finaledition
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Post by finaledition on Sept 13, 2019 19:21:46 GMT
So I'm going to stick to the facts that have been shared from the principal and not throw in the gossip unless I state otherwise. And I should also add that my community in a suburb of the tech industry and would generally classify it as few people who own guns and/or know how to use them-not a high interest hobby here. On Sept. 4 ten minutes before the end of the school day, parents received an email that stated a student at the middle school (6,7,8) brought a bb gun to school. They were alerted and it was confiscated. Later that evening the principal sent a follow up email which stated, "It has come to our attention that the BB gun confiscated this morning had been discharged and inadvertently struck another student who did not require medical attention." Both emails feel very crafted to avoid any trigger words, likely run by a lawyer or two (yes, my opinion  ). Part 2: This is 1/2 rumor mill and 1/2 drawing some conclusions from another email. The child who alerted the principal has been bullied on his social media. "The students responsible for the social media posts have been identified with the help of our XXXX Police Department and our District Tech Services Team and will face appropriate consequences. " We also received a link to a video email of the statement the principal made to the students about how this will not be tolerated and we need to support one another. I will update with what our district did about the first and second kid, but wanted to hear from others beforehand. _____________________ ETA: I did not speak with any parents at the school until 1 week after the event and it was only then did I realize this is turning into quite a shit storm. Sometimes it's kind of nice to be in the dark. BB gun bringing kid received 2 day suspension. A bb gun is not classified as a firearm and therefore not grounds for expulsion. The kid who reported it (and this really is what makes me mad)-he is being transferred to another school for his own protection (do not know if this was initiated by his parents or the district). But the kid who did the right thing is getting what feels like a punishment. And what the punishment is for the social medial bullies-I do not know. Other things that have the parents up in arms is the lapse between the incident and when it was communicated to the parents. In the past, these things have been more promptly communicated. And some parents are mad that the school did not go on lock down. Anyway, big meeting coming up on Monday night and I have a feeling it's going to be a doozy! |
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peabay
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Jun 25, 2014 19:50:41 GMT
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Post by peabay on Sept 13, 2019 19:23:31 GMT
I have no idea how they would handle it. This kind of stuff can't legally be discussed so we never know what happens to kids in these situations.
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Post by lucyg on Sept 13, 2019 19:27:42 GMT
If you wanted to hide your exact location, the city name is in the school email quotation. Just a heads up.
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MerryMom
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Post by MerryMom on Sept 13, 2019 19:28:14 GMT
I live in rural central Ohio and our school would have handled it the same way.
I’m not sure what you are getting at; do you think the school overreacted or under-reacted? Our school would have noted it was a BB gun so people didn’t think it was a .45 Colt revolver or hunting rifle with scope.
I’m not a gun owner BTW
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Post by workingclassdog on Sept 13, 2019 19:38:56 GMT
It's hard to say, schools here don't share much of anything when regarding incidents.. Even when a school is locked down, typically we don't know the 'real' reasons, unless of course it is needed or in the media. They are very vague in making incidents public. I would say our school would put out a similar memo..
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Post by revirdsuba99 on Sept 13, 2019 19:43:47 GMT
Don't know the answers, but think long and hard about how much damage a BB gun can do. You don't need to go any farther than bergdorfblonde and no I have not tagged her, but she may see this anyway!
She lost an eye, not just her vision, to a BB shot!! She has suffered years of pain and is still dealing with ongoing surgeries RIGHT now.
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Post by shevy on Sept 13, 2019 19:59:28 GMT
I don't think any school district would release any additional information about what happened to protect the students involved.
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Post by Darcy Collins on Sept 13, 2019 19:59:49 GMT
The first child (ie who brought a bb gun to school) would most likely be expelled for one year. Our district verbiage which you'll see mentions bb gun:
I can't really say without seeing exactly what the social media bullying entailed to say about the second child.
