The Repeated Audacity of High School Bomb Threats

Email to a friend Permalink

Friday, November 28, 2014

Patrick Sargent, GoLocal Worcester Contributor

On Monday, Leominster High School postponed their Tuesday pep rally for their Thanksgiving Day Football game due to a shooting threat. Two students reported to administration that a Leominster High student threatened to shoot up the pep rally.

The shooting scare is one of many recent threats to local high schools.  Since December, in Central Massachusetts there have been a reported seven high schools evacuated because of bomb threats.

"A main focus for schools is to ensure that students are safe and that they actually feel safe in the building so they are in the correct mindset to learn. Something like a bomb threat is likely to impact the students feeling of security making them unlikely to learn," said Jillian Karns, a school psychologist in Central Massachusetts.

Where Have These Threats Occurred in Central Mass?

In July, a Massachusetts Task Force released a report on School Safety and Security. The report was presented to Governor Deval Patrick. The report states, “Massachusetts leads the nation in student achievement, but we also know that children who do not feel safe at school suffer academically.”

Of the high schools reported, North High School in Worcester, Auburn High School, and Westboro High School were evacuated twice since December for bomb threats. Authorities believe the Westboro bomb threats were connected. The North High threats occurred within ten days of each other. The threats at Auburn High School were a little over two weeks apart.

The first North High threat came on November 12, joining five other schools in the state that received bomb threats that day. Notre Dame Academy in Hingham also received a bomb threat that day. The other schools included Boston College High, Boston English High, Natick High and Amherst Regional.

Auburn High School's first bomb threat was last month and it's most recent was November 10th. Tantasqua High in Sturbridge had a bomb threat this past February.

According to the Task Force report, The evacuation plan must be designed specifically for each building and include a crisis response team, a designated manager of an incident, as well as substitutes; a communication plan, and protocols for safe and effective evacuations. 

As reported by GoLocal Worcester last month, Assumption College was one of three Massachusetts colleges to report a bomb threat and be evacuated in October. In May, Mount Wachusett Community College in Gardner was also evacuated due to a bomb threat.

How and Why Do Bomb Threats Get Delivered?

According to a report from National School Safety and Security Services, across the United States the majority of bomb threats during the 2013-2014 school year were delivered electronically. Of the 315 studied cases, 35% of bomb threats were delivered via social media, email or text message. Other forms of bomb threat deliveries include bathroom graffiti, notes found in the school, phone threats, and verbal threats.

"The vast majority of school threats are empty. Kids often claimed they were joking or did not mean it. But police are taking no chances and responding to every call. This is costing taxpayers real money and raising the anxiety level of millions of children and their parents," the report stated. The report also mentioned the relationship between bomb threats and local crime. The study "found emerging indicators of a new trend of threats made by individuals outside of schools who are trying to distract police from community-based crimes or to extract revenge against their rivals in business and criminal activities."

The Psychological Effect of Bomb Threats

One section of the state’s Task Force report focused specifically on the psychological problems that could occur with students who are victims of these bomb threats and evacuations. According to the report,"Helping students and staff recover physically and, especially, psychologically from an incident is a critical task requiring at least as much skill and training as restoring the building and infrastructure...Students will experience the incident differently depending on their age, physical and emotional challenges or past experience."

When asked what kind of mental disorders that someone who calls in bomb threats may suffer from, Karns said, "In terms of a specific mental disorder it would be difficult to pinpoint because there is such a range of individuals that display different signs and symptoms when they're having difficulties. Mental disorders exhibit themselves differently depending on the individual, so it would be important to identify any changes in normal behaviors and no sign,no matter how small, should go ignored."

---

Related Slideshow: Central MA High Schools—2014 Rankings

Related Articles

• MA Colleges New Danger: Bomb and Shooting Threats Cause Evacuations
• $73 Million North High has 31% Dropout Rate
• BREAKING: Assumption College is Being Evacuated Due to Bomb Threat
• NEW: Arrest Made In Assumption College Bomb Threat
• EXCLUSIVE: Worcester Public School Allows KKK Costume
• Worcester’s Teachers Feel Pressure of Potential Performance-Based Licensing
• The 50 Least Diverse High Schools in Massachusetts
• How White is Your School? The Most Diverse High Schools in MA
• The Top High Schools in Central MA 2014
• The Top High Schools in Massachusetts 2014

Enjoy this post? Share it with others.

Email to a friend Permalink