Bartholomew Consolidated School Corp. is investigating several incidents involving student threats, including one that occured Monday and resulted in parents questioning the safety of their children while in school.
Columbus residents David and Robin Brady attended Monday’s school board meeting after their daughter, a fourth-grade student at Smith Elementary School, was involved in a classroom altercation earlier in the day with a special-needs classmate. They told school board members a chair was thrown at their daughter in the classroom.
BCSC Superintendent Jim Roberts said in this particular case, the school corporation is still investigating what happened, and is continuing to work with the families, the teacher, the principal and the students to “put together the pieces” of the incident and determine appropriate educational opportunities or discipline for students involved.
There were no injuries in the Smith Elementary incident, the superintendent said.
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After the investigation is completed, the staff will make a decision best for the special-needs child and all the children in the classroom, Roberts said.
“We are talking about a 10-year-old special-needs child and behavior related to that,” Roberts said.
Considering that the incident had occurred at Smith that day, few school officials had been notified about it before the 6:30 p.m. board meeting, he said. Additionally, school officials were cautious about discussing a special-needs child’s behavior in a public board meeting, Roberts said.
During the meeting, board member Jeff Caldwell said the school corporation has been instituting safety procedures in its buildings. But parent Stephanie Studley, who has addressed the school board in the past about school safety, said more needed to be done.
School board member Bob Abrams encouraged parents who felt they were not being heard to send an email to board members, and promised he would pass the information on to the appropriate person for it to be handled. Board members’ emails are located on the school corporation’s website.
A formal complaint process has been established at BCSC, which includes a chain of command, first asking parents to start by talking with the teacher and then the building principal, Roberts said. It then goes higher in the process to either the directors of elementary or secondary education and to the administrative level as necessary, he said.
North threat
School officials are also looking into a school threat reported Friday at Columbus North High School.
That incident was investigated by the North school resource officer, and a 14-year-old male student has been detained on a felony charge of intimidation, said Lt. Matt Harris, Columbus Police Department spokesman.
A text message was sent out to North parents around the lunch hour Friday about the incident, Roberts said.
The 14-year-old was overheard making threats to other students involving a weapon, but no weapon was located and no injuries were reported, Harris said.
The case has been forwarded to Bartholomew County Prosecutor Bill Nash and the juvenile probation department to determine if the juvenile will be prosecuted under a felony charge or misdemeanor. If it is a felony, the proceedings will be open to the public in juvenile court.
Taylorsville case
Updates were also provided Tuesday about two threat cases that were reported recently, but actually began earlier in the school year.
Bartholomew County Sheriff’s Capt. Dave Steinkoenig said an incident reported last week about an 8-year-old Taylorsville Elementary student who was accused of making a hit list and showing it to a classmate on a school bus actually occurred in September, not in November as initially reported.
The incident was reported on social media by the family of the girl who was shown the list, who did not specify it had happened two months earlier, investigators said.
Neither police or school officials have seen the note, Steinkoenig said.
The 8-year-old told investigators he got the idea from a movie called “Death Note,” a film rated “mature” on Netflix about a character who finds a supernatural notebook and uses it to mete out death, attracting the attention of a detective, a demon and a girl in his class, according to marketing materials for the show.
A sheriff’s department report on the incident has been sent to juvenile probation officers and Steinkoenig said it is up to them as to whether the 8-year-old will face any charges.
East, Hauser trash talk
One more ongoing investigation is continuing involving social media threats between students at Columbus East High School and Hauser High School, including an allegation that an East student sent a picture of a gun to a Hauser student as part of some “trash talking” on Snapchat over the past month and a half.
Hauser Principal David Wintin said when students told him about the messages, the parents of the student who received the photo of the gun had already contacted law enforcement, so it was handled through police.
Sheriff department detectives interviewed the students who reported the messages to Hauser authorities and Wintin said it was mainly outside of school parameters.
“But you can’t go sending pictures of guns to each other,” Wintin said.
Steinkoenig said that case also has been sent to juvenile probation and the prosecutor to evaluate whether charges will be filed.
Roberts said all the incidents reflect the “see something, say something” message being embraced by students, who are reporting when they hear or see threatening behavior or talk.
The superintendent said he understood the worry that parents and families have.
In fact, Roberts said he worries about BCSC students and their safety from the time they get on the bus in the morning until the time they get off the bus and arrive home.
“But I don’t have fear, because of the staff that we have in place and the things we are doing to provide a safe and secure environment for our kids,” Roberts said. “I cannot guarantee that something won’t happen. But we can put things in place to limit that possibility. And it could be viewed that what we have put in place is working. We are noticing problem behaviors and taking positive steps to address them. When we are made aware of situations, we are addressing them.”
