Submitted by Denair High School:

There was a “fatal” car crash Tuesday morning on the Denair High track. Christian Obando was pronounced “dead” at the scene. Chloe Padgett and Scott Badal later “died” at local hospitals.

Valerie Sutton survived, but lost three friends.

Hunter Musgrave was led away in handcuffs, arrested on suspicion of drunken driving and vehicular manslaughter.

The graphically real-life scene – complete with Obando smashed through a windshield, actual emergency personnel using the Jaws of Life and even a helicopter — was part of the Every 15 Minutes program organized by the California Highway Patrol in conjunction with school districts.

It was a frightening, heart-breaking and, yes, sobering reminder to Denair’s students and others of the dangers of drinking and driving.

Shortly after 9:30 a.m. Tuesday, an alarm went off on campus. All students and staff were ordered to evacuate to the football bleachers.

There, they sat in stunned silence as emergency crews – sirens blaring and lights flashing – raced to the accident scene unveiled before them.

Some students quietly cried as paramedics and firefighters worked frantically to “save” Padgett and Badal. They held their breath as CPR was performed on the two teens before they were whisked away by regular and air ambulances.

They heard Sutton wail after Obando’s body was covered with a yellow tarp and, later, zipped into a body bad and loaded into the white coroner’s van. “You killed our friends,” she screamed at Musgrave.

They watched intently as Musgrave failed multiple sobriety tests.

They sat eerily still as a CHP officer read Obando’s obituary.

And Wednesday morning, they relived the whole horrible scene again during an assembly at which a victim of a real-life DUI incident talked about the impact it has had on his life.

The two-day event was timely, with the high school program this Saturday and graduation in a few more weeks.

The message, said Denair Superintendent Terry Metzger, is that “it only takes a minute to change your life.”

Submitted by Denair Unified School District:

Everyone who lives within the Denair Unified School District is invited to attend Open House on our campuses Thursday, May 2, 2019, from 4:30 to 7:30 p.m.

Open House is a chance to see all the great things happening at Denair High School, Denair Middle School, and Denair Elementary Charter Academy.

Teachers and administrators will be on hand to explain programs, show off the best of their students’ work and answer any questions.

You don’t have to be a parent to enjoy Open House — the whole community is invited! We look forward to seeing everyone on Thursday.

Denair Charter Academy hosted its annual Spring Family Night on Tuesday at the brand new outdoor Coyote Plaza.

About 60 home school and independent study students and their families attended. The students represented grade levels ranging from elementary through high school.

The participants enjoyed pizza and refreshments, made ceramic crafts, potted succulent plants, competed in a trivia contest organized by the PHAST (Protecting Health and Slamming Tobacco) Club and were able to get their faces painted.

Students in the American Sign Language class also performed several songs.

DCA Principal Breanne Aguiar was delighted with the turnout and believes the event helps “strengthen our connections and communication among members of our DCA community.” “Family Night promotes a sense of belonging, and reinforces the strong value we place on the relationships established with students and families,” she said.

Submitted by Denair Elementary Charter Academy

There is still time for parents to register their children in dual language immersion kindergarten, traditional kindergarten and transitional kindergarten at Denair Elementary Charter Academy for the 2019-20 school year.

Packets with complete registration information are available at the DECA office at 3773 Madera Ave., Denair. Anyone with questions should call (209) 632-8887.

Completed applications must include a copy of the child’s birth certificate, updated immunization records and proof of residency (such as a utility bill).

Incoming kindergartners must turn 5 by Sept. 1. Children who turn 5 between Sept. 2 and Dec. 2 are eligible for transitional kindergarten. All parents also are required to attend a mandatory orientation meeting if they are enrolling their children in the dual language immersion program.

Submitted by Denair Unified School District

Collin Kartchner didn’t set out to be an expert on cyberbullying. He was a full-time video producer who posted satirical sketches on Instagram, where he has a big following.

Collin Kartchner didn’t set out to be an expert on cyberbullying. He was a full-time video producer who posted satirical sketches on Instagram, where he has a big following.

