Monday, December 4, 2019
Haley SPC Meeting Notes
Community Safety Meeting
The School Parent Council hosted school and community partners to address parents’ concerns regarding recent murders in the area, safety protocols, and an overview of services available to those affected by trauma.
Presenters:
Haley Staff (Principal Kathleen Sullivan & School Psychologist Alex Freeman)
Boston Police Department
Boston School Police, Department of Safety Services
Community Trauma Response Organization
Details of the events in question:
On Oct 31, 2019 a shooting occurred across the street from the Haley at approximately 2:04pm. The location was at 581 American Legion Highway, in front of the One Stop Shop Auto Repair.Boston Police responded and were in touch with Ms. Sullivan. Students were preparing for dismissal. Once learning of the police activity, Ms. Sullivan called for the school to go into ‘Safe Mode.’ No students were allowed outside of the school until the Boston Public School Police reported it was clear for children to be dismissed. The following day, the Haley Pilot had the BPS Trauma Response Unit and all Haley mental health counselors available for immediate response for any student that requested or required individual attention.
At approximately 10:40pm on Friday, November 1, 2019 another shooting occurred near the Haley Pilot property at 35 Paine St.
Jenn (parent): This will be an opportunity for respectful dialogue about the safety concerns, as well as a Q&A as it comes up
Kathleen Sullivan (principal): Some clarification about what happened that day: it was getting close to dismissal at 2:05, the middle school was about to prep for dismissal at 2:20.
It was brought to my attention there was activity outside and went into safe mode instead of shelter in place because of the timing. I didn’t want anyone to move while I gathered more information from BPD and BPS police.
They cleared dismissal. There was police presence outside and parents coming and going. The protocol [inside the school] was for everyone to stop what they were doing at that moment.
Anna: What is the difference between safe mode and shelter in place?
Kathleen: Safe mode is moving into one area of room. Shelter in place is stay close to the classroom.
Kathleen: The next day I talked to Alex and Andrea. There was no threat to the school. Alex went around to talk to elementary classrooms two times since then, to see if anyone was showing signs of distress, had been asking questions.
Parent: What were students told that day? My daughter thought it was practice, but other kids were saying that something happened.
Kathleen: Kids were told that something happened outside the school.
Parent: What were they told about safety mode at the time?
Kathleen: Nothing, because it was so close to dismissal.
Alex Freeman (School Psychologist):
I’ll be speaking broadly about discussing traumatic events with students
I’ve prepared slides to organize thoughts, the methods are adapted from the National Association of School Psychologists.
Kids will look to us for guidance on how to react. Reassure children that they are safe. Validate their emotions: anger, fear, anxiety. It's OK to feel that way.
How do you help kids through those feelings? Make time to talk. Let their questions be the guide. Too much information can also be traumatizing.
Watch for clues that they want to talk: hovering around you while you're doing dishes or yard work, etc.
Sometimes we think kids will want to have a sit-down and talk about it. Sometimes they’ll express this need through art, music, writing-- those are communication too.
What is developmentally appropriate?
Early Elementary : Reassurance
Upper elementary/middle school: Will have more questions about safety. Help them feel safe.
Upper middle/HS will have their own opinions about violence. Emphasize their role in maintaining a safe society.
Tjere are many ways kids express emotion: changes in eating and sleeping habits, behavior.
Limit media exposure to events. For example, is it being shown on TV's in common areas?
Developmentally inappropriate information can cause anxiety or confusion. Be mindful of exposure to social media. Monitor this content.
Maintain a normal routine and structure, promote physical health, keep up schoolwork.
Some talking points re: school safety:
Schools are safe places
Families and community partners work to keep you safe.
If something makes them uncomfortable tell an adult. Talk about who that trusted adult would be.
Differentiate between possibility and probability (this is for older kids). We can’t promise that nothing bad will ever happen, but it is unlikely. Senseless violence is hard to understand.
Haley response : Teachers are students’ primary connection in the school community. They are trained to support as primary processors of traumatic events.
We asked that teachers maintain typical routine.
When asked, acknowledge own feelings, remain calm, reassure that the students are safe, be mindful re: trauma triggers
School Counseling Team (Alex, Lisa Cummings-Knight, Ashley Vandal, Cate Barclay) visited classrooms to talk to students.
The overwhelming response: Students kept up normal routine and this subject was not coming up. We didn’t want to do harm by bringing it up. Kids were able to come talk if they indicated they wanted to. They came to us not about being dysregulated, more about curiosity. Sometimes details will help anxiety.
In the weeks since have checked in and teachers do not report it being an issue in classrooms. This doesn’t mean the conversation is over, of course.
Parent: Back to how to communicate to parents? We haven't talked about that yet.
I heard on the news heard several incidents related to or in the Haley neighborhood. My husband couldn’t get info, the principal was waiting for info and had none to share. I kept my daughter home. She had no idea why but parents did. We went to police station, couldn’t get info from them.
Joe Gillepsie BPD Officer (Hyde Park) : They should have told you they were targeted events, not part of a random rampage. The victims were known and targeted.
Parent: But if he had been targeted during school hours near playground..
