Safety in the Wrangell School District has been a hot topic around town these past few days. On Saturday, March 2, school officials were made aware of a high school student making threatening comments on Snapchat. The student, who is underage and will not be named, sent a photograph to friends saying, “Don’t go to school Monday, guys,” while making a finger gun. School officials were made aware of this photograph, according to an email by Secondary School Principal David Macri, and they contacted the police department. The department then interviewed the student who sent the message, and determined that there was no threat.
“After this interview, Wrangell Police have communicated to Wrangell Public School Officials that the author did not intend to incite concern, that the author understands the gravity of their action and to proceed with school as normal,” Macri’s email read.
While it was discovered there was no actual danger, many Wrangell residents felt that more action needed to be taken. About half of the student body stayed home on Monday, according to Macri. Many people left comments on Facebook saying they wanted the school to provide more details about what was going on, and what safety protocols were in place. Others stated they were unhappy with the lack of communication between the school district and parents, and still others said they wanted to see police officers stationed at the schools. In response to public concern, the district organized a public meeting at the WHS gym Monday afternoon.
Superintendent Debbe Lancaster opened the meeting by saying that the school district did have a history of poor communication with parents. This was something they were trying to improve, though, and she assured parents that there were safety protocols in place.
Macri went into a little more detail of what happened. Macri became aware of the photograph in question around 5 p.m. on Saturday, and he informed Lancaster of it a few minutes afterward. Police were made aware of the photograph by 5:15 p.m., he said, and they had interviewed the student and determined there was no real threat by 6 p.m. A press release was put together between 10 and 11 a.m. the next morning, on Sunday, and that was sent out to the public via email, text messages, and automated phone calls. Matt Gore, technology director for the school district, said that 297 families were successfully contacted on Sunday. Gore also added that parents may have blocked the number the notification came from, as they also use the number to send out lunch reminders to families on Thursdays, and that would have kept them from receiving the news.
“If you’re not receiving that email, or that phone message, then we need to get that information, if you’re interested in receiving these messages,” Macri said. “You can do that by calling Stephanie Carney at the elementary school, Katelyn Reeves at the middle school, or Megan Talburt at the high school.”
Macri also pointed out to attending families that the school district did have a crisis management plan in place. The plan was created in 2015, and he added that it received an annual review in 2016 and 2017. It was revised and updated in 2018. The plan covers about 20 hypothetical scenarios, and gives guidelines on how school staff and students should be prepared to respond. Lancaster added that they were in the process of putting an emergency folder of “what if” scenarios in every classroom, for easy access for teachers. There are also several security practices that the district is wanting to put into place in the near future. Teachers and students will be undergoing ALICE and ACEs training sometime in April, Macri said. They are also looking to update security cameras and monitors around August. Lancaster added that they would like to hire an additional counselor for the district, as well, but that may prove to be a challenge with recent cuts to the education budget proposed by Governor Mike Dunleavy.
After reviewing the situation and discussing what safety protocols were in place, the floor was opened up for a Q&A session. One parent asked why the school doors were kept unlocked all the time. Practically anybody could come in and walk through the high school, and hang out there for quite some time before anybody noticed. Macri said that this was a bit of policy they had changed. Before he became principal last year, he said, almost all of the outside doors of each school were kept unlocked. It has changed, now, so that only the main entrances are kept open. He added that there are only three doorways kept unlocked at his schools: The middle school and high school entrances facing Church Street, and the high school entrance facing Reid Street. Another parent asked why the Reid Street entrance to the high school is kept open until 9 at night, it seemed like an unsafe practice. Macri agreed that was something that could be changed, and said that door would be locked around 5 p.m. in the future.
James Nelson, a member of the Forest Service and former Wrangell police officer, offered to lead some ALICE training for the students. While training for a school shooting could be disturbing to some children, as well as parents, he said he could “tone it down” to a level where it would be appropriate for children at the eighth grade and higher. Other parents agreed that it was better to train for such an emergency than to go unprepared.
Communication was one of the major topics at the meeting. Several people who spoke agreed with Lancaster, that communication between the district and parents needs work. A similar situation, a bomb threat that was made against the school district last year, was brought up. Reportedly, the district did a poor job of communicating the situation to the community. Wrangell resident and parent Heidi Armstrong said that she was very appreciative of the school staff working to improve communication, and said that a lot of progress has been made, but there is still room for improvement.
“Unfortunately, communication hasn’t been good,” she said. “The first time I heard about the bombing was maybe at my dinner table, three weeks after it happened. That was last year … It’s not your fault for the brokenness. There’s been a bucket-load of turnover in this school, and the kids feel the stress. To teachers that are here, I want to say thank you for hanging on, for working together and hanging on to this mess. It’s been awful, it’s been horrible, but I want to say thank you for all that you have done. This is more than it has ever been.”
Wrangellite Don McConachie also voiced his thanks to the school for improving their communications. He suggested that the school look into taking their desires for new cameras and a counselor to their state representatives in Juneau, to see if they could find ways to appropriate the money. Another parent said that it would have been helpful to know exactly what kind of “incident” had been happening when they received the notification. June Leffler with radio station KSTK, also said that it would be nice if the school would come to the media with information like Saturday’s incident. Lancaster and Macri said that any delays in communication were because they wanted to make sure what they were telling people was accurate, and within legal boundaries. However, there was some information that could not be shared according to state and federal laws, such as the student’s identity or how, specifically, he/she was being punished.
“I know that it is human nature, when you’re thinking about your kids and the people you love and the people you live around,” Lancaster said. “When you’re thinking about that you want more information than that. You want to know exactly what’s going on, you want to know exactly what you can do. That’s not something I can do lawfully. That’s why you have information you feel is not complete. I understand your frustration. I’m a mother, I’m a grandmother, I have family too, and when my family has something going on I want all the details. I understand that. So, I’m sorry that you’re frustrated with the lack of information, but I’m giving you everything that you can lawfully have.”
The meeting lasted for over two hours. There were questions about what kind of counseling was available or what “debriefing” the students would receive on the incident and what kind of plan of re-entry there was for the student who caused this incident. There were also suggestions from the public such as stationing police officers in the school, or possibly arming teachers.
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