GRESHAM, Ore. — Students and teachers from Gresham High School shared growing safety concerns with the Gresham-Barlow School Board on Wednesday. Their frustrations follow an incident that took place on Sep. 20. Gresham police arrested a 17-year-old student for allegedly bringing a gun to school.
Reliving what happened that day is difficult for social studies teacher Mark Adamski. He said the student who was arrested had recently been hostile during his class and on that day, Adamski took the teen's cell phone.
“Luckily, they complied because unknown to me, the student had a loaded 9 millimeter handgun in their waistband with a bullet in the chamber,” Adamski said. “Ten minutes later, a campus monitor stood at my doorway and asked that armed student to go with them. The student slowly walked across the entire room with time to do whatever they wanted.”
School officials said they learned about the threat when a community member tipped them off, saying the teen had threatened them with a gun outside the school before walking in.
“(School officials) let a known student with a weapon walk through my class filled with students and the police hadn't even been called or consulted yet,” Adamski said.
With so much at stake, many who testified on Wednesday said they believe school officials should have placed the campus on a hold or lockdown as they responded to the threat.
In a statement, the Gresham-Barlow School District praised how building administration and campus monitors handled the incident.
"We also review input from students, staff, and families. We are always looking for ways to improve our processes and procedures," the statement said.
Adamski said he’d like more to be done.
“I'd like to see a full investigation just to see missteps,” Adamski said. “We were told (by school officials), ‘We did everything right,’ and I'm often told as an educator to reflect on what you've done.”
Students and teachers approached the school board last spring and delivered a vote of no confidence in Gresham's principal and district officials. The move came after months of what they described as drug use and frequent, violent fights among students armed with weapons. They were frustrated to be in front of the school board yet again, with similar concerns.
“Your actions of continuously ignoring what we want as students have led us to no longer trust any of you or leadership at Gresham High School,” said Elizabeth Westbrook, a senior and the co-founder of the Gresham High School Student Union (GHSSU).
Several students plan to stage a walkout during school at noon on Thursday. The event is organized by the GHSSU with the goal of drawing attention to their continued safety concerns at school.