BUFFALO, N.Y. — After a 16-year-old was arrested after a series of fights outside McKinley High School after dismissal on Tuesday.
Buffalo Public School officials provided some new information about what happened during a news conference on Wednesday.
"When you have several hundred students in a place where there is not a whole lot of adult supervision to redirect them, you have what happened yesterday," BPS superintendent Dr. Tonja Williams said Wednesday.
What happened at McKinley High put people on edge. A cellphone video captured the after-school brawl on Elmwood Avenue, outside McKinley. Police were on the scene, as were community peacemakers.
Some people were pepper-sprayed. The principal was also outside.
Dr. Williams outlined new dismissal plans during the news conference.
"The plan for today is to stagger the dismissal for grades 9 and 10, and 11 and 12," Dr. Williams said. "In addition, grades 9 and 10 will exit from one door, and after three or five minutes, grades 11 and 12 will be dismissed from a different door.
"This will allow security, staff members because all the (career and technical education) teachers committed to being outside at dismissal to help with student transition from school to the buses, so this will help students move their way from the school directly to the specials in front of the school."
Sam Radford from the Better Schools Better Neighborhoods program says the district needs to be more inclusive with students when it comes to decision-making.
"I think the thing that we got to do significantly right now is increase the space and opportunity for student voice to be part of the planning," Radford said.
While Dr. Williams says that students in the district are "not out of control," Radford says incidents keep occurring at McKinley High.
"We saw that 20% of the suspensions in all of buffalo Public Schools happen at one school, and it was McKinley," Radford said.
The police response Tuesday was significant. Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia says officers from three separate districts responded to the high school.
"Our officers were being physically engaged by kids that were involved in the fight. Pepper spray was used by at least a couple of officers," Gramaglia said.
One 16-year-old student was arrested.
Gramaglia says he and the department have a good working relationship with the superintendent and the district. Gramaglia, however, did admit that there is a problem with violence and disorderly students that needs to be addressed.
"We're going to continue to work through the problem," Gramaglia said. "But we're not going to tolerate this if criminal conduct occurs, we will make arrests."
Dr. Williams also disputed the notion that the students lacked control.
"The students in Buffalo Public Schools are not out of control. They are not," she said. "Yesterday we had an unfortunate situation, which happened with some of our McKinley students who made poor decisions.
"They are not out of control. They are students who have been impacted by a global pandemic, as most all of us has, and as students have across our state, and our country."
Sam Radford of the Better Schools Better Neighborhoods program also spoke at Wednesday's news conference.
"We really got get ahead of this before somebody loses their life," he said. "We were looking at suspensions in this first month of school. We saw 20% of suspensions in BPS happened at one school, and it was McKinley."
Radford pointed to leadership in the school and the need for more seasoned leadership.