“We were looking to have a successful first day dismissal at the Highland Falls Intermediate School on opening day, but ….”

That’s how Highland Falls-Fort Montgomery Central School District Superintendent of Schools Michael McElduff started his report at a School Board meeting on the second day of school, going to talk about an incident on the roof of the HFIS that caused a bit of dismissal chaos.

The superintendent said that a worker (new to the job) on the roof of the school was using a tool which ignited a small fire between the roof and the ceiling of a storage area in the school’s gym. He said local fire departments responded swiftly to the 1:37 p.m. fire alarm, and at 2:33 p.m. everyone was allowed back into the building.

But it wasn’t quite as simple as that. Due to a combination of a messaging tool which the school district uses to communicate with parents not functioning correctly, some changing information about when students and teachers would be allowed back into the building, and the approaching dismissal time for the building, the incident caused a bit of concern in the community.

For instance, parents who arrived at the building, either in preparation for dismissal or because they heard about the fire alarm, saw children standing in front of the HFIS, on both sides of Mountain Ave. That’s because due to the roofing project, they couldn’t use the field for their evacuation area.

And, because pre-kindergarten dismisses earlier that the other grades, McElduff said the decision was made to go ahead and get them out of the area directly from the evacuation. The buses for those students loaded them from School St.

Traffic back-ups on Mountain Ave. then caused the rest of the school’s buses to arrive late, and they weren’t able to be loaded and leave the area until 3:36 p.m., about a half hour after they typically do. There was also a short hold-up for some students once they left HFIS thanks to an issue on Firefighters Memorial Drive in Fort Montgomery.

About the communication with parents, McElduff acknowledged that the way it worked on that day “is not okay”. Once they were able to get connectivity, teachers used a different app to get messages out. On Thursday, district officials reached out to Blackboard (Parent Link), the company they hire for the messaging; that company acknowledged the issue was on their end. A successful test was done on Thursday, reassuring McElduff the system was now working.

“If you aren’t getting messages from us,” McElduff said, “please reach out to your building administrator.”

He did take a minute to address complaints that they did not use social media to reach out to families during the incident – “Social media is great,” he said, “but it is not our regular line of communication.”

Another concern discussed on social media at the time of the incident was why roofing work was going on while school was in session. McElduff said the type of work that caused the incident was not supposed to be taking place during school hours, and the contractor “has changed their ways”.

“They were held accountable,” the superintendent added.
Facilities Director Chris Kirwan noted that, as of that day, roofing work at the HFIS was about 80% complete. Similar work at the high school was about 65% done on the main roof and 90% done on the gymnasium roof. He said that the district was expecting the roofing work to be completed before school resumed last week, but “18 days of rain this summer” slowed the process.
McElduff said they learned from the incident.

“The HFFMCSD places a high priority on the safety and well-being of our students, faculty, and staff. We strive to keep the community informed regarding any emergent situations to the best of our ability during and after such incidents. The district holds itself to high standards of transparency, and yesterday, our communication system did not meet those standards. Most importantly, we want to reassure you that the health and safety of our students, faculty, and staff are always our top priority. All students were safe and well cared for by our incredible faculty and staff during the event.”

But, the end result, the superintendent said, is that “some things did not work perfectly, but our kids were always safe, and they all got home okay.”