By Caitlyn Meisner | Staff Writer
Waco High School students returned to their campus Wednesday after a hoax report of an active shooter sent them into lockdown on Tuesday.
The Waco Police Department tweeted at 2:21 p.m. that multiple agencies were already on the scene to respond to the threat. Waco PD officially cleared the building at 3:38 p.m.
Cierra Shipley, Waco PD spokesperson, said there was no credible threat the day of the report. She said no weapons — real or fake — were found on the school’s campus.
“There were no injuries, and no shots [were] fired,” Shipley said.
Shipley said Waco PD completed an after-action review done by each department to evaluate everyone’s actions in order to see what went well, what could have gone differently and what went wrong. She also said every unit that responded did well in accordance with procedures.
Orange County, Calif., senior Ava Dunwoody, a 9th and 10th grade English intern at Waco High School, said this was her first time in this situation as a teacher. She said it was a different experience, as she was a responsible adult instead of one of the students. As a future teacher, she said she realizes this is a part of her reality.
Dunwoody said students were updating her and her mentor teacher as they saw notifications through social media. She could hear and see several police officers with big guns in riot gear. Dunwoody said she and her students sat in the corner of the classroom with the lights off, protected by the bookshelf-barricaded door.
At one point, Dunwoody said she heard the police officers slamming on the classroom door, but she said she was unsure if she could believe they were legitimate officers. She said she saw them trying to unlock the door, so she slammed the door shut to protect her students from a potential intruder.
“It’s a really scary reality, and [school shootings are] happening at ridiculously large rates,” Dunwoody said. “It’s sad. It makes my career path difficult, [and it’s hard] to rally myself into going to work.”
Dr. Suzanne Nesmith, associate dean for undergraduate education at Baylor, said the student interns are fully embedded within the campuses they participate in.
“Once student teaching interns are on their school campus, they participate in all professional development that the teachers participate in,” Nesmith said. “If trainings were held on their campus for an active school shooter situation, the intern would have done that training also.”
Nesmith said the School of Education recognizes these trainings are an aspect of the job, but they hope and pray the training is not needed.
Cristina Ramirez, Waco High School librarian, said the situation escalated so fast and became very real. She said all she wanted was to keep her students safe.
Ramirez said she was casually walking to the door of the library, but she looked up and saw a police officer with a large gun in her face, shouting that there was an active threat and that she needed to lock down her room.
Immediately, Ramirez said she went into the college lab at the Waco High School campus, screamed “lockdown” at the students and teacher in the lab and grabbed them — along with her own students — to go to the back closet of the library.
“My main goal was to secure the kids,” Ramirez said. “I wouldn’t hesitate to do it all over again.”
Both Dunwoody and Ramirez said the atmosphere at Waco High School on Wednesday was grim.
“It was very somber and dark,” Ramirez said. “We had seven counselors available in the library for the kids to come and see throughout the day. We sent kids home if they asked.”
Dunwoody said there was low attendance at Waco High School today. She said there were likely at least 10 absent in each class she saw. Dunwoody and her mentor teacher had a “restoration circle” for their students to reflect on what happened yesterday.
“I don’t blame them [for being absent],” Dunwoody said. “It was an emotionally draining day.”
Several other schools across Texas had similar fake active shooter threats on Tuesday. These include Whitney ISD, Houston Heights High School, Thorndale ISD and Eanes ISD. Many schools in the areas surrounding Waco High School — including Lake Air Montessori, Hillcrest and Crestview Elementary — were also under lockdown.
Shipley said she spoke to the other police departments that received threats but could not confirm if the reports were related.
