PEARSALL, Texas – The Pearsall Independent School District is continuing to work to fully restore phone service to its junior high school.
The school district announced in a Facebook post on Thursday afternoon that Pearsall Junior High School was experiencing “severe issues and outages” with its telephone lines.
The post said that the phone provider, AT&T, believed the lines were beyond repair. The district also stated that Pearsall ISD was trying to find a workaround to deal with the problem.
As of Friday morning, at least some of the problems appear to have persisted, according to Assistant Superintendent Adam Martinez.
“It’s not that we’re not having anybody having access, it’s more it’s going to be limited until we can find a long-term solution,” Martinez said. “Right now, we’re only able to use two lines that we have available for parents or community members to call our junior high school.”
While Martinez said he hoped to have a solution as quickly as possible, it was unclear when all the problems would be fixed.
In the meantime, he said, members of the public who are having trouble getting through to the school could call Pearsall ISD’s central office for assistance.
“We need the phones here. In an emergency, we need it,” said one woman, who asked not to reveal her identity.
The woman said she has grandchildren who attend the school, but she was not aware of the district’s phone problems.
Upon learning of the trouble, the woman said that she is particularly worried, given that a new state law bans students from using cellphones in schools.
“That’s not right cause with everything that’s going on in this world. It’s crazy,” she said. “They need their phones.”
Several other parents spoke to KSAT 12 News off-camera and also expressed concerns.
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