Sacramento-area parents describe ‘nerve-wracking’ wait during a school lockdown
Rebecca Amico waited patiently for about 45 minutes Tuesday after learning her three children were sitting in locked classrooms as authorities placed their school on lockdown and Roseville police investigated a reported threat made toward the campus.
She didn’t know anything else. She didn’t have any details about the reported threat at Woodcreek High School, and she didn’t know when her kids would be allowed to leave the campus. But she says she was never super scared or nervous.
Amico said school lockdowns have become more common as schools and police respond to perceived threats on campus. She said she and her kids have become somewhat desensitized to lockdowns, having experienced them before and hearing about others more frequently in news reports from throughout the country.
“Sadly, I wasn’t immediately too worried,” Amico said. “My kids were in their classrooms, the doors were closed and locked. And there was a heavy police presence at the school. As soon as I saw them (later that day), I pulled each of them into a big hug.”
But she said she knows there were plenty of Woodcreek High parents who waited nervously until the all-clear was given and their children were allowed to go home.
Another Woodcreek High parent described the nightmarish scenarios that can start to seep into the minds of some parents as they wait for more information about a lockdown. He wished parents could receive more information in a timely manner to put them at ease as they wait to make sure their children are safe.
The Roseville school wasn’t the only campus placed on lockdown over the past week.
Two schools in Yuba County were placed on lockdown Wednesday as sheriff’s deputies investigated reports of an armed person in a nearby neighborhood. That same day, a much scarier situation unfolded at a Texas high school as shots were fired in a classroom and four people were wounded; two of them hit by gunfire.
Yuba County school lockdowns
The lockdowns at Lindhurst High School and Johnson Park Elementary School in Olivehurst ended after about 30 minutes. Yuba County sheriff’s deputies had responded to a report of a man with a gun acting erratically and took him into custody.
One person questioned on Facebook whether the Yuba County incident had anything to do with the Texas school shooting. The Yuba County Sheriff’s Department responded to that Facebook comment by ensuring everyone there was nothing linking the two incidents.
Initially, Amico was upset Woodcreek High did not immediately send out information about Tuesday afternoon’s lockdown. She first learned of it when her daughter in the 10th grade and her son in the 11th grade sent her text messages. They each told her they were safe and locked in a classroom with staff and other students.
“I wasn’t too upset about it, because the school’s primary focus should be that the kids are safe, and that’s where I want (the focus) to be,” Amico said.
She remembers participating in school intruder drills with her children when they were much younger, so she feels likes she’s grown used to the situation. As a child, she experienced school safety drills in West Virginia in case of an industrial chemical emergency. She said her school was less than a mile from a chemical plant.
“I’m not someone who panics easily,” Amico said. “Worrying is useless if there’s no need to be.”
Driving by Woodcreek High School lockdown
Amico was getting a haircut when she first learned of the Woodcreek lockdown and drove by the campus on her way home. She also opened a police scanner app on her phone and listened to officers talk to dispatchers about the situation. She was more calm after hearing the officers later discuss plans to safely release the children from school.
“They were completely professional, and I know they’re not new to this either,” Amico said about the response from the Roseville Police Department. “I saw the police presence, and I knew they were taking it seriously.”
In a letter to school families and staff, Woodcreek High Principal Suanne Bell said the students on campus were never in any danger. She said the lockdown was in place to ensure the safety of all students. She also said school officials worked with police and “resolved the issue.”
“This afternoon, our campus was temporarily placed in a lockdown due to a threat from an off-campus individual,” Bell wrote in Tuesday’s letter. “The threat indicated that the individual would be coming to Woodcreek to harm another student.”
Amico says her oldest son, an 18-year-old Woodcreek High “super senior,” has autism and attends adult transitional courses in the school’s special education department. Amico said he was in his classroom watching a movie during the lockdown, and she was confident he would be OK there.
“I have faith in his teachers and his paraeducators,” Amico said. “They’re trained well in handling those situations, they keep (the students) calm and divert their attention from what’s going on.”
Her two younger teens were somewhat annoyed that their classmates were laughing and seemed not to be taking the lockdown seriously. But Amico said each child, like each parent, is going to deal with that type of stressful situation in their own way.
Waiting, wondering if there’s a shooter on campus
Brent Robken had a similar experience Tuesday as he waited for his son, a 16-year-old junior at Woodcreek High, to be allowed to go home. Robken first heard about the lockdown in a text message from his son.
“That put me a little at ease, knowing he was safe,” Robken said. “It can be nerve-wracking, not knowing. Is there a shooter? Is it active? Is my kid safe.”
Robken has grown accustomed to hearing about school lockdowns. He said having very little information can cause him to wonder whether his town has now become the latest victim of a tragic school shooting. Like Amico, Robken listened to a radio police scanner, hearing officers at the school. Robken works from home not far from the campus.
“The more communication (from police and schools) the better, because you’re going to freak out about it either way,” Robken said. “I can’t imagine the stress for parents who live far from the campus or are stuck at work while this is happening. ... If I couldn’t have gotten a hold of my son, I would’ve been a complete mess.”
After listening to the police scanner for about 15 minutes, he heard officers discuss the plan get the kids home safely. Robken said his son was more annoyed that the lockdown meant he wouldn’t have time to study for his midterm exams before heading to football practice.
“I never got the impression that he was scared, except when he initially heard the police officers running down the hallway and making sure the classroom doors were locked,” Robken said. “That’s when he and his friend decided to move away from the door and the windows.”
