12/14/21 - Message from Principal Hurley

Transcript: Good morning everyone, I really wanted to come on to Sunrise this morning to talk about the threat that we received yesterday and I know many of you have seen it, I know it was on social media, and we've had many emails with regard to what our next steps are here at Barrington High School. The first thing I want you to know is that if you're feeling anxious or nervous about this, our school counselors are gonna be out and about all day today, they'll be out in the hallways, they'll be there for you in the School Counseling office if you need to see them for any reason. The other thing is we had a quick meeting with the faulty after school yesterday, was the fact that if you're hearing things, if someone is saying something and you're concerned about it or you think it may be something that would help us in trying to find out who wrote the threat in the girls room, that is something we'd also like to have you come forward with and talk to a trusted adult as you would for any concern you have. Obviously, we're taking this very very seriously. We're asking teachers also to make sure that there aren't a lot of kids out in the hallway today, if you need to go to the restroom or go down to the office for any reason, please have a pass in hand. We're asking our staff to be sure that all kids leave their classroom with a pass so that we don't have a lot of roaming in the hallways. One of the things we were talking about in the meeting yesterday is kids letting kids into the caf or going out to the parking lot to get something from their cars, we don't want that to be happening. If you need to go out, come down to the office, we'll write you a pass to let you do that, but we shouldn't be letting one another in and out of the side doors because it's just not safe and we want to ensure safety for everyone at this time. Finally, you'll see a police presence here, the police will be making their presence in the school now until the winter recess. I know there were several requests that students wanted to Zoom at home during this time, at this point we're are not Zooming, however, if you do not feel safe coming to school, your assignments will be posted on Canvas. As far as starting to create a Zoom link for those things, that's not going to be happening at this time. Today we will have the Police Chief here with the Superintendent, I met with my crisis team earlier today to talk about next steps and what we'll be doing to ensure safety throughout the day, we'll communicate that immediately, I know a lot of the emails we were receiving were asking what we were doing besides a police presence. That will be communicated very shortly, the Police Chief and Mr. Messore will be creating a communication that will go out to the district, not just to those people that responded today. We're going to try to keep today as calm as possible but also as normal as possible as we work throughout the day. Like I said, if you have any concerns, please bring them forward, if you're feeling anxious or upset about this, which again it was a very disturbing threat that was written, please seek out a counselor in the School Counseling Department or go to a trusted adult. Thank you and have a good rest of your day. (minor edits made for clarity)