LISD parents, students and employees:
As we return to school on Monday, the events of Thursday afternoon are, no doubt, still on our minds. LISD staff will be debriefing to ensure that we continue to learn and improve on our response to unusual or threatening situations. LISD administrators will also debrief with law enforcement agencies very soon.
Our main focus on Monday is our students. No one envisions a school day when a SWAT team will storm in and loudly evacuate our classrooms. This was scary and unsettling for many students and adults. Our LISD counselors will be available to students and teachers have been asked to be keenly aware of any student who appears to be struggling with the gravity of what happened. If we see the need for additional counseling, we will lean on our neighboring districts as we always offer support to one another in such times.
I have asked teachers to not shy away from talking with their classes about the incident on Thursday. Students will want to talk about it and this is a big part of how they manage their feelings about it. I completely trust our teachers’ judgement on how and what to communicate with students based on their age and maturity level. We do not want to hide information from them, but more importantly, we do not want information shared that would make students fearful of being at school or make them more likely to spread rumors and false information.
I shared a statement with all of you on Thursday night, but I am sharing the information again along with a few updates:
The law enforcement incident commander was in charge of the situation on Thursday for its entirety. The threat was called into the police chief and not the school. Chief Garza of LPD was incident commander until Sheriff Durrenberger arrived on scene. From that point on, the sheriff was the incident commander. I was in continual communication with the IC. All LISD administrators were in constant communication with each other for the entirety of the incident.
All alerts sent out on LISD’s text alert system during the incident were coordinated with law enforcement’s handling of the incident. The situation was fluid and each decision made by law enforcement required district personnel to adjust. This is why the LISD text alerts started with announcing a slight delay in dismissal, and gradually escalated to a complete evacuation and reunification that lasted several hours. Each text alert reflected what we knew at that moment. Due to limited characters, the alerts were brief and direct. They were also transparent, stating the nature of the threat and communicating that no real threat had been located.
As for the timeline of events, just after 3:00 PM on Thursday, the Lexington Police Department received an anonymous call from someone claiming to be inside Lexington Middle School. The person said he was in a middle school restroom with a loaded weapon and multiple pipe bombs. He made a threat against the school.
Multiple law enforcement agencies immediately mobilized and responded within a few minutes. Both the middle and high schools were locked down while all restrooms and other possible locations were checked. Officers arrived at the elementary school and placed it in a hold, not releasing car riders until the situation was more stable.
A SWAT team from Bastrop County was called in. They went room to room, dismissing high school and middle school students one classroom at a time. They were in full gear and I'm sure this experience was unnerving for a number of students and employees.
The room-to-room process was slow and deliberate, and at approximately 4:40 PM, law enforcement decided to relocate all students to the Lexington park building in case any explosive or incendiary device was discovered.
LISD's relocation and reunification plan calls for relocation to multiple sites to help alleviate traffic issues, but law enforcement determined the Park Building to be the safest plan under the circumstances.
A bomb search team swept every building and nothing threatening was found. We were then allowed back into the buildings and we announced that the buildings would be open until 8:00 PM for students/parents/employees who wanted to retrieve their belongings. Times were also announced when the buildings would be open on Friday for anyone who needed to retrieve their belongings.
On Friday, around noon, Chief Garza and I talked. She said the investigation is ongoing to try to determine if someone from the area (maybe an LISD student) made the threat or if it was part of a larger plan. She stated that several Texas districts received threats on Thursday afternoon and, after we talked, I learned that there were a few on Friday as well.
LISD will cooperate fully with the criminal investigation into this terroristic threat, including interviews with employees and/or students. If/when the perpetrator of the threat is determined, the district will cooperate with law enforcement with regard to criminal charges and prosecution.
Though the threat was a hoax and created a very inconvenient situation for all of us, we will always take every precaution to keep our students and staff safe. I commend our staff for the way they took care of our students Thursday afternoon and evening. I have received more messages of gratitude from our parents than I can count. Many of you have praised our wonderful staff and many more have thanked me for the effort to always keep students safe. I appreciate your support and your trust. Nothing is more important than keeping our kids safe and secure.
Here’s to the hope and the prayer that these final weeks of school are quiet, calm, and happy for all of our LISD community!
Cliff Lightfoot, EdD