A 12-year-old girl was sent to the hospital after a violent attack from a 13-year-old boy, who identifies as a girl.
The victim, along with at least one friend, was on a “hit list” and had been threatened by the boy in prior days. The girls reported the threats to at least one guidance counselor, saying explicitly that they would be attacked at lunch.
At a school board meeting of North Penn School District on April 18, the friend of the victim, also an eyewitness to the attack, gave a tearful and passionate recounting to the school district board of the warnings given by her and her friend. Those warnings were not acted on, with a teacher claiming the male student was under control and that an attack was “not gonna happen.”
The male student used a Stanley to strike the female’s head, causing a gushing wound and concussion symptoms. After the attack, students were detained in the cafeteria for nearly 30 minutes as staff cleaned the blood and decided how to proceed. In a letter home to parents, Principal Nick Taylor asked parents to discuss the “consequences of fighting,” raising the ire of at least one parent, who pointed out the cheap-shot attack was not a fight.
Other speakers at the board meeting pointed out that the assailant had previously made threats at other schools in the district – threats specific enough that parents spoke to administrators, who only said their “hands were tied”. The “Safe2Say” program, which is managed by the Pennsylvania Attorney General and mandated for all public schools, was mentioned by several parents as a failure in need of review. On April 20th, the district superintendent offered a list of ten items he would be pursuing – none directly addressed the special treatment of transgender students.
