It wasn't 30 girls, more like 10ish. Sad when events in the community spill into the school. The staff works hard to keep it safe, but sometimes the street wins.

What nothing about the fact that the staff took control, restored order and had the school operating normal within 20 min? Short of the lunch times being off a bit, the school was back in business. Of course some kids were on edge but that's to be expected.

Amazing we've done what we have after geeting the alternative school kids back and then the "great kids comebacks" The system keeps throwing gas on us and then acts shocked when a fire starts.

Suppose we're not doing the work because we made the paper. It was ok when we were positive though. How about those bride projects and the 500+ completed..... ahhh gotta love it.

What do you expect would happen? In a city where teachers are powerless and not respected and where administrators hands are tied to keep these children in school? Its a fact that less than 50% of the students graduate in the city. Why allow them to bring down the education of the other HALF? When they do these types of things, they must go! Why do we allow these troublemakers to bring our schools down?

I'm proud of how my school handled this situation. If this happened last year, I can't imagine the violence that would've taken place.

I do wish, though, that this posting by Sarah read less like gossip. It would help if you could explain your sources, only because as a teacher there - it doesn't sound accurate. If the principal gave you this information, I'd be more ready to accept it.

In a perfect world, we would start to get more positive coverage for what we have accomplished this year to help balance out these other negative incidents. This post unfairly keeps our already negative perception going strong.

I think the gossip-like tone comes because this is a blog format, not an official news story, although I think that as online news progresses, that line is getting blurred... i tend to agree though -- many stories have not been written by Sara because no one would "go on record," yet many other stories seem to show up without sources being named -- not sure what the criteria is there...

I will always take issue that she needs to publish the source's name in order to write the story. I wonder if Watergate would have happened if they had to use the real name? The media has fallen in love with AAA and thus doesn't do the hard reporting, esp if it will upset his agenda.

Ditto critics your post on creditable fairness on Sara Neufield poor and some times lacking creditable ocular or any other first, second, or third party evidence reporting style.

As a teacher at Northwestern I would like to bring your attention to the following: Northwestern had the most bridge projects in the state, we have the highest pass rate, and the highest completion rate. Parents come to our building everyday and complement us on the changes that have been made at the school this year. Students tell us everyday that the current administration cares about them and their success at the school, something they didn't feel in the past. In fact I was with a teacher from another city school on Friday and he could not believe how clear the halls were and how much learning was going on.

The administration works harder than any administration I have ever seen in the system. Teachers and students spend their Saturdays working on Bridge projects and preparing for the HSA, where is this reported?

The incident on Friday spilled over from the community into the school. The staff responded and all students involved were dealt with. I was there and saw the staff working as a team to bring order to the school.

The way this is being reported would make average person think that the administration hasn't done anything to improve the climate of the school. When in fact much has been done.

Students come to class with a plan for graduation. Many students that walked the halls in years past are in class working a plan to get them out. We have many "come back kids" that are seeing success, we have been able to work with students to create a plan and keep them out of alternative schools.

The work the staff does is hard work, they are dedicated professionals determined to change the climate of NW. Before people continue to judge us, lets wait and see what the test scores show. After all Rome wasn't built in a day, and look at all the battles they fought.

PS. all the research says it takes 3 - 4 years to change the climate of a school.

The incidents that transpired at Northwestern were a result of neighborhood violence spilling into the school. It was something that had been brewing all week. It came to a head Friday morning.
While there have always been fights in schools, these brawls have plagued high schools for the last six or seven years. Why the change? The answer is TECHNOLOGY. Fights are no longer isolated situations because of the cell phone that every student carries. They allow allies to team up and meet at a chosen location to fight. They allow these students to then text parents, older siblings, and friends to add to the chaos.
The events Friday could have been worse, but we, as a faculty, acted swiftly. They will continue to happen as long as cell phones are not banned from city schools. They need to be banned, not confiscated selectively. Or the next time, things will be worse.

Really and NW teachers: Thanks for your feedback. I followed the standard operating procedure on Friday: The director of the school system's communications office read me the school police report. This is how the media are supposed to get information officially about school violence. The blog is written in a more conversational tone than a newspaper article, but the brief that ran in the paper attributed the information to a system spokeswoman.
That said: If the information I got was incorrect (and there were 10 kids involved rather than 30), we should run a correction. And we should also report the Bridge data. I've left a message for the principal this morning and requested the data from the school system. I'll write another post when I've heard back.

In the meantime, could you change the false headline on this blog post?