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Post by bc2ca on Sept 13, 2019 20:30:23 GMT
So I'm going to stick to the facts that have been shared from the principal and not throw in the gossip unless I state otherwise. And I should also add that my community in a suburb of the tech industry and would generally classify it as few people who own guns and/or know how to use them-not a high interest hobby here. On Sept. 4 ten minutes before the end of the school day, parents received an email that stated a student at the middle school (6,7,8) brought a bb gun to school. They were alerted and it was confiscated. Later that evening the principal sent a follow up email which stated, "It has come to our attention that the BB gun confiscated this morning had been discharged and inadvertently struck another student who did not require medical attention." Both emails feel very crafted to avoid any trigger words, likely run by a lawyer or two (yes, my opinion ).
Part 2: This is 1/2 rumor mill and 1/2 drawing some conclusions from another email. The child who alerted the principal has been bullied on his social media. "The students responsible for the social media posts have been identified with the help of our XXXX Police Department and our District Tech Services Team and will face appropriate consequences. " We also received a link to a video email of the statement the principal made to the students about how this will not be tolerated and we need to support one another. I will update with what our district did about the first and second kid, but wanted to hear from others beforehand. I'm sure the principal sent out those emails in consultation with district administrators/lawyers. It sounds like the first was to get ahead of the story and the second send after an investigation of the event. Both good things IMHO. I expected law enforcement is also involved and that student would be expelled and facing charges in juvenile court. I'm glad they are also taking the SM bullying seriously and think that would be multi-day suspension around here. FWIW, when DD was in K (15 years ago) a 6th grader was bringing a real gun to school. Sometimes with bullets, sometimes loaded.  Many kids knew about this and handled the gun, sometimes on the bus. The circle of kids who knew about and/or saw the gun grew until a terrified 4th grader refused to get on the bus one morning. Her before school carer contacted the principal, who met the kid when the bus arrived at school. To my knowledge, the girl who reported it wasn't bullied (definitely not on SM which barely existed), but many, many parents were very vocal about the fact they were proud of their kids for not turning him in. The kid was sentenced to a year in detention and went to the adjacent district when released (not sure if that was parent choice or district expulsion). |
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Post by Jennifer C on Sept 13, 2019 22:01:13 GMT
I'm in SE Texas. Heavy gun owner area. It's not unusual for kids to go to hunting leases over the weekend and then show up straight to school from there.
Our school is zero tolerance. The student with the BB would have been sent to alternate school in our district and the other student would of been protected.
Our campus police officer deals with all social media problems that are brought to the schools attention.
Jennifer
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Post by hop2 on Sept 13, 2019 22:08:06 GMT
Well, this is NJ, an airsoft pellet gun can be considered a weapon & can have weapons charges prosecuted & jail sentences for having it, even unloaded in the wrong place. I can dig up links where this has happened if you don’t believe me.
Here the police would have been called gun bringing kid would not be back at school until authorities determined if ‘bb gun’ kid would have weapons charges filed or not. Might or might not spend that time in jail. Depends on what the prosecutor does. Gun bringing kid would be possibly expelled. Definitely suspended for way longer than 2 days. That’s a joke. I’m pretty sure that kid would be expelled here even if charges we for some reason not filed. But then again I’m pretty sure weapons charges would be filed here.
The social media shit would be shut down, internet access in the school shut down until things calmed down ( cel service doesn’t exist inside the building so if they shut it down then the kids are off line while in the building. )
I would never know what, if anything happened to bullying kids as I was not allowed to know what was done to the kids who bullied my son.
The closest situation we had here was threats were made via social media & that kid was expelled. When the ‘threats’ were made on social media the kids reporting it were rallied around and supported by the whole school community. The other kids were in support of reporting kid for the most part. Everyone was on reporting kids side. There was no ‘bullying’ of reporting kid. Anyone bullying reporting kid would have had a lot of people to deal with. I’d like to think that would be the case if the reporting kid was anyone but I can’t say that for sure. Reporting kid is pretty well liked to begin with, so I can’t rrally say if the support stemmed from liking the kid to begin with or from doing the right thing.
