BRECKSVILLE, Ohio — The superintendent for Brecksville-Broadview Heights City Schools is praising an anonymous tip app for alerting them of a potential threat.
According to a statement released by the district, a student was taken into custody Wednesday morning after a threat to the district’s high school, including a “list of student names” was released.
“It was a picture of a list of student names on it that was sent to [a parent’s] child,” Superintendent Joelle Magyar said. “We became very concerned about that list.”
According to the district, a tip came in late Tuesday night after a parent reported the suspicion using the “STOPit” app, a program that the district adopted three years ago.
The tip alerted administrators, whose investigation determined the student they believe was responsible for the list before school on began Wednesday.
“We have great administrators who were trying to recognize hands and the watch that the student was wearing in the picture,” Magyar said. “We were able to identify who that student was right away before they came into the building and were able to get them into the office to question.”
Magyar praised the app as a launching point to safety success.
“We had a process,” she said. “We knew exactly what we needed to do, how we needed to handle this situation.”
This marks the third reported school violence or threat in a Northeast Ohio school district since Sunday.
Bedford City Schools closed down for days after a 14-year-old freshman made two threats to Bedford High School Sunday and Monday.
In Akron, a seventh grader was arrested Monday for bringing a loaded gun to Litchfield Community Learning Center, sending two schools on lockdown.
Magyar told 3News that the student was taken into custody for further questioning and will also face district consequences.
Brecksville-Broadview Heights City School is comprised of three buildings and roughly 3,700 students.
The district told 3News that each building has a School Resource Officer on campus, with additional police officers in the area at the both the beginning and end of the school day.