Students evacuated as a safety precaution
By Ryan Spoehr
Editor
As students were about to start classes for the week at Whitewater High School on Monday, the learning was put on hold because two suspicious packages were found on campus.
At about 7:55 a.m. on Monday, one suspicious package was found by the tennis courts. After the report was made, Whitewater Unified School District Superintendent Mark Elworthy and Whitewater Police Chief Lisa Otterbacher made the decision to put the school on lockdown and usher students into the auditorium.
“Shortly after that, it was brought to my attention that a door was left unsecured during the evening,” Elworthy said Monday in his monthly report to the Whitewater School Board.
At that point, Elworthy and Otterbacher went one step further and evacuated the school, transporting students to the nearby Young Auditorium on the campus of the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. The Whitewater Aquatic Center was also evacuated.
A second package was later found, according to a joint press release issued by the school district and the Whitewater Police Department. The release did not specify the location of the second package and Elworthy did not comment on the location of the second package during his report.
“Two suspicious packages were located, analyzed and subsequently determined to be non-threatening,” the release states.
Little has been revealed on what was in those packages, and what those packages were.
“We were fortunate to have Hawk. He is the K-9 officer with UW-Whitewater,” Elworthy said. “Kenosha County (bomb squad) also came over, and they were the experts in removing the suspicious devices.”
However, there were no other suspicious circumstances or items found other than the two packages, according to the release.
Students were shuttled to the facility with their first hour teachers, who took attendance of all the students. The students were later released to parents and guardians.
“We were able to account for all of our students, so thank you to all the staff,” Elworthy said.
Elworthy met with staff after the incident and staff assisted students in retrieving their backpacks. Class resumed as scheduled between 1:15 and 1:30 p.m.
Elworthy said while there was prompt notification regarding the situation and the district was prepared, there is always room to improve.
“As we talked during the day, we talked about having a quick message. We do communicate in English and Spanish. So, we are going to have – much like for our weather days – a couple phrases all ready to go so we can say, ‘Something is going on at one of our buildings. More information is coming soon,’” Elworthy said. “So, that’s something we are learning, but again, technology worked very well.”
The school went back to a full day of classes on Tuesday.
