Zero tolerance shown for gun at school

Expulsion recommended for 8 boys after loaded weapon found at Ross

Eight boys have been recommended for expulsion for handling a loaded gun Wednesday morning at Ross Elementary School.

The school was placed on im- mediate lockdown when a student tipped off a staff member about the gun.

“The staff quickly located and detained the child,” said Memphis City Schools spokeswoman Stefani Everson, who added that the staff felt “there was no time to wait” for police to arrive before confiscating the gun.

Once officers arrived to investigate, they located the seven other children who had handled or known about the weapon.

Everson said school officials were all “very, very grateful” for the student who tipped them off, but was reticent to provide further details about the child to protect his or her anonymity.

She declined to comment further on the child who brought the gun, or under what circumstances it was confiscated so as not to interfere with the ongoing police investigation.

None of the eight boys, who range from grades 2 through 4, was in school Thursday, Everson said. They will be expelled from the district unless their parents successfully appeal the decision during a Pupil Services review process.

The Memphis City Schools Code of Conduct lists the “possession, concealment, use, sale or distribution of explosive devices and firearms” among the three highest-level offenses, which are labeled as “level 5 state-mandated zero-tolerance offenses.”

Other such offenses are the assault of school personnel and possessing or selling drugs on campus. All carry a mandatory one-year expulsion.

Elementary-level students who are expelled will be able to attend either Hollywood or Westhaven Success Academy, schools that use an intervention-

style learning and behavior modification program.

Kiva Mallory said Thursday that she was “kind of stunned” when she heard that a gun was found on the campus where one of her children is in prekindergarten.

“Guns are all we see on TV these days,” Mallory said. “When I was that age, I was looking at cartoons, and now everything is about violence.”

Mallory said she could understand that many children are “just curious” about guns and that “it could have happened anywhere,” especially considering all the publicity around guns and gun control following the December shootings in Newtown, Conn.

Principal Evette Smith talked with concerned parents all day Thursday, according to Everson, who stressed that school officials wanted to be as open about the incident as possible.

In a letter to parents Wednesday, Smith pointed out that parents could be held legally responsible if their child brings a gun to school, and asked them to check their “child’s belongings each morning to see that dangerous, illegal, and inappropriate items are not brought to school.”