Two Incidents at White Hill Prompt Letter to Parents

Following two incidents involving a BB gun and an Airsoft gun earlier this month, Principal David Finnane sent a letter to parents alerting them of the incidents and assuring the community that the situation was under control.

Below is the letter that went out to White Hill parents:

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Dear White Hill Parents,

I am writing to you today to notify you about two incidents that took place at some point in the past month at White Hill.  The exact timing is unclear because the students we have interviewed are not certain about the dates.  Regardless, the incidents are serious in nature and I wanted to notify you of what took place so you hear directly from me vs. out in the community. 

The incidents that I am referring to involved a student bringing an air soft gun to school on one occasion and a BB gun to school on another occasion (both in pistol style). Both incidents occurred in the boys’ locker room (where the boy displayed the guns and actually shot the BB gun at the upper wall/ceiling area) at the start of PE class and were not reported to any adult at White Hill prior to a student speaking to me on Monday, April 18. No one has indicated that the student appeared to have any intention of hurting anyone but the danger involved with such behavior is obvious. 

I want to assure you that we are taking these incidents very seriously. School discipline procedures and CA Educational Code are being followed and the Fairfax Police have been notified and have conducted their own investigation. I am not at liberty to discuss the situation in much greater detail given the legal protections when minors are involved but you can be certain that we are spending a great deal of time addressing this situation. 

We take your son/daughters’ safety seriously and will continue work to nurture White Hill’s safe and caring school environment.  We are readdressing our supervision practices during the time students are in the changing rooms (PE teachers have always waited outside the changing rooms out of respect for the students’ privacy) and believe we have an appropriate interim plan in place effective first thing this morning. 

As you can imagine, we are concerned about why no students came forward earlier. It’s is understandable at some level because many of the kids were scared by what took place, but please talk with your children about their role in helping keep our campus safe. We are very focused on trying to create an environment at White Hill where our students feel that we respect them, will protect their confidentiality, and need their involvement to create as safe a school environment as possible. If you have any suggestions for how we can improve on this aspect of the culture here at White Hill, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Thank you for your attention to this information.