SCMS student assault posted on social media

A Shawano Community Middle School student was assaulted by another student May 16 in a classroom, according to a video posted on Instagram, prompting anger in the community.

The video, less than a minute long, showed the victim being punched at least three times and pushed at least twice by the perpetrator with a number of students watching in the classroom. The video only showed the attack from two angles and then a third angle, which was repeated twice, where someone could be heard jeering. It did not show if anyone tried to stop the attack.

The video has since been reposted on other social media, including Facebook, and comments on one of the postings indicates that there have other incidents of bullying and assault at the school. Other comments indicate the school does nothing about it, and that children are afraid to go to school for fear of being a bully’s target.

Shawano School Board President Mike Musolff, who is also a lieutenant with the Shawano Police Department, said on May 17 that the school has taken action to remedy the situation but could not discuss specifics because of student confidentiality. He also said that the police received the call the day before and is actively investigating the matter to determine criminal charges.

“Today, someone posted a video on Instagram, and it’s rather graphic,” Musolff said. “Further action will follow.”

Musolff acknowledged that community members have been calling both the school district and the police department, and he’s been trying to explain that an investigation is underway, even as some are calling for immediate consequences for the attacker.

Musolff said it would have been better for the video to be provided to law enforcement rather than be posted on the internet to stir up anger.

“If there’s an issue going on, report it,” Musolff said. “If you’re afraid to report it, report it in a different way where it’s done quietly and anonymously, and we’ll get to it from there.”

Musolff said the school district and the police department has discussed bullying policies “quite often,” but it has not been a topic of conversation at the school board level. Board member Mart Grams suggested that bullying should be discussed in more detail at the May 15 school board meeting, and Musolff said May 17 that there should be some more discussion.

“It’s an interesting situation,” Musolff said. “You don’t want to expel students for any reason, but we’ve also got to take back our schools from these bullying situations.”

Musolff added that it’s important for the community to know that, even though schools everywhere try to be safe spaces, they can’t be all the time.

“We want to tell you that your kids are as safe as can be in school, but then isolated incidents happen like this,” Musolff said. “We do what we can to prevent them from happening, but unfortunately a lot of things go unreported, and then something accelerates into something worse.”

The “something worse” Musolff worries is that students might commit suicide as a result of being bullied. There’s also the possibility of victims snapping and becoming one of the school shooters that have become all too common on news reports.

“Parents, make sure you’re talking to your kids about this,” Musolff said. “If you’re being bullied at school, we have to know about it to try to stop it from happening in the future. Parents with bullies for kids, you need to tell them to knock it off. You don’t know what’s going to happen with that kid that you’re bullying. They may have a lot of other stuff going on, too.”

Musolff emphasized that bullies need to learn that their actions have consequences.

“You keep your comments to yourself. You keep your hands to yourself,” Musolff said. “With school, you’re there to learn, not to bully or cause mischief.”

Musolff said that not having adequate staff in the schools is not making the efforts to curb bullying any easier. He noted that one thing the district is going to do if it can get an operational referendum passed is to try and get more adults in the schools, whether it’s more teachers, aides or police officers.

“Is the community going to allow the school district to step up and get more staff to try and stop these problems from happening in their tracks?” Musolff said. “We seem to have a higher percentage of these things happening in Shawano. I’m not saying they don’t happen elsewhere, but it seems like a lot of the bullying is happening. Maybe it’s because we’re here and we see it, and maybe it’s not so different from any other school district, but it seems to me that we have a higher amount of things happening.”

Musolff’s phone has been ringing constantly as community members are reporting their displeasure about the situation.

“I’m getting a lot of phone calls about the situation because it’s on social media,” Musolff said. “It is being worked on by both the school district and the police department, and unfortunately, we can’t give resolutions (publicly) on what we do with children as far as punishment goes, but it’s important for people to know that juveniles have different level of privacy than adults do, and blasting the kids or posting videos with victims is not a good thing.”

lpulaski@newmedia-wi.com