Snapchat rumor prompts NC high school to switch to remote learning, nix football game
A rumored threat on Snapchat of a planned campus shooting prompted Mooresville High School to switch to remote learning on Friday and postpone its home football game.
The rumor caused 39.4% of students at the school to stay home on Thursday, Tanae McLean, spokeswoman for the Mooresville Graded School District, told The Charlotte Observer on Friday.
“Due to the investigation continuing today, we decided it would be more instructionally sound to have a virtual day where students who were staying home due to concerns would still receive instruction,” McLean said in an email. “We postponed the football game due to going virtual.”
Late Wednesday, McLean notified parents that school officials received a screen shot of a Snapchat message that said: “Okay so apparently someone said that they were going to shoot up the school tomorrow at 10:30 Mooresville high I’m not going to school bruh (expletive) dat.”
According to McLean’s message to Mooresville High School parents, officials found “no evidence to the legitimacy of the threat” but were “taking it very seriously” and notified police.
In her message to district parents late Wednesday, she said: “We wanted to make all our our district parents aware so that if you or your student see or hear anything, you can let us or the Mooresville Police Department know immediately.”
More police than usual were at the high school on Thursday “as a precaution,” McLean said.
McLean on Friday provided the Observer with a copy of the messages she sent Wednesday night to parents of students at the high school and parents of all students in the district and another message to parents late Thursday.
In the late Thursday message, McLean said district officials anticipated a similar percentage of students would stay home again Friday.
On Facebook, the high school posted that officials are trying to reschedule the nonconference football game against Providence High School.
This story was originally published October 1, 2021 at 11:50 AM with the headline "Snapchat rumor prompts NC high school to switch to remote learning, nix football game."