Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the School Safety topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Parents and community urge Danville SD118 board to act after assault, viral student videos at Northridge
Summary
Multiple speakers told the board the district is failing students at Northridge Middle School, citing a reported strangulation incident, frequent police calls and viral videos; parents asked for policy changes, more monitors and increased parent communication.
Multiple parents and community members told the Danville School District 118 Board of Education on Monday that the district must take immediate steps to address student safety at Northridge Middle School after several recent incidents, including a reported strangulation and widely shared videos of fights.
Parent Amy McCarty told trustees her 12-year-old son was assaulted at Northridge and that no school official contacted her about the incident. McCarty read her son’s witness statement into the record and said the school’s dean of seventh‑grade students handled the matter without notifying her. She said the dean told her the student had said he was fine, and McCarty argued that parents should always be informed when a student is physically assaulted. McCarty said the state of Illinois classifies strangulation as aggravated battery, a class C felony, and demanded an immediate review of incident-response and parent-communication policies.
Others, including multiple community speakers, referenced a series of police responses to Northridge and viral video clips of fights and misconduct, and urged the board to increase staffing — including more hall monitors and student-resource officers — and to consider stricter policies such as banning cell phones at the school. Several speakers asked the board to speed the work of the district's discipline committee or to restructure Northridge to improve safety and climate.
Why it matters: Trustees said student safety is a prerequisite for learning and asked for specifics about current communication protocols and discipline implementation. The parent who described the strangulation said she had FOIAed police call records and received 17 pages of incidents over 2½ school years, including juvenile problems, battery, threats and suspicious-person calls.
What the board did: The board heard public comment and asked staff to bring questions and concerns to the appropriate administrators. No formal vote changing discipline or communication policy was recorded at the meeting.
