Ohio County Schools discusses cell phone policy after the school year began with a lockdown

ELM GROVE, W.Va. (WTRF) – New policies took effect and received reaction quicker than expected in Ohio County Schools, as Wheeling Park High School started their first day of school with a lockdown.

Although the situation was handled, the new cell phone policy concerning communication between students and parents during these scenarios is a point of contention for some and was discussed at the school board’s most recent meeting.

Two bullets were found on a school bus, putting Wheeling Park High School into lockdown on the first day of school.

”We all met as an administrative group and with law enforcement and decided because it was an investigation, we just didn’t want that compromised. So rather we had our PR/Marketing person Ms. Butyn send constant messages to everybody so they knew that it was just procedural. We were teaching, we were safe.”

Rick Jones – Assistant Superintendent, Ohio County Schools

Over 1,500 students were wanded by law enforcement as part of the investigation that took hours to complete.

After the Ohio County Schools Board of Education passed a new cell phone policy for this school year, many parents were concerned that they were not able to communicate with their children directly in this scenario.

The school board had split viewpoints on how the new policy should be handled in situations like these.

”The balance I was trying to strike tonight is the administration felt strongly that there was more damage by having students miscommunicate or getting things out into the community that weren’t true versus the value of parents getting information firsthand from their children.”

David Croft – President, Ohio County Schools Board of Education

24 total messages were sent out to the Ohio County Schools community every three to five minutes, providing instant updates on the situation at hand.

The policy states that students would be able to request their phones from their teacher in the event of an emergency, and as Wheeling Park High School Principal Dailer mentioned, instruction would not continue in a true emergency.

”Each situation is determined by the situation and what can still be done. If instruction can still be occurring – we went into an internal lockdown last year – Instruction continued. That was the thing that we would have been doing regardless of being in a lockdown or otherwise. So, I think those are the things you have to take into consideration. If we are barricading doors, if we are being directed by police, that is an emergency.”

Meredith Dailer – Principal, Wheeling Park High School

The majority agreed that allowing students to use their cell phones has the potential to disrupt that search.

”It was not something that we were trying to keep kids safe from some immediate danger. We were just trying to figure out if there was anything else in the school that we should be concerned about.”

Rick Jones – Assistant Superintendent, Ohio County Schools

What constitutes a “true emergency” is where board president David Croft says can become subjective.

”If there was an active shooter, if there’s something going on at the school, then that would constitute emergency, which is an exception under the policy. On the other hand, you might have a child in distress or a student in distress who said, ‘I’m having an emergency.’ Consequently, ‘I need my phone.’ If they asked the teacher for the phone, they should get it.”

David Croft – President, Ohio County Schools Board of Education

The board says they will let the policy sit and see how it operates further into the school year for now.

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