FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 12, 2005
Dear WAHS Parent,
I write to you to provide you with information regarding the district’s and the high school’s response to the tumultuous events of the past week. The information is included here simply to provide you with a greater understanding of how we have responded to these events, and what our plans are going forward until the end of the school year.
Following the shootings on Sunday evening, our concerns at the high school (and throughout the district) were two: to provide support and counseling services for those students in our schools who had been affected by the events, and to continue to provide for the safety and security of all students who attend our school. To that end, immediately Monday morning, we put into place our crisis management plan, which, for an event of this type, provides counseling and psychological services for those students in need of debriefing. We allocated our entire counseling staff for the Monday morning period to work through the grieving process with students directly impacted by the shootings. At the same time, we worked behind the scenes with local police agencies to gather as much information as we could about what actually transpired, and to gauge the impact of those events on our high school. We are deeply thankful for the complete support of both the Williamsport Bureau of Police and the Old Lycoming Township Police Department, both of which were immediately helpful in support and advisory roles.
As your student has hopefully indicated to you, the high school has been a very quiet place this week. Although absenteeism had been up for the first days of the week, attendance is now approaching normal levels without any incident whatsoever. We have taken care to provide additional supervision at lunches and throughout the day, and to continue, on a scaled-down level, our grief counseling services for students. The combination of these efforts has helped the high school maintain its primary educational function throughout the week, despite the difficulty of the immediate moment . . . which causes us to consider our course of action for the remaining 17 days of this school year.
As part of our normal end-of-the-year protocol, we will increase our security within the building beginning Monday, May 16. There is nothing unusual about that element: additional faculty reporting to cafeterias, increased hall monitoring, signouts and hall passes for every student departure from the classrooms. What will be different beginning Monday, May 16, 2005, will be our increased ability to control traffic access to the high school. I need to state upfront that the measure I am about to explain comes about as the result of absolutely no threat, no hint of trouble, no tips, no intelligence derived from any sources. It is simply a security measure that we have the ability to put in place for the remainder of the year, and will do so simply to provide another layer of security for our students, staff and building. There is, again, no threat, implied or stated, with regard to the high school or its population. We are simply exercising reasonable caution by putting in place the following measure:
Beginning Monday morning, after the arrival of students and staff, the Fox Hollow entrance to the high school will be closed by means of the existing evening gate system, and not available for entrance or egress until shortly before dismissal time. That means that for the remainder of the year after school begins, access to the high school will occur only from the West Fourth Street entrance. There will be positioned at that entrance a certified, contracted security officer who will stop each vehicle entering the access road and politely inquire about the purpose of the visit to the high school. Following that inquiry, the individuals with legitimate reason to be on campus will be invited to continue up the hill. After the security measure is put in place daily, all visitors, adults and teens alike, will be politely and quickly asked their business during the hours when school is in session. For motorists who use the high school access road as a shortcut to or from work, that shortcut will no longer be available between roughly 7:40AM and 2:ooPM. Once again, this measure is being instituted simply to provide better management of traffic visiting the high school over the remaining few days of this school year. We have chosen this measure because it adds another layer of protection for our students, and is the least intrusive modification to the students’ instructional day. Indeed, students and staff who attend a regular school day here will be completely unaffected by this measure. For all practical purposes, to those within the building, the measure will be invisible. There is absolutely no threat, knowledge or suggestion that prompts this action other than the want to provide, in a proactive manner, for the continued safety of students and staff. The entire Williamsport Area High School community thanks you for your support and understanding.
Sincerely,
Stephen C.
Huddy
Principal
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