An elementary school in Columbia Heights has had three of its students and at least 25 parents detained by ICE.

COLUMBIA HEIGHTS, Minn. — Valley View Elementary School in Columbia Heights is in crisis. Its teachers and staff are more like front-line responders right now, as three of their students, a pre-schooler, a second grader, and a fifth grader, are now in immigration detention. At least 25 other families have had a parent detained, the school says, by immigration agents.

“It’s been chaotic for our whole staff,” said the principal of Valley View, Jason Kuhlman. 

The student population is 570, with more than half of them being Hispanic or Latino.

Before the first bell tolls to let the kids in, a principal checking the perimeter is a good way to set the scene for Minnesota in January of 2026.

MORE KARE 11 COVERAGE: ICE in Minnesota

“When I come to school in the morning, I take a lap around my block with my truck first to see who is there, sitting there. When we go to dismiss kids, we look up and down the block.”

And for this principal, it isn’t coming from paranoia; it’s coming from the reality of what his school community has gone through for the last nine days. It started with Liam Ramos, who was taken on Jan. 11 with his father. Both of them, their lawyer and this principal, say, were seeking asylum and had their papers.

“His cubby is still there, his seat is still there at the table where he sits, but he’s one of many,” Kuhlman said. 

In addition to the students of his now taken into custody, he has even more students going home to broken homes.

“Yesterday we had two students, mom was abducted outside of a courthouse that she reported for her monthly or weekly check-in because of her asylum status and she was taken right out of there,” Kuhlman said. 

“So now we have single-parent families trying to manage on a single income to stay here,” Kuhlman said. “To this date, 25 families… in this school alone.”

For those who are left but are afraid to bring their kids, about 60 families, there is food stacked in a hallway where kids typically roam. The staff and volunteers deliver every week and those deliveries also reveal loss.

Valley View Elementary School has three less students, at least 25 less parents, and a growing sense of dread, because they are seeing no reduction in force or let up in fear.

One ray of good? A deliveryman was at the school carrying a backpack. It was a Spider-Man backpack, like the one 5-year-old Liam was wearing when he was detained. It was a gift from a stranger to give to him, if and when he comes back.