So, yea to answer your question here this would have resulted in
Expulsion, possible weapons charges, no bullying, & parents kept mostly in the dark officially because of privacy laws but this shit gets around anyway our town isn’t that big so everyone would mostly know anyway,
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Post by dizzycheermom on Sept 13, 2019 22:08:21 GMT
So I'm going to stick to the facts that have been shared from the principal and not throw in the gossip unless I state otherwise. And I should also add that my community in a suburb of the tech industry and would generally classify it as few people who own guns and/or know how to use them-not a high interest hobby here. On Sept. 4 ten minutes before the end of the school day, parents received an email that stated a student at the middle school (6,7,8) brought a bb gun to school. They were alerted and it was confiscated. Later that evening the principal sent a follow up email which stated, "It has come to our attention that the BB gun confiscated this morning had been discharged and inadvertently struck another student who did not require medical attention." Both emails feel very crafted to avoid any trigger words, likely run by a lawyer or two (yes, my opinion ).
Part 2: This is 1/2 rumor mill and 1/2 drawing some conclusions from another email. The child who alerted the principal has been bullied on his social media. "The students responsible for the social media posts have been identified with the help of our XXXX Police Department and our District Tech Services Team and will face appropriate consequences. " We also received a link to a video email of the statement the principal made to the students about how this will not be tolerated and we need to support one another. I will update with what our district did about the first and second kid, but wanted to hear from others beforehand. I'm sure the principal sent out those emails in consultation with district administrators/lawyers. It sounds like the first was to get ahead of the story and the second send after an investigation of the event. Both good things IMHO. I expected law enforcement is also involved and that student would be expelled and facing charges in juvenile court. I'm glad they are also taking the SM bullying seriously and think that would be multi-day suspension around here. FWIW, when DD was in K (15 years ago) a 6th grader was bringing a real gun to school. Sometimes with bullets, sometimes loaded. Many kids knew about this and handled the gun, sometimes on the bus. The circle of kids who knew about and/or saw the gun grew until a terrified 4th grader refused to get on the bus one morning. Her before school carer contacted the principal, who met the kid when the bus arrived at school. To my knowledge, the girl who reported it wasn't bullied (definitely not on SM which barely existed), but many, many parents were very vocal about the fact they were proud of their kids for not turning him in. The kid was sentenced to a year in detention and went to the adjacent district when released (not sure if that was parent choice or district expulsion). What was the thought process behind them being proud that their kids did not turn him in??? |
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Deleted
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Apr 27, 2024 1:41:25 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Sept 13, 2019 22:26:00 GMT
- What parents feel and what district policies are written are two separate things. I would look at district policy to see how these things should be handled and if policy were followed.
- Same thing with the bb gun classification. It may not be classified as a firearm at the federal level but if district policies forbid them the school has plenty of ground to stand on for delivering consequences.
- As for the good kid being transferred to another school - the parents more than likely agreed to it and wanted it to happen. Kid are freakin' viscous.
- Regarding the bad kids not receiving punishment for their social media posts - Unfortunately, a majority school districts do not get involved in social media situations. Rare cases are when a posting happens during school time. The social media posts being a crime could fall under local police jurisdiction. The young ages of the kids make me believe police will not be involved in the bullying aspect.
- There was no "active shooter" situation and the gun was confiscated as soon as school officials knew. There was no need for a lock-down in my humble opinion.
- I would need more details on the time lapse between the events and the communication from the school.
- You bet your sweet butt any and all communications like this were run by legal before being publicly released.
- There will more than likely be a parent or two charged for "failing to secure weapon" or something along those lines, especially since the bb gun was discharged.
Glad I'm only dealing with lack of bathroom privileged and backpacks being restricted during one teacher's class that this. I don't envy you.