BPD Officer: But he wasn’t. Happened Fri night at 10:30.
Parent: I did not feel it was taken care of...we saw safety officer outside for a few days, I guess that was the solution.
BPD Officer: If the [securing of crime scene] wasn’t complete would have notified school and surrounding areas.
Parent: How do have better sense of communication as parents besides texting each other?
BPD Officer: Some people felt that since the school was closed and there was little impact (second incident)
We don’t routinely notify schools of events that happen near schools and not during school hours
Parent: Were two incidents related? If so this is concerning, but still concerning even if they’re not connected. Stray bullets are a real thing. Are there more targeted incidences coming?
BPD Officer: We don’t know if they're related but homicide doesn’t tell us. These incidences aren’t really preventable. Yes it could have happened at 10 am but it didn’t.
Parent: If stuff was happening and they were related how is that info communicated? When do we need to be on alert?
BPD Officer: We tell BPS police. Anything on the streets that will impact schools comes to Boston Police School division. They decide what actions or notifications must happen.
Parent: How can we as parents know if something like this happens again?
BPD: The Chief and I have been on crisis team for 20 years and this hasn’t happened here before. This wasn't directly related to Haley. If every time this happened in the city and principals had to send out notifications every time, that would send the wrong impression school safety-wise.
When something directly impacts your kids and their safety you will know, people will be in place.
Sometimes it’s the other way - school police sometimes tell BPD about something. It works both ways.
We rely on students and parents to keep schools safe as well. If a child makes a threat on social media, they tell the school, they tell school police and on up.
Parent: The pre-dismissal event was brought to the attention of the school because a parent noticed it.
BPS police: When the scene is going on, we get info on the radio and head to school, principal is calling, then Sergeant called and ok'd dismissal
School police have a couple of offices in the area.
Parent: Do they monitor criminal activity near but not related to school?
BPD: Yes they're aware.
School police officers have radios that monitor BPD.
BPS police: You can't plan on a crisis to happen. One thing they've done to prepare is to train and empower principals. We’ve had a lot of law enforcement involved but principals are the guardians of children, trained to act in the moment without waiting for someone to tell them to go into safe mode, etc. BPS police radio will get info about activity. This tells them to alert schools in area, put into safe mode or whatever is appropriate. They send closest officers.
Parent: Given multiple incidences, can the robocall be something less edited? A little info goes a long way. All due respect, this is a month later. If this happened again would we be able to hear from police sooner?
BPS: We are careful what we put in robocalls because kids answer phones. A main tenet of crisis response is do no harm. We will not be overly descriptive. We don't want to expose them to something that didn't know about. Also, crises are fluid. Things are moving fast, we don't want to compromise what the police are doing, give wrong info. We rely on partners to relay information.
BPD Officer: We don't want to harm the investigation.
Other officer: What you find in the media will be as much as they'll generally release [if you ask]
BPS police: We have the same info you do. We don't have inside info. Chief Weston and I don't have information we're keeping from you.
Parent: The incident across the street happened 20 minutes before dismissal. How is a crime scene secured in 20 minutes?
BPD: Suspect and victims were gone, we were just protecting scene. Every threat was gone.
Mark Scott, Boston Public Health Commission
What the city is doing as community: what you're doing tonight is very important. Talking about it helps prevention and healing. One thing that helps: when first incident happened when it was a homicide. I called Sargeant Tim Golden. They gave him the same information we heard tonight: the incident was not connected to school. We're concerned about health. We were on the scene that night and afternoon. Our other important partner is the hospitals. We’re working with surviving families. We are a network. When the first incident happened we’re concerned with, how is this impacting community, institutions, businesses, other entities? I went to the community meeting a few weeks ago.
Helen Joseph with Boston Neighborhood Trauma Team:
Our website is Neighborhoodhealing.com
What is trauma? When events impact your ability to eat, sleep, work
What you can do for yourself for supportis contact our 24-hr support line
Boston Trauma Response /Justice Resource Institute:
This program supports individuals and families impacted by violence and community violence. Only 5 years old as a program. Provides clinical services short and long-term. Respond to the scene of violence. We give psychological first aid to witnesses and those indirectly impacted. With our support line we can support anyone impacted by violence. We provide referrals, how to get services, anything in the realm of next steps. Within 30 min of your call we will get back to you. Line to clinical services specific to impacts of community violence.
Jenn: this has been a great opportunity to hear from everyone. Any additional questions?
Parent: Approaching the school and not knowing what the police presence was for was terrifying. I’m wondering about any other ways to get information earlier?
Kathleen: Non-emergent messages go out later. I'm ultimately responsible for your children. I want to acknowledge that this is difficult but I had no other information.
BPS: This is good feedback. We want to make sure at district level BPS communication gets involved. We need consistency.
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SPC updates:
We are extending book fair through Monday. Shifts are open!
Parent Teacher Social: Feb 7
Spring Spectacular: May 30
At our January meeting Ms. Scott coming to talk about the health curriculum.
Alex Freeman is coming in Feb to talk about anxiety and resources for students.
Boing! Fundraiser December 2-6. Mention the Haley and we get money back from Boing.
Room parents: restarting program. Has everyone heard from their room parents?