BRIGHTON, Colo. — Concerned parents filled the auditorium at Bromley East Charter School (BECS) Tuesday night, looking for answers from school leadership.
The school’s administration and Brighton Police Department led a safety town hall just days after bullets were found at the school, leading to a "hold" where students were kept in classrooms as police searched the property.
School leadership said “three unspent rounds” were uncovered on the property Friday, but no weapon was found, and an offender has yet to be identified.
Brighton
Bromley East Charter School parents want accountability after bullet found
Tuesday night, BECS executive director Jennifer Shaver said “the ammunition was located in a hallway and got kicked into a classroom.”
“I just want to acknowledge that this event was not easy for anyone, and we hope something like this never happens again,” Shaver told the parents gathered at the school and those watching the town hall via livestream.
Parents reached out to Denver7 after the incident on Friday, saying communication during the roughly 4-hour hold was limited, leaving them unsure what was going on and if their kids were safe.
Shaver said during the town hall that while they did not want to alarm parents to make them come to the school during the search, she acknowledged that there should have been an update sooner.
“So given the length of the hold, it would have been appropriate to give families an update stating, ‘We remain on hold and all students are safe,’” she said.
Ryan Liggett, one of the parents who spoke with Denver7 before and after the town hall, called that “one of the biggest ownerships [school leaders] had,” but still felt like the town hall “skated around a lot of questions.”
The town hall only addressed pre-submitted questions Tuesday night. Leaders said the school received more than 250 questions, but condensed them into about an hour’s worth of questions and answers.
“It was a lot of general, ‘We can't speak about that. Here's our policy.’ There was no specifics,” Liggett said. “They're trying to make it very low-key. They put this meeting together because of the social media uproar that happened over the weekend. I do not believe this would have happened without us parents speaking out.”
Another parent who did not want to share his name, fearing retaliation, called for changes to school leadership for how they handled communication during this incident and others. When asked about Tuesday’s town hall, he said he believes the administration “just chose to pick the general nicest questions that they can answer that make themselves look good.”
There were other communication issues during the incident. Shaver said staff members were supposed to receive notifications at the same time as parents on Friday, but did not.
“This was due to an error on our part when sending the parent communication along with crafting the staff communication that didn't link it back either,” she said. “So when we typically send out those notifications… We'll hit parents and staff at the same time. In this instance, we didn't do that, and we do try to make sure we're linking information that we send to our parent community into those communications we send them to staff. And that detail was not executed Friday, and so it will be our practice going forward to include parent community communications within staff communications to ensure consistency with information.”
Shaver said while there won’t be major safety policy updates, she announced the school is already in the process of securing a full-time school resource officer, and leadership is working to fill that position.
Brighton PD's investigation into the incident is ongoing. Parents are still looking for a resolution and someone found responsible for bringing the bullets to school.
“It’s disheartening,” said Liggett. “You know, I have multiple kids in this school, and we're about to send them back to school, and they have no idea what happened.”
Friday's incident comes one month after a student was reportedly approached by a suspicious man outside the school. In response, Brighton PD increased its patrols near the school.
