CORNING-PAINTED POST, N.Y. (WETM) – New York State law requires all school districts to submit an annual “School Safety and the Educational Climate” report. It tracks nearly a dozen categories, ranging from falsely pulling fire alarms to homicide. The 2022-2023 “SSEC” report for the Corning-Painted Post Area School District breaks down information for 9 schools, which serve 4,318 students from K-12.
The report says there were no homicides, sexual offenses or assaults. There were also no weapons found on school grounds.
The report does show 30 incidents of “Discrimination, Harassment, and Bullying (DASA) – Excluding Cyberbullying. That’s 0.69% of all students in the district. The 30 incidents are down from 46 reported incidents during the 2021-2022 school year.
10 of the 30 incidents happened at the Corning-Painted Post High School. 15 others happened at the Corning-Painted Post Middle School. The rest happened at 3 Elementary Schools: Two of them at Erwin Valley Elementary School. Two others at William E. Severin Elementary School, and one at Hugh W. Gregg Elementary School.
The report says there were 30 “student offenders” and the same number of “targets/victims.” That number doesn’t include cyberbullying.
The report says 21 of the incidents were “bias-related.” They include discrimination based on race, disability and weight. 8 students received “in-school suspensions.” 21 were “suspended out-of-school.” None of the incidents were “gang or group related.”
The report says there were 3 cyberbullying incidents involving 3 victims. All 3 offenders were suspended from school. That’s down from 4 cyberbullying incidents during the 2021-2022 school year.
The report says there was one threat of school violence made by a high school student. The report says it happened off school property, but met the threshold of “creating a risk of disruption within the school environment.” The report says the threat was not bias-related and did not involve a weapon. The student was suspended from school.
The report also shows there were 51 incidents of “Use, Possession, or Sale of Drugs.” In an email to 18 News, the school district said most of the incidents involved vaping marijuana. The district says there were also a few incidents that involved over-the-counter medications. All 51 students were handed out-of-school suspensions. None of the incidents were “gang or group related.” The 51 incidents are up from 42 reported during 2021-2022.
The report says there were 2 reported incidents of “Use, Possession, or Sale of Alcohol.” One incident was during regular school hours. The other one was outside regular hours. Both students were suspended from school.
The report says there was 1 false alarm and 0 bomb threats.
In an email to 18 News, Superintendent Michelle Caulfield wrote:
“As a district, we have a focused Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility effort including education for students and professional development for staff. We also have implemented a reporting mechanism that allows us to intervene earlier and quicker when situations arise. It is essential that our students and families work with us to help prevent these incidents before they start. One new initiative at the middle school that has had a tremendous impact is “Away for the Day”. Cell phones are no longer allowed during the school day. As a result, we have seen less negative social media incidents and an increase in the overall attentiveness of our students during the school day.
We will continue to focus on education for our students, families, staff and community. For example, we recently hosted a vaping risk awareness evening session for our students, families and community. Although at times it may be difficult to directly correlate specific efforts to a change, we believe each of these opportunities to learn and grow together add up, and help us in creating a safer environment for our CPP family.”
Michelle Caulfield
Superintendent, Corning-Painted Post Area School District
Below, you can view the full district summary report, followed by data breakdowns of the following schools: Corning-Painted Post High School, Corning-Painted Post High School Learning Center, Corning-Painted Post Middle School, Calvin U. Smith Elementary School, Erwin Valley Elementary School, Frederick Carder Elementary School, Hugh W. Gregg Elementary School, William E. Severn Elementary School, Winfield Street Elementary School.
