe when they're at school, and not with people that just don't want to deal with these kids."
Briana would like to see a change too. To show their support for the suspended students, she and several other classmates staged a protest Friday by stacking milk cartons on a lunch room table and recording video of it.
"It's inappropriate that they did that, and everybody is mad about it," Briana said. "So we're all getting together and trying to prove our point that they can't do that to students."
The Ogden Police Department is now involved and is conducting its own investigation, as is Child Protective Services. Ogden School District administrators say it's important to have more than just their own investigation.
Eight of the nine suspended students are expected back at school next week, but the return of the student involved in the altercation with the staff member is still being determined.
