On Friday, September 6, Warren Grant, a Joppatowne High School student, was killed while attending school. I want to express my sincerest condolences to his family, friends, and all who knew him and were touched by him during his too short life.
We’ve taken the past days and hours to grieve with and support Joppatowne. Our hearts are broken for our students, our families, our staff, and our community who are forced to confront fear, anger, and uncertainty as a result of this senseless violence.
Everyone involved in this incident will deal with the impact in different ways. I ask our entire community to focus on supporting and lifting one another up. Please, talk with your students about the best path forward for them as individuals and for you as a family. Every school has services and staff in place who are ready and available to support your students as we collectively process and grieve the loss of one of our own.
While our community has confronted tragedy in the past, this is the first time we have lost a student to gun violence inside one of our schools.
Immunity from senseless tragedies like this can never be guaranteed, but I am committed to doing everything we can for the students and everyone else connected to our schools so they can focus on the primary reason for being in school – education.
We have received many suggestions about how best to ensure a more secure environment in our schools. I appreciate the ideas, and we will consider every recommendation we receive. That said, I ask people to not lose sight of the most effective deterrent to tragedy in our schools – relationships characterized by open communication. Please encourage people to speak up if they have concerns or learn of threats to our students, our schools, or our community. Our staff are trained to elevate information they receive to the appropriate authorities whenever information reaches them about potential safety issues. Local law enforcement is an incredibly responsive partner to Harford County Public Schools whenever we make them aware of any type of threat. If you see something, say something, and please encourage your children to do the same.
The Harford County Sheriff’s Office is still actively investigating what occurred at the school on Friday. You can monitor their communications for the latest updates about the investigation, and I encourage you to reach out to them if you have additional information that might be of assistance.
In addition to a wide variety of Harford County entities, we have received offers of support from Governor Moore, Senator Cardin, the State Board of Education, and the State Superintendent of Schools. Much of our work over the past two days has focused on how we might leverage that support to heighten security and create the safest possible environment in our schools.
Our very first priority is to ensure we address the immediate needs at Joppatowne High School so the community can begin healing. We still have much to do toward that end and have made adjustments to their schedule for this week. As we announced on Saturday, Joppatowne High School plans to return to classes on Thursday, September 12. The other Joppatowne schools, Magnolia Middle, Magnolia Elementary, Riverside Elementary, and Joppatowne Elementary, will be closed on Monday and return to classes on Tuesday.
On Monday, September 9th, I encourage everyone across the county to wear purple in support of Joppatowne.
Over the next few weeks, we will conduct community meetings so people may share concerns and ideas about how we might move forward in creating the type of environment we want for our schools and our community.
Thank you for your support throughout these past few days. It is felt and appreciated. We will continue to navigate this tragedy with steadiness and transparency.
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