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Father tells Kaneland board his daughter faced repeated threats, asks why family wasn’t notified
Summary
At the board’s public-comment period, Maple Park resident Rich Jonas told trustees his daughter was repeatedly bullied and threatened with death by another student; he said administrators failed to notify him after an earlier incident and asked the board for assurances on student safety.
Rich Jonas, a Maple Park resident, used the board’s public-comment time to describe what he said were repeated threats and harassment of his daughter at Kaneland High School and to ask why the family was not told earlier.
“[In the fall of 2025] my daughter was told to kill herself multiple times,” Jonas said, and later described a prom‑night threat in which another student said he would “legit … drive there and kill her.” He told the board the alleged offender was suspended after a dean investigated, but that he was not notified of the earlier incident and that his daughter was not referred for counseling.
Jonas said a county judge recently upheld a restraining order protecting his daughter and that the alleged offender has been removed from school and extracurricular activities for the remainder of the year. He told board members that, when district human-resources staff contacted him after the court action, their apparent concern was that the student might lose the ability to play baseball rather than his daughter’s welfare.
“I need some reassurance this is being taken seriously and that my daughter will be proved at school as a victim. She has a right to a safe education,” Jonas said.
Board members did not debate Jonas’s comments during public comment; the board’s standard public-comment rules note that trustees do not engage in back-and-forth during that period. School staff present in the transcript include the high school vice principal and the student’s counselor; Jonas said those two did follow up to ask how his daughter was doing.
The board did not announce immediate follow-up actions in the public portion of the meeting. The district’s public comment protocol asks speakers to state their name and residence and limits remarks to three minutes.
What’s next: Jonas asked the board to explain why he was not notified earlier about the fall incident and to outline steps the district will take to prevent similar situations. The transcript records the request; the meeting record does not include a board response or a formal direction to staff in the public session.
