More than one hundred people came to meet with the Wójt and municipal officials. The parents did not want to watch a presentation about the school or listen to the Wójt’s assurances that the school was not under threat. They immediately brought out the heavy artillery and challenged every statement made by the officials. They spoke about the lack of funding for the school, the imprecise, or even manipulated, presentation of eighth-grade exam results, and criticised the lack of renovations at the facility for several years. They did not trust the Wójt’s assurance that he would not close the school over time.
– Let’s not fool ourselves – said Jan Puk, who was present at the meeting. – If there are no grades 4–8 in Dąbrowa, parents will not enrol new children at the school only to have them transferred to another school after three years of primary education. The decision to leave only grades 1–3 at the school is the first step towards closing it. The school has a good reputation. Closing it would be the greatest harm you could do to the children and this community – Jan Puk added.
Wójt Andrzej Dutkowski assured those present that he would not impose solutions by force.
– This meeting concerns lowering the school’s organisational level – argued Andrzej Dutkowski. – We are seeking your opinion. A decision concerning the school may be made only in February next year, after the opinion of the Education Superintendent, because the Superintendent has the decisive say. I know that the opinion of the Teachers’ Council is not favourable to my proposal, even though we guaranteed that no teacher currently working at the school would lose their job – Wójt Dutkowski added.
The director of the Municipal School Services Centre, Barbara Majecka, who discussed a presentation about the school in Dąbrowa in comparison with other schools, was frequently interrupted. People wanted to speak, not listen. The ranking of municipal schools and the reputation of the school in Kraśnik Dolny aroused strong emotions.
– One more question concerning behavioural problems – one of the women took the floor. – In Dąbrowa, we do not have problems with alcohol, drugs or cigarettes, whereas they do in Kraśnik, and we know this because we have friends there – the woman argued.
Director Majecka retorted that there had been no such reports from either teachers or parents.
Lucyna Krzyśko, the former village head of Krępnica, also spoke at the meeting. She had already defended the school in Dąbrowa against closure several times.
– I cannot understand you. What do you want from this school? – said Lucyna Krzyśko. – How many times will I have to defend this school? I stood up at council sessions so many times and said: hands off this school. I fought for this school when there were 45 children; now there are around one hundred. This school is everything to these children and parents right now. The children learn things at school and then pass them on at home and in the villages. The Wójt built community centres and has no idea what to do with them; they are closed. It is now a time of epidemic, but there was no epidemic before and nothing happened in those community centres either. Something was always happening at the school in Dąbrowa. The teachers prepared programmes with the children and invited grandparents and parents, but what has happened at the community centre? I said that the school would be closed over my dead body. Wójt, leave these parents and children in peace, just let us live, because I no longer want to defend this school. I want this school to remain and I want to be able to enjoy that – Lucyna Krzyśko appealed to the Wójt.
Those gathered in the hall applauded her speech. Below is a video featuring excerpts from the statements made by people at the meeting in Dąbrowa.