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Dani-Mani
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Post by Dani-Mani on Sept 13, 2019 22:37:37 GMT
As someone who sits in on every disciplinary meeting in our district, I think the rumor mill makes things so much worse. Please don’t add fuel to the fire; if you’re concerned, contact your school directly instead of relying on the rumor mill for information that I can assure you is so convoluted once I had to call my boss to make sure I didn’t miss a second incident because nobody on social media managed to get one fact straight about a case we had just spent 17 hours on.
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Post by revirdsuba99 on Sept 13, 2019 22:44:15 GMT
Speaking of NJ... Maybe 15 years ago a kindergartener pointer is finger as if shooting. He was suspended. I do not know the total outcome.
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Post by bc2ca on Sept 14, 2019 0:05:42 GMT
I'm sure the principal sent out those emails in consultation with district administrators/lawyers. It sounds like the first was to get ahead of the story and the second send after an investigation of the event. Both good things IMHO. I expected law enforcement is also involved and that student would be expelled and facing charges in juvenile court. I'm glad they are also taking the SM bullying seriously and think that would be multi-day suspension around here. FWIW, when DD was in K (15 years ago) a 6th grader was bringing a real gun to school. Sometimes with bullets, sometimes loaded. Many kids knew about this and handled the gun, sometimes on the bus. The circle of kids who knew about and/or saw the gun grew until a terrified 4th grader refused to get on the bus one morning. Her before school carer contacted the principal, who met the kid when the bus arrived at school. To my knowledge, the girl who reported it wasn't bullied (definitely not on SM which barely existed), but many, many parents were very vocal about the fact they were proud of their kids for not turning him in. The kid was sentenced to a year in detention and went to the adjacent district when released (not sure if that was parent choice or district expulsion). What was the thought process behind them being proud that their kids did not turn him in??? It was along the lines of you don't rat out your friend, he didn't use the gun on anyone so what was the harm, boys being boys, one bad decision and didn't deserve to be sent to JD, etc., blah, blah, blah. |
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Post by freecharlie on Sept 14, 2019 0:37:53 GMT
Parents would not know the offical outcome as that would violate privacy.
Student would be expelled. Colorado defines a bb gun as a dangerous weapon.
Social media is harder. If it is done during school hours, internet access would be revoke and the students involved would be disciplined. If it was done after hours, that would police territory.
In school teachers and staff would shut down any bad talk about the person who informed people.
As a staff we would commend students who come forward. We may do an assembly about how we have to do our part to keep us all safe.
OP-
Any idea how everybody found out who turned the kid in?
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finaledition
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Post by finaledition on Sept 14, 2019 1:12:36 GMT
@pinkshirlee I don’t know if it was found out before first period or during. I think the timeline will be revealed at the meeting on Monday. freecharlie I have no knowledge of how the reporter was discovered. I don’t know any kid involved or close to the situation and only found out via the principal’s email. I agree that this kid should be treated as a hero for doing exactly what we’ve asked of our kids-if you see something, say something. Other kids may hesitate to do so after seeing how this kid was treated. |
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seaexplore
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Post by seaexplore on Sept 14, 2019 3:30:18 GMT
We had a student with a BB gun at school in my district last year.
I do not know for a fact who reported it. They excused themselves from class to “go to the bathroom” and went to let the office know.
Student was expelled.
Parents of students (not the expelled student) were NOT notified of anything- gun or consequences.
All of the students friends knew why the student was expelled because the student told them.
Student is eligible to return to my district after 1 year pending completion of counseling, grades, etc.
As far as I know, nothing was on social media. No bullying took place toward the student(s) who reported.
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*Marjorie*
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Jun 26, 2014 16:43:45 GMT
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Post by *Marjorie* on Sept 14, 2019 4:58:42 GMT
My Son was shot by his cousin with a pellet gun. He was hospitalized for 5 days with a collapsed lung.
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Post by annie on Sept 14, 2019 13:44:52 GMT
BB gun kid only receiving a 2 day suspension shocks me!
