Some members of the Chicago Board of Education are calling for virtual learning options for students in the face of ongoing Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids in the city.
The members spoke at a board meeting just hours after a 17-year-old Benito Juarez High School student was detained on his way to school during an anti-ICE protest in Little Village, according to a letter sent to parents, obtained by Chicago ABC station WLS.
“We have received reports of federal law enforcement activity in a nearby neighborhood, and I am very sorry to share that a member of our school community was impacted,” the letter from Chicago Public Schools reads.
The student was later released without charges, according to WLS. The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment on the student’s arrest.
“I marked a junior student absent, not because that student was sick… it was because ICE had snatched him up on his way to school,” Benito Juarez Community Academy teacher Liz Winfield told WLS. “It’s a sense of unease. It’s a sense of anger and frustration. It’s a lot of students calling in, or parents calling in saying, ‘I don’t feel safe.'”
