Arrowhead superintendent vows changes after rumored threat snowballed
While authorities say there was never a real threat to Arrowhead High School on Feb. 9, the untraced rumors of a threat became powerful enough to drive hundreds of students off the campus.
Superintendent Conrad Farner said too many parents and students were spreading false information about a threat without reporting it to the district or 911. Some parents, meanwhile, were frustrated that district staff didn’t announce more quickly that the school was safe.
One thing they agree on: Communication could have been better. Farner said the district is making changes.
How is Arrowhead responding to the Feb. 9 rumored threat?
At a Feb. 14 school board meeting, Farner said his team has been spending most of their time since Friday reflecting on what could have been done differently, reviewing video and examining protocols.
Farner said it's an opportunity for the district to pinpoint weaknesses and implement better procedures.
"We actually are very lucky," he said. "We're going to learn more from this than what any drill would teach us, what any simulation would teach us."
Arrowhead exploring text-message service for parents
Farner said that, since Feb. 9, the district has been contacting companies about setting up a text service for parents and had "already entered into a contract with a company."
Asked by the Journal Sentinel to provide more details about the text service, Farner declined, citing security concerns. He said he was unsure whether the school board would need to approve the contract as it would depend on the cost, which he did not share.
After rumored threat, Arrowhead reviewing lockdown procedures
Farner said the district was exploring the idea of entering lockdowns more frequently.
"We're looking at going to lockdown upon receiving any threat or rumor or threat," Farner said. "Looking at that, I don't know if that's the right idea. Everyone needs to understand, we don't go to lockdown lightly."
But at the board meeting, Farner said he worried that using lockdowns too often would desensitize students.
Farner said some districts have what they call a "soft lockdown" procedure. That typically involves limiting movement in the school but allowing classes to continue while a search or investigation takes place. Asked whether Arrowhead currently has a "soft lockdown" procedure, Farner declined to answer.
"We do not share student information or information that would enable someone who wants to do harm to be able to anticipate how we attempt to prevent that from happening, or how we would respond to any imminent danger," Farner explained.
"Any kind of lockdown is a big deal," Farner said. "Lockdowns cause anxiety. Lockdowns cause fear. Lockdowns get people upset. Lockdowns raise emotions, they're not small things. People say, 'Why didn't you just go to lockdown?' It's not that simple."
Asked how the district would be determining whether to change its lockdown policies, Farner declined to answer.
What do we know about what happened Feb. 9?
Farner shared more details Wednesday about the timeline Feb. 9.
Farner said it was 9:50 a.m. when the school first heard about the rumors. A parent had left a voicemail about a rumor of a threat, Farner said. School staff talked to the parent at 9:55, and contacted the Waukesha County Sheriff's Department at 10 a.m., he said.
At 10:15 a.m., Farner said a student came to the main office. He said his mom wanted him to leave school because of something they heard in a text message.
"At that time, we started to get wind of the fact that the news was rampantly known, unbeknownst to us, because no one had let us know sooner, that there were all these parents and students sharing text messages about a possible rumor of a threat," Farner said.
At an unknown time that day, Farner said there was a false post on the Lake Country 411 Facebook group about a stabbing threat and shooter. The post appears to have been deleted. An administrator for the page told the Journal Sentinel the post was made after rumors had already been spreading.
By 11 a.m., Farner said the Sheriff's Department concluded it could find no credible threat, and school staff started to prepare communications. He said the school had a Facebook post by 11:14, a message to staff by 11:16, and other messages at 11:30.
From about noon to 2 p.m., Farner said he was monitoring the pickup area, telling people the school was safe and secure. Hundreds of students left the school early that day, the school reported that afternoon on Facebook.
Farner said the school's procedures for responding to reports of threats have worked well in the past, but this time, school officials were hampered because of the way false information was spreading. Authorities still don't know how the rumors started.
"Our procedures have worked in part because we became aware of the threat before false unsubstantiated rumors were spread via text and social media," Farner said. "To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time a false rumor was spread before anyone contacted us. I hope it's the last."
Contact Rory Linnane at rory.linnane@jrn.com. Follow her on X (Twitter) at @RoryLinnane.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Arrowhead superintendent vows changes after rumored threat snowballed
