Dear Syd, I would like to go on record thanking the Headmaster David Priestley and all the staff at Greenfield School, for the professional and caring way they handled the incident that took place outside the school on October 5th, when two youths were seen to be brandishing an air rifle. They should be commended for taking the decision to keep the pupils safe and secure within their classrooms, away from any potential harm outside the school gates, until the Police arrived. As a parent of two girls who attend the school, I am told the environment was calm and lessons were taking place as normal, throughout the “lock down” period. Unfortunately the most concerning and disturbing part of this episode, took place outside the school on Thursday October 6th, when a clearly misinformed parent, for his own mystifying reasons decided that instead of asking for a private meeting with the School to air his view, he would instead stand outside the school as pupils were leaving for the day and hurl abusive, threatening language and behaviour at the Headmaster in full view of pupils and parents. I do hope that on reflection this individual will issue an apology to pupils and the School for any upset his frightening and needless behaviour caused. Kind regards, Richard Mallender
Newton News spoke to Greenfield Community College and the following reply has been submitted by David Priestley, Executive Headteacher: “As you can imagine it was really important to keep everyone safe and calm while the police undertook their investigations and dealt with the matter. We feel that the situation was handled in an appropriate and robust way and are hugely grateful to both the staff and pupils for their calm and sensible approach. “As soon as we were able we shared the information that we had by texting the majority of the parents to explain the situation with letters being sent to those not on our automated system.”
