Not too long after the Columbine School shootings in Colorado, which was in 1999, all schools were on alert to watch for threatening behaviors in students.
Sometime shortly thereafter, I had a Spec. Ed. class of high school kids in the last period of the day.
One afternoon, one of my students got called down to the office toward the end of the period. I don't know what the issue was, but he came back angry, and as the whole class was gathering by the door a minute or two to await the dismissal bell, he announced that he should just blow up the whole school.
I knew the kid. He was a lead in one of the plays that I'd directed. I was pretty sure that he didn't mean what he said--was just upset about whatever had happened at the school office--but I was stuck. Had he not announced his threat in front of other students, I could have overlooked it, but since he did, I could only imagine the headlines:
STUDENT BLOWS UP MONROVIA HIGH SCHOOL. DOZENS DEAD. TEACHER HEARD THE THREAT BUT DID NOTHING. NEWS AT 10.
I had no choice, really. I didn't particularly want to be that teacher who failed to take things seriously. Thus, I went to the admin and reported the threat. The kid never returned to my class. Apparently, he lived outside of the district boundaries but was paying no tuition. It was a convenient excuse to expel him. He wasn't supposed to be one of "ours". I did my duty but felt really bad about it. *Sigh*
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