LAKELAND, Fla. — WARNING: This story contains graphic content.
Parents at a Lakeland elementary school said they made multiple reports of bullying to school officials but nothing has happened.
A group of parents of students at Medulla Elementary showed up to voice their concerns at a school board meeting earlier this week. That’s where they realized how many other families were experiencing the same response.
“I thought I was the only one, I thought my child was the only child, I had no idea about all the other stories,” said Heather Brenneman, whose son is in second grade at Medulla Elementary. “There’s a whole village of students and parents who have experienced the exact same response that I had faced, that my son has faced: little to no help from administration at all.”
“Last Tuesday at the school board meeting,” added Tracey Dannemiller, whose granddaughter is also in second grade. “I had already heard the stories, but when you stand in the room and you hear time after time, ‘I’m so-and-so and my child is so-and-so, who attends Medulla Elementary’, ‘Medulla Elementary’, ‘Medulla Elementary’… It’s daunting to hear.”
Anthony Walker, whose son is also in the second grade at Medulla, said his son’s issues with bullying started last year and that he reported it to the school back then.
“I made a report on paper, I handed it to them, they said they’d take care of it,” said Walker. “We never heard anything else about it. Then it happened again, what really triggered the whole thing all over again was, now it happened again and the only reason why we heard anything about this was because my son decided to fight back.”
In a statement emailed to 10News, Polk County Public Schools said:
We heard loud and clear the concerns that were raised at Tuesday’s School Board meeting. We are committed first, foremost and unwaveringly to providing a safe environment for all of our students and staff members. Following Tuesday’s Board meeting, Superintendent Byrd and Deputy Superintendent John Hill met informally with Medulla Elementary Principal Myra Richardson. District administrators will continue to work closely with the school to better understand the concerns that were shared at the Board meeting and to identify and develop solutions that will provide the best learning and working environment possible for all of our stakeholders.
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