VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — An 11-year-old boy who alerted his principal at St. John the Apostle School in Virginia Beach after another student brought a bullet to class is in trouble at the school.
His family said he’s being punished for speaking up and doing the right thing, and they’re upset because the reporting student received the same suspension as the student who had the bullet.
The family also thinks the adults involved at St. John the Apostle School in Virginia Beach need to have, “in their words,” an ounce of grace dealing with an 11-year-old child who was only trying to do the right thing.
The 11-year-old saw the bullet, but he was about to begin mandatory testing, so he waited until the testing was over, which was about two hours.
“We teach our children, ‘see something say something’ but that means ‘see something, say something’ when it is safe,” said the family’s attorney, Tim Anderson.
Said the reporting child’s mother, Rachel Wigand: “He doesn’t want retaliation or people to dislike him, so he is going to do it anonymously.”
To do that required his waiting until after testing, and then he told the school principal.
“Said thank you for reporting that, but in the same breath you are suspended because it wasn’t quick enough,” Wigand said.
And the reporting student and the student with the ammunition received the same two-day suspension.
“If you punish a child for reporting, they are not going to report anymore,” Anderson said. “It makes school more dangerous. She doesn’t want that. I don’t want that; nobody should want that.”
A woman who answered the door at the school only replied, “I’m sorry,” before slamming the door closed. There was no response to a question shouted through the door about why the student who reported the bullet was suspended.
The school’s attorney, who serves as general counsel for the Catholic Diocese of Richmond, wrote to Anderson that “the school will not reduce the discipline,” said that the child should “bring safety issues to staff immediately” and “please confirm parents will support the school’s decision.”
Do the parents support the school’s decision?
“I do not,” Wigand said. “I think it is extremely harsh, and unjust and the most ludicrous decision to do that, to suspend the reporting person.”
Anderson said there is no policy in the school’s student handbook for failing to report possession of ammunition.
“There is no punishment if you don’t immediately report it,” Anderson said. “I mean, what if he would have jumped up, and said ‘there’s a bullet in his bag.’ They would have locked down the school. It would have caused chaos.”
According to the reporting child’s mother, what happened has changed the dynamic of the classroom when the two students returned to class Monday after the two-day suspension that began on Thursday.
“He ultimately requested that he be allowed to be out of that desk group and move his desk over,” she said. “… There was no communication … between the two, according to my son.”
They also argue that the way the school handled the situation by suspending both removed the element of anonymity, as opposed to getting the information, calling police, finding the bullet and suspending only the student who had the bullet without any reveal of Wigand’s son.”
What message is the reporting student’s mother giving to her son now?
“I’ve told him that it is out in the school,” she said. “Hold your head high. That he did the right thing. He should relay that to the other students and say, ‘if this were you, what would you do?’”
Legal action could be pending on this.
Wigand and Anderson said that, if the school does not reconsider the two-day suspension as part of Wigand’s son’s record, they will go to court as a last resort.
In a statement from Superintendent of Catholic Schools Dr. Michael Riley, it said wouldn’t comment about student or family matters, but that it expects students “to bring safety issues to the attention of school staff immediately.”
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