Area law enforcement investigated two school-related threats this week: one on social media and one via a phone call.
On Tuesday, while law enforcement continued to investigate threats posted by Mount Markham middle school students Sunday, an angry parent allegedly made threats during a phone call to Madison-Oneida BOCES.
The Oneida County Sheriff’s Office has probably investigated at least six to eight school-related threats so far this year, including the one at BOCES, said Sheriff Robert Maciol. But with 15 districts and 81 buildings in the county, that’s not a lot, he said.
“We live in a very safe community,” Maciol said.
But the reality is that school violence has become more common in past decades, he said. And both Maciol and area superintendents said they take threats, however they’re made, very seriously.
The goal is to prevent violence, but also to minimize the disruption threats bring to education, they said.
“Social media activity that contains threatening language, name calling or other objectionable material causes a significant disruption to the school community because it challenges such a critically important characteristic that allows our school to focus on learning — school safety,” said Mount Markham Superintendent Paul Berry. “If our students and staff do not feel safe on our campus, we cannot expect quality teaching and learning to take place.”
And that’s why Maciol said he’s tough on this subject.
“I have a zero tolerance policy for people who are going to cross that line and make a threat, whether they’re credible or not,” he said. “If they cross that line and make a threat, we’re going to charge them because they’re, obviously, breaking the law, but also we want to send a message that it’s not going to be tolerated.”
Neither of this week’s incidents culminated in violence, nor did they disrupt classes. As a result of the BOCES incident, a Utica woman was charged later that afternoon with aggravated harassment, a misdemeanor, according to the sheriff’s office.
None of the middle school students at Mount Markham were charged with a crime. But they did face school discipline, said Berry, who chose not to discuss their punishments because many people had seen their names on Facebook.
‘EXTREME CARE AND CONCERN’
Action is imperative, said several school superintendents who responded to a request for comment.
“As I am confident with all schools in the area, every threat is taken with extreme care and concern,” said New Hartford Superintendent Robert Nole in a statement. “Any threat that provides a disruption to the educational process will be thoroughly investigated whether the threat was made on or off campus.”
Those threats can come in many forms: a phone call, social media postings, a note found on the floor, graffiti on a bathroom wall, a bullet found somewhere in the school or overheard conversations about bringing a weapon to school. They can target individuals, a group or no one in particular.
“We have never received word of a threat that was specific enough to indicate an individual, group or even location,” said Rome Superintendent Peter Blake in an email. “The majority of situations we investigate are related to students (or in rare cases, a parent) overhearing other people talk of weapons.”
The district investigates every report, even when it leads to a home visit at 2 or 3 a.m., Blake said.
An increase in school violence isn’t the only thing that’s changed in the past decade, Maciol said.
“Ten years ago, we did not have armed law enforcement in every single school district,” he said. “Today we do.”
Whether special patrol officers or school resource officers, these law enforcement professionals help schools to investigate threats and to determine when outside law enforcement needs to be called in, superintendents said.
Districts also have taken a lot of other safety measures in the past decade, including conflict resolution or anti-bullying education programs as well as physical security improvements, such as moving to a single point of entry to schools, Maciol said. Often, physical security, such as bulletproof glass, is dependent on how much money a district has, but every district had made improvements, he said.
“Every single school district has been exceptional,” Maciol said, “when it comes to working with us to do all that we can together to keep our children safe.”
HANDLING SITUATIONS
Schools have created a variety of mechanisms for handling threats.
The Little Falls City School District has a director of school safety, for example. And the Clinton Central School District has a student threat screening and management system, which can help identify at-risk students and get them and their families appropriate support services, and a threat assessment team, said Superintendent Stephen Grimm.
The state requires districts to have policies on hand to help deal with these situations, including a bullying policy, safety and emergency plans that address violent threats against students, and codes of conduct outlining behavioral expectations and consequences, said Al Marlin, communications manager for the New York State School Boards Association, in an email.
“How any particular situation is handled would depend on the individual circumstances and their emergency plans and not usually a prescribed if/then list of actions,” Marlin said.
Local superintendents also stressed that many variables affect decisions involving school threats, including whether to call law enforcement in and how to punish those responsible.
Schools become involved, in general, whenever they hear of something that creates a “foreseeable risk of material and substantial disruption within the school,” said Whitesboro Superintendent Brian Bellair.
Law enforcement must be called for any threat of physical harm or if a law may have been violated, he said.
“Student consequences depend on the level of threat,” said Little Falls Superintendent Keith Levatino via email. “Outcomes can be an out-of-school suspension, conducting a superintendent’s hearing to extend the suspension (with home instruction being provided) and contacting law enforcement.
“In Little Falls, students are made aware how serious we take any form of threatening behavior and that it will not be tolerated.”
TEACHING A LESSON
But school responses to students who make threats aren’t just about punishment.
“Consequences are aimed at providing a reasonable response and can vary according to the severity of the misconduct,” said Mount Markham’s Berry. “Importantly, we try to follow up with students involved in misconduct so that important lessons are reinforced in the hope that the misconduct will not be repeated.”
One thing is predictable — schools are paying attention, superintendents said.
“Schools need to build trust,” said Clinton’s Grimm, “by demonstrating that they are able to competently identify and respond to such threats, provide an appropriate level of security throughout the school day and support programs that foster a culture that values kindness and embraces inclusivity and diversity for all students.”