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Kerri W
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Post by Kerri W on Sept 14, 2019 13:59:45 GMT
finaledition Do you know how the reporter feels about transferring? Is it possible the family requested a transfer? BB Gun in my district has resulted in moving the offender to alternative school after a several day suspension. As the family of the reporter I wouldn’t automatically be upset over moving to a different school. Two of my children could handle whatever the backlash/comments might be and two could not. If there was another option for them to attend school and be comfortable, I’d jump on it. ETA I also think it’s very wise of the district to have legal advice on how to handle the matter.
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artbabe
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Post by artbabe on Sept 14, 2019 15:41:54 GMT
I don't know why you are surprised that the statement was put through legal. The district would be dumb not to have a lawyer look at it. I don't really see a problem with the timeline, either. As I read it, they notified the parents the same day and then made a follow up statement later.
The news would definitely report the matter, but wouldn't use the student's name. I can think of two schools in my area (not my district) that have had someone bring a gun to school. One of them is my nephews' school. They have 3 resource officers in the building and the school is right next to the police station and I am very glad about that.
They would never announce what happened to the student because that would violate FERPA. The rumors may be true or they may not. I wouldn't believe everything you hear- I've heard a lot of rumors that were so far from the actual facts.
The school district that I work for would consider it a gun and there would definitely be a suspension. Whether that becomes an expulsion depends on the circumstances. I'm guessing the student that was bullied asked to change schools.
I work for a really large district. We would probably handle it in a fairly similar manner. I'm guessing a bb gun would end in an expulsion but I'm not positive about that.
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Post by freecharlie on Sept 14, 2019 15:58:33 GMT
Also districts often don't send notices home until close to the end of the day to keep parents from panicking when there is no threat
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sweetpeasmom
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Post by sweetpeasmom on Sept 14, 2019 20:33:44 GMT
When DS was in 2nd and DD was in K, there was a kid in DS's class that brought a pellet gun to school. This kid was my DD's reading buddy as well. So he had interaction with both of my kids. There was never any communication from the school or district that this incident occurred, what happened or what was being done to ensure it didn't happen again. I only found out when a mother of another student in the class called me to find out if I was aware. My own son didn't even mention it. I learned that this kid had been an issue in the class all year - throwing desks, choked another kid, etc. So I was already aware of him and kept an eye/ear out for him. Like I said, he had contact with my Kindergartner as well.
The parent that called me had already setup a meeting with the principal. I told her I would come to the meeting as well. 1 other parent did too. The principal proceeded to be on the defensive. All we wanted to know was what they were doing about the matter. We let her know we were disappointed that there was no communication at least to the parents of the kid in the class that this happened but has been handled, if not to the parents of the school. I told her that all we knew is it was a gun. We knew nothing of the type or anything. Not that a pellet gun isn't to be taken seriously but it wasn't a Glock. She told us she was unable to tell us what punishment was being given to another child. She was very condescending to us.
The kid was moved, I think out of the class. Then his parents moved him to another school, supposedly because they were afraid of how the parents would treat him.
This was not the only time I was disappointed in her lack of communication regarding what I would consider serious matters.
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Post by refugeepea on Sept 14, 2019 20:39:50 GMT
The child who alerted the principal has been bullied They don't. They say they have a zero tolerance policy for bullying. They bring in the perpetrator who gets a stern lecture, if that. If the bully becomes terrible to numerous people, they finally get suspended. I know there are other steps in between, but you have to be quite the asshole to receive any type of suspension (outside of the school) or expulsion. |
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Post by refugeepea on Sept 14, 2019 20:41:39 GMT
This kind of stuff can't legally be discussed so we never know what happens to kids in these situations. And that's what's infuriating to the victim and their family. At least in my district, "it has been handled". I was able to catch a principal lying. I went straight to the bus driver who pulled surveillance and said no one talked to me.
This is the number one reason I put my child in a small public charter school. She got to the point where she accepted she was going to be bullied. She only told me when it got really bad. Two other students went to the vice principal and told her what one child was doing to my daughter.
Two different bullies; NOT suspended until there were multiple victims.
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