West Chester police are investigating the threat and will be on hand when students return to school on Tuesday.
The bomb threat comes during a time when many threats have been made toward schools in the Butler County area. Edgewood Schools have been the latest district to see a spate of threats, some of which saw district officials react by locking down school buildings for a portion of the class day.
Edgewood Superintendent Russ Fussnecker said such threats are an unfortunate reality of modern school life but concedes nothing to anyone who may be trying to disrupt a school day.
January was particularly bad for this school year as threats of violence against schools shut down buildings — or caused temporary lockdowns — in both Edgewood and New Miami Schools.
Most school threats are false and amplified by social media but they are all investigated with the close cooperation of local or county law enforcement, Fussnecker said.
“We have informed our families that we take these types of threats seriously and we work with the Butler County Sheriff’s Department and Trenton Police Department to determine the seriousness and the source of the threat,” he said.
“Fortunately, our recent school threats have turned out not to be credible,” said Fussnecker, who is the most veteran Butler County school superintendent.
“That being said, it does not mean that it goes without repercussions to the person who made the threat. It also does not imply that there were no negative effects at school.”
While students’ adeptness at social media can accelerate the spread of a threat, internet savvy students can also alert others to threats made online.
“Some of the most recent threats have dealt with photos that were taken from other websites or stock photos that were photoshopped to mention our schools or district. These have then been posted on students’ storylines or shared through social media.”
As to why a tiny minority of students — or others — would risk legal prosecution, punishment to threaten a school remains a mystery to the former Edgewood High School principal and earlier in his career a classroom teacher.
“No one truly understands what causes students to take such actions but it is disappointing that those decisions have been made at all.”
Journalist Michael Clark contributed to this report.
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