But in 2016, the Utah man ran into an old friend. Her name was Roxanne. He asked about her daughter, Whitney, whom he had known when she was a child. Tragically, Roxanne said Whitney, at age 23, had committed suicide. Sadly, Kartchner learned, Whitney had become heavily involved in social media, which her mother blamed for her death.

“When she was 14 or 15, she was spending all her time social media and she was scrolling through these beautiful, curated photos of models and perfect people and she started feeling really bad about herself,” Kartchner told students at Denair High School on Tuesday. “And it led to depression, which then led to self-harming, which then led to addiction, which then led to her death.”

Kartchner felt he needed to do what he could to prevent similar tragedies.

“If we don’t stop this problem, it’s only going to get worse,” he said in one of his videos. “Adults can more easily understand that photos are manipulated or touched up, but kids don’t see that. They look at it and say, ‘Why is my life not like that?’ I shared that and I was flooded with hundreds of stories saying, ‘That was my daughter, that was my neighbor, that was my grandson. This same thing happened.’ ”

Kartchner decided to use his own social media platform – he has nearly 100,000 Instagram followers – to warn teens and their parents about the dangers of cyberbullying and social media addiction.

He created the hashtag #SaveTheKids to amplify his message. He produced videos aimed at teens and adults, and began to speak to audiences around the country. It is that campaign that brought him to Denair on Tuesday.

Everywhere he speaks, he asks teens to accept what he calls “the Collin Challenge:”

• Take a week off social media each month to “reset your brain”
• Get/give eight hugs a day for a minimum of 8 seconds
• Start sharing more authenticity and positivity. Show others it is OK to be real.
• Don’t participate in any kind of cyberbullying. Cut it off when you see it.
• Do something awesome and DON’T share it
• Fail at something and SHARE it proudly
• Unfollow every account on Instagram or Snapchat that doesn’t make you happy

“My challenge is for teens to connect in real life,” Kartchner said. “Put your phone down. Don’t let social media tell you what you are worth. You will never be happy if you are chasing numbers and followers. You don’t have to follow accounts just because others do. Don’t follow accounts that make you judge yourself or make you feel less or inadequate.”

He readily admits he’s not a counselor or a psychiatrist, but said experts he has talked with are convinced there is a link between social media use and an increase in the teen suicide rate. He equated the addiction to social media to cocaine and said it “ruins lives.”

“They say giving a smart phone with social media and untethered access to all these apps with no training and no guidance is like handing the keys to a car with no driver’s ed,” Kartchner said. “So how do we sit here in shock wondering why kids are crashing and burning every single day.”

He emphasizes to teens that what they read and see on social media often does not reflect reality.

“We want to change the narrative with social media and how it’s affecting us to make us feel like we’re not enough,” Kartchner said. “To be able say that you are enough, that you are perfect the way you are. That you don’t need to compare yourself to people who are putting perfect photos that have been staged with an entire team, with professional makeup artists. That’s not real. Let’s just be happy with who we are.”

One of his main messages is that parents and their children must reconnect.

“What are we doing spending all day scrolling through other people’s photos that we don’t know?” he asked. “Why are we spending eight hours looking for validation from strangers we’ve never met? Let’s put our phone down. Let’s spend time with our kids. Let’s go make memories. Let’s go enjoy life.”

Kartchner held a separate meeting just for parents Tuesday afternoon at Denair Middle School. And he spent lunch talking about social media with Denair Superintendent Terry Metzger, school administrators from Hilmar and Keyes, officials from Sierra Vista Children and Family Services and Legacy Health Endowment, and about two dozen other adults.

“My big takeaways,” said Metzger, “were that he stressed the need to help build empathy in students, how we can empower students to use social media to share positive messages and how can we help parents.

“He talked about the ‘trust dance’ between parents and children, and how taking phones away or giving them back as a punishment or reward doesn’t work. He emphasized there is no shaming or blaming of parents, but that we must be real about the world we live in and that kids need parents to help them navigate social media.”