Chatham-Kent's public school board is standing by the procedures that are in place following a "suspicious vehicle" incident, that has since been cleared.
Letters were sent home with students in the Ridgetown area Tuesday night, in regards to a "suspicious vehicle" that had approached a student. Police clarified on Wednesday morning that the vehicle in question had just stopped to check on a student who had slipped on a patch of ice while waiting for the school bus.
Although the matter was nothing more than two people asking a student if she was okay, Gary Girardi, superintendent of education with the Lambton-Kent District School Board, said it's part of their procedure to contact police, who then look into the matter further. It's also part of their procedure to communicate with parents when police are contacted.
"Off of the initial concern, we sent a letter home to parents and guardians to let them know that there was a report of a suspicious vehicle," he said.
"When we get reports, we do continually reiterate safety protocol with our students. While we don't give out specific information until we have further clarification, it's always in our protocol to contact police, have them investigate, and if there's a need for clarification from parents we follow up with that as well. We do have steps that we take in order to make sure that we're always erring on the side of caution and providing parents with as much up-to-date information as we can, without causing concerns within the community."
One parent, who had contacted Blackburn News Tuesday night, questioned why emails were not sent home earlier in the day. Girardi said in this instance, they believed a letter to parents was appropriate.
"If there would be some concern from the police for us to provide information in a more prompt way, we would do that as well. But as in all of these situations, we are conferring with the police on a regular basis and we work in conjunction with them," he said.
"We believe that we are effective in terms of communicating with parents and that's only because of the support we get in the school, in our community, and from the partners with Chatham-Kent police."
Officials with the St. Clair Catholic District School Board did not want to comment as the reported incident did not involve one of their students. However, the supervisor for community relations said different school boards will relay information to one another when a matter involving a student is reported to police, as part of a common procedure.
