Category: School

Ex-school principal accused of ‘willful cruelty’ after video shows him shoving student

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A former elementary school principal was accused of abusing a 9-year-old student after video showed him shoving the child to the ground, officials said Thursday.

Brian Vollhardt, who resigned from Wolters Elementary School in Fresno after the school district launched an investigation into the June 7 altercation, faces a charge of willful cruelty to a minor, police and school officials said during a Thursday news conference.

Court records show Vollhardt is scheduled to be arraigned for the alleged crime, a misdemeanor, on Sept. 26.

“There’s no excuse for repugnant behavior such as this,” school district superintendent Bob Nelson told reporters.

A video of the incident was released by the Fresno Unified School District and Fresno police with some faces blurred.

Nelson said the incident occurred after Vollhardt joined a group of students eating breakfast. Fresno Police Chief Paco Balderrama described the boy as a “special needs” student, though he did

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Hanover County, Virginia, school district apologizes for logo resembling swastika

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During the conference held for staff this week, Hanover County Public Schools distributed T-shirts and conference materials containing the logo, which the district says had been designed by one of its teachers.

The logo was intended “to represent four hands and arms grasping together — a symbol of unity for our all-county professional learning conference. Nothing more,” Michael Gill, superintendent of the district situated north of Richmond, said in an online message.

“We are deeply sorry for this mistake and for the emotions that the logo has evoked by its semblance to a swastika and, by extension, to the atrocities that were committed under its banner,” Gill said. “Unquestionably, we condemn anything associated with the Nazi regime in the strongest manner possible.”

Gill said the apology comes after concerns about the logo were raised, and that the district understands that the logo “has deeply upset members of our staff and

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False active shooter reports at schools are having serious consequences

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It was a peaceful Friday morning for Murrisha Leon, who was asleep when she received a call from a fellow parent warning her of an active shooter at their children’s high school in Arkansas.

Immediately, Leon’s heart sank as images of worst-case scenarios flooded her mind. She might lose one of her kids today, she told herself.

“I jumped up in a panic and instantly threw up,” Leon told CNN. “I believed it and feared for my children’s lives. I called them, and when they didn’t answer the first time, I started crying.”

Leon’s son, 14, and daughter, 16, both attend Watson Chapel High School, which was put on lockdown immediately after the school received news of a possible active shooter on campus – another in a series of reported threats at US schools this week.

Leon soon received a text from her son, saying, “Mama please come get me,

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