Officials at Swegle Elementary School in Salem, Ore. sent a letter to parents this week indicating that parents who are late to pick up their children will find the children delivered to state officials for a possible overnight stay in a juvenile detention center.
Portland ABC affiliate KATU-TV reported the story earlier this week after a concerned parent contacted the station.
The letter — typed in a goofy, unprofessional font which looks to comic sans — explains that breakfast service begins promptly at 7:45 a.m. and ends at 8:15 a.m. Parents should feed kids at home if they are “running late.”
“Please don’t drop your children off before this time. There will not be any supervision. If children are dropped before 7:40,” the letter ominously warns, “the staff will contact authorities.”
Then things get really serious.
“Children must be picked up on time,” the alarming comic sans letter threatens. “If they are not picked up on time, we will call DHS and you will then have to pick them up at court the next day.”
DHS is the Oregon Department of Human Services.
“See you in the fall,” the letter cheerily concludes after a series of other warnings and rebukes.
A spokesman for the local Salem-Keizer school district blamed an unidentified “office-level employee” for sending the menacing missive. It was an “error,” the spokesman, Jay Remy, said, because Swegle principal Corina Valencia-Chavez had been on vacation and had not approved the threats to call police on kids who show up early and to remove children from parental custody when parents get to school late in the afternoon.
“It doesn’t strike the right tone,” Remy promised the Statesman Journal. “There will be an apology.”
The actions described in the letter “would not be taken” if kids show up too early to school or if parents are late picking up their children, the school spokesman promised and swore.
The parent who initially reported receiving the letter told KATU she has since received a prerecorded, impersonal robocall from Valencia-Chavez, the Swegle Elementary principal.
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