NILES SCHOOLS Parents raise concern over questioning

The school district's attorney looked into the situation, the superintendent said.
By SHERRI L. SHAULIS
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
NILES -- Parents of two Washington Elementary pupils say school officials didn't follow policy when they questioned their children, but the superintendent insists everything was followed to the letter.
Melissa Givens and Dawn Lundgren say their fourth-graders were called to Principal Linda Eckelberger's office several weeks ago to talk about a conversation they had overheard but were not part of.
School officials and Mike Wilson, the city police officer assigned to the schools, were there.
Both mothers say the children were questioned on what they heard because they were not directly involved in the situation. The problem, they said, is the children became upset over the questioning and asked to call home, but were denied.
"We didn't know about anything until she came home from school that day and was still crying," said Givens.
Pupils were upset
Givens said she later spoke to the child's teacher and found out her daughter was removed from the classroom twice because she was visibly upset over the encounter.
The second time, she was sent to the school office, where she was told to calm down and return to class, Givens said.
"She is too young to really understand what happened, and it scared her," Givens said. "She didn't know if she was in trouble or not."
Lundgren said her daughter had a similar experience and was also removed from her classroom because she "was sobbing uncontrollably. She begged to be allowed to call home but was told no."
Lundgren and Givens said they tried contacting school officials and police to find out why they weren't notified about the questioning, especially since a police officer was involved.
Givens said she took her concerns to a board of education meeting but was told there was no policy requiring parents to be called when pupils are called to the principal's office.
She insists there is, referring to a section of the handbook titled "Schools and the Police." The policy says when police request permission to interrogate a pupil at school the principal must determine why the questioning cannot take place at home, inform the superintendent and inform the pupil's parents.
Response
Superintendent Patrick Guliano said since Givens and Lundgren's children were not questioned by the police, but rather by school personnel, the policy does not apply.
"Our procedures were followed to a T," he said. "We even brought in our legal counsel to investigate the investigation procedure and there was nothing done wrong."
Guliano said there was no reason to call parents, since none of the children were being considered for disciplinary action.
He said a number of children in each school in the district ask to call home for a number of reasons, but not all requests are approved.
In this case, he and DeneSherri Stack, attorney for the school district, said it was an issue that needed to be addressed, but none of the children were directly questioned by the officer, nor were they in trouble, so there was no need to call parents.
"It wasn't anything more than something happened and the school needed to inquire about it," said Stack. "That was the beginning and the end of the story."
Guliano said based on the concerns expressed by parents, he asked Stack to investigate and determine if anything was done wrong. Stack said she found no wrongdoing.
"Believe me, if there had been something done wrong, then I would be the first to say heads would have rolled," Guliano said.
slshaulis@vindy.com