New Athens principal resigns amid scrutiny over response to gun found on child

A New Athens principal is resigning amid scrutiny of her actions after staff found an unloaded gun in a first-grader’s backpack.

New Athens Community Unit School District 60’s board accepted elementary and junior high principal Stephanie Kennedy’s resignation at its meeting on Monday. She has been on a paid suspension in relation to the incident since it happened in late April, School Board President Karen Meyer said during the meeting.

The resignation is effective May 31, according to Superintendent Brian Karraker.

At Monday’s meeting, school leaders said Kennedy failed to immediately alert police and the superintendent after confiscating a gun on school grounds, in violation of district procedures.

Some parents have also criticized the information Kennedy provided them about the incident as vague and delayed.

Kennedy did not respond to requests for comment this week. The BND has requested her resignation letter and district communications about the incident. Under Illinois law, the district has five business days to respond.

Kennedy told police she did not report the gun earlier because she believed it was fake, according to a police report obtained by the Belleville News-Democrat. It was a Rohm RG10 revolver. Kennedy said the student did not make threats and brought the gun as a toy to play with at recess, the report states.

“I informed Principal Kennedy that the Police Department should have been notified immediately as a gun was involved, ‘real or fake,’” Police Chief Tim Buehler wrote in the report.

Breanna Robison, the child’s mother, described the gun as an inoperable antique to police and the BND.

Robison has been charged with misdemeanors related to child endangerment, unsafe gun storage and possessing a firearm with an expired Firearm Owner’s Identification card.

The police report states a student told a first-grade teacher that a classmate had a gun in his backpack around 10:30 a.m. on April 20. The gun was confiscated that morning and returned to the student’s mother after school.

The elementary secretary could tell the gun was real when she picked it up to give it to the mother, and she informed the principal, according to the police report. Kennedy told police she called the superintendent at that point.

She emailed district parents and Buehler shortly after 4 p.m. saying a student had an unspecified weapon at school.

Buehler missed a call from Kennedy just before 4:30 p.m. The first-grade teacher called Buehler shortly after 5 p.m. and reported the incident.

During Monday’s school board meeting, New Athens Village Board Member Richard Fitzgerald questioned the school district’s policies and procedures for such situations.

In response, Karraker said the district has policies for addressing weapons on school grounds, but they were not followed in this case. Meyer, the school board president, agreed.

“It’s not really a policy that needed change,” Meyer said at the meeting. “There were a lot of things that were done incorrectly by the principal at that time that Mr. Karraker acted upon as soon as he could legally do something, and she was put on paid suspension.”

Since the incident, the school has hosted an assembly for its kindergarten through fourth-grade students with Buehler and information from the National Rifle Association’s Eddie Eagle GunSafe Material program.

The program teaches children not to touch a gun if they find one and to promptly tell an adult, its website explains.