When student dies, school district only lets investigators look into bullying on race or disability

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In a troubling report obtained by KUTV, investigators failed to find enough evidence that a 10-year-old Black girl was harassed because of her race and disability, and committed suicide after allegedly dealing with prolonged bullying at a majority-white Utah school. Although the child’s family attorney, Tyler Ayres, told Deseret News that Isabella “Izzy” Tichenor was bullied at Foxboro Elementary School in North Salt Lake for being Black and autistic, a team of three independent investigators hired by the school district alleged the attorney did not make the same allegation when emailing the school district’s general counsel. Ayres allegedly said in the email that the district was “deliberate[ly] indifferen[t] to reports of bullying made by Izzy and her family” but did not specify that the bullying was due to Izzy’s race or disability.

Isabella’s mother, Brittany Tichenor-Cox, told The Salt Lake Tribune after her daughter’s death last November that a teacher told Izzy’s class that some students smelled bad and that the girl’s classmates used the comment to threaten her and tell her that she stunk because of her skin. Still, the Davis School District was allowed to limit the scope of investigators’ work to bullying that happened only on the basis of the child’s race or disability. “The Team was not authorized to investigate Mrs. Tichenor-Cox’s allegations that Izzy may have been bullied on any ground that was not race or disability,” investigators wrote in their report.

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Investigators said they found no direct evidence supporting allegations that Izzy was “bullied on the basis of her race or disability … While many interview subjects reported that students and teachers made comments to Izzy about her hygiene, no witness recalled that she was expressly bullied for being Black or autistic,” investigators wrote. They also concluded there was “no direct evidence to support allegations” that Foxboro or district officials “knew and failed to respond to the alleged bullying on the basis of Izzy’s race or disability.”

“The only allegations the Team could find came from Mrs. Tichenor-Cox, who alleged after Izzy’s death that Izzy was bullied for being Black or autistic,” investigators wrote.

They did, however, note that “issues relating to race, disability, and poverty sometimes intersect and when they do, can further complicate already challenging situations.”

“It can be very difficult to extricate one from the others,” investigators wrote.

They reviewed more than 2,600 pages of documents, including Izzy’s educational assessments, Individualized Education Plan, and emails between Foxboro and the district. Investigators also interviewed 47 witnesses, not including Izzy’s mother, who investigators alleged declined through her attorney.

The Davis School District received the report of the investigation on March 29, yet waited until just before 5:30 PM the day before its spring break to release the findings and an attached statement to media, KUTV reported.

“Once again, the Davis School District expresses its sorrow and sincere, heartfelt condolences to the family of Izzy Tichenor,” District Spokesman Chris Williams said in the statement. “We thank the Independent Review Team for its work and its diligence. We are studying the report and reviewing its recommendations. We are taking it seriously.

“We vow to continue our ongoing and extensive efforts to foster a welcoming environment for all students in the Davis School District.”

There have long been reports from students of color and their parents of a toxic environment in the district. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) reviewed more than 200 incident files containing allegations of racial harassment and other discrimination, according to findings the DOJ released last September. “The Department’s investigation uncovered systemic failures in the District’s handling of complaints of racial student-on-student and staff-on-student harassment, discipline of Black students, and refusal to allow Black students to form student groups,” the DOJ wrote.

The agency reported that the district was “deliberately indifferent to known racial harassment,” including white students repeatedly calling Black students the N-word. “We learned of incidents in which white students referred to Black students as dirty, asked why they did not wash their skin, and commented that their skin looked like feces,” the DOJ reported. “White students also called Asian-American students pejorative slurs, such as ‘yellow’ and ‘squinty’ and told them to ‘Go back to China.’”

The report regarding Isabella’s experience is only the latest incident of reported racism at the school. Investigators recommended the district provide training to identify and address bullying, diversity and equity, and trauma-informed poverty as well as establishing “clear protocols” regarding record keeping. “As described above, Foxboro did not document Mrs. Tichenor-Cox’s complaints that Izzy was being bullied until after they were informed that Izzy had attempted suicide,” investigators wrote in the report. They also said the school failed to identify Isabella’s family as the complainant when her mother reported that another student had called Isabella’s sister the N-word on or around Oct. 25, 2021.

“The District did not learn who the complainants were until November 3, 2021 — the day Mrs. Tichenor-Cox told Foxboro that Izzy had attempted suicide,” investigators wrote in the report. “That same day, the District reviewed the Izzy’s Encore file, which, by that time, Foxboro updated to include Mrs. Tichenor-Cox’s complaints that Izzy’s sister had been bullied for her race.

“If the District had been alerted to Mrs. Tichenor-Cox’s concerns sooner, the District could have investigated the allegations and taken corrective action against the perpetrator earlier.”

Investigators concluded in the report that while the school cared about the Tichenor-Cox family and provided resources to assist with its housing instability, it ultimately failed to protect Isabella. “Mrs. Tichenor-Cox reported at least one incident that she believed constituted bullying to Foxboro,” investigators concluded. “Foxboro had an obligation and responsibility to Izzy to investigate Mrs. Tichenor-Cox’s report. Yet, Foxboro dismissed and failed to timely document her concern. As a result, Foxboro failed to conduct the investigation that Izzy was due and deserved.”

Darlene McDonald, an advocate with the Utah Black Roundtable and the Utah Educational Equity Coalition, told The Salt Lake Tribune she wishes investigators had gone further in their report after the only evidence of racial harassment cited was regarding Izzy’s sister. 

“As a community, as a state, as people of color, we must look at this and ask how we don’t keep going through this year after year after year,” she said.