I'd love to take advantage (call me what you will) of the situation to snag some resources from APS for use in building up the HHS parent, student, staff, and friend community.
(1) translation of the HHS and parent websites into Spanish and possibly Vietnamese, etc.;
(2) childcare and youth activities available for parent meetings;
(3) more portable or fixed signs that can be sited in enough places to catch more people with news of Highland activities (maybe even a classy sign on Central!);
(4) more publicity for parent/community meetings;
(5) student and school outreach - recruiting students to write for the Youth Express newspaper column and write other stories, engaging student volunteers with the Highland senior center, etc.; and
(6) a site at Highland and equipment, people, and programs for community engagement, with night/weekend classes, activities, events, talks, assistance, and support for HHS graduates, parents, and the community. (This may need some planning and will take more resources, but maybe it could start small.)
Also, the sad event of Ace's arrest has implications beyond Highland, with reports of inappropriate behavior from parents and perhaps coaches or staff at other APS schools. It could be timely for APS to send a notice to remind people that APS is one community, that malicious comments have no place in interscholastic activities, and to ask people to think about how they'd feel if comments such as those had been made about their school and their students.
Pat Byrnes