A handgun was confiscated Monday morning from a student at Thompson Middle School. The initial report about the presence of the gun on campus was made by a student, and after officers with the Quinlan Independent School District Police Department were told about the situation, they were able to confiscate the weapon and take the student who was in possession of the firearm into custody. view article

The rush Ally Harrison craved was gone, so she upped the nicotine levels. From three milligrams of the drug, to six, nine, 25 and eventually 50 milligrams. "I actually started doing cigarettes and 50 nicotine (vaping)," said Harrison, 18, who started vaping the summer before her freshman year of high school after a friend gave her one as a gift. "You wouldn't get a head rush the seventh or eighth time you did it, so, hey I guess it's time to up the usage of it, or the amount." view article

Nashville school district officials say they shouldn't have described two men they say sought student records at a school as "immigration officials" without confirming they were. District spokeswoman Olivia Brown says Una Elementary staff haven't been able to recall when it happened, and the district hasn't found video or other records because the date remains uncertain. She says the school didn't document the incident, copy their badges or record the men's information before turning them away. view article

Laredo ISD is taking an extra preventive measure when it comes to their student's health. The school board bought nine EKG machines and today all LISD school nurses were receiving a training to learn about the new equipment. Through a pilot program last year, LISD was able to learn about students’ hearts. view article

A firearm was confiscated from a student at Thompson Middle School Monday morning. Superintendent of Schools, Jeff Irvin sent a letter home to parents telling them administrators and police took the weapon from the student who’s currently in custody. view article

The Cameron Independent School District Board of Trustees discussed campus security and an agreement with the Burleson-Milam Special Services Cooperative during a meeting Monday night. CISD Superintendent Kevin Sprinkles told the board the final installations of access controls at Yoe High School are being done. view article

Two local organizations in Forney recently provided their generous support of Forney ISD students. The Forney Lion's Club recently conducted free eye exams at the First United Methodist Church in Forney and provided free glasses for a number of students in Forney ISD on Wednesday, Oct. 30. The Lions Sight and Tissue Foundation of District 2-X1 brought the Neil Roach Mobile Eye Clinic to provide eye exams for Forney ISD students. The Neil Roach Mobile Eye Clinic set up their operation at the Forney First United Methodist Church. view article

A video captured on a Katy ISD school bus on Oct. 18 showed a student attacking another student. The district said the results of a police investigation were turned over to the Harris County District Attorney’s office. They will decide if charges will need to be filed. Katy ISD didn’t launch a separate bullying investigation until this week after the victim’s mother requested it. view article

Manor ISD’s (MISD) Board of Trustees unanimously voted to approve the creation of the Manor ISD Police Department during its regularly scheduled Board meeting on Monday. MISD is currently under a contract with the Travis County Sheriff's Office (TCSO) that is set to expire in June 2020. MISD Trustee Johnny Velasco said the decision was long overdue. view article

From China Elementary in Sour Lake: "HJISD was notified (Sunday) evening of an unconfirmed case of meningitis at China Elementary. For the safety of our students, China Elementary will be closed...November 4, 2019. view article

Bartlett ISD will be closed Monday, November 4 due to water complications. The schools say the NHS induction will be rescheduled to a later date. School is planned to resume on Tuesday, November 5. view article

Cedar Hill police are investigating after an 11-year-old boy was found dead of an apparent shooting injury in his parents bedroom with handgun nearby Saturday night. The incident happened at about 7:43 p.m. Saturday in the 900 block of S. Highland Drive, Cedar Hill police said. Sunday, the Dallas County Medical Examiner identified the boy as Daron Sneed Jr. view article

There have been 13 lung injuries related to e-cigarettes in Travis County so far. As the number continues to climb, Austin ISD took action to stop it with the Red Ribbon Week re-focus. The campaign ended on Friday and teachers think students were receptive to the information. view article

The Katy ISD is investigating the alleged assault and “bullying” of a 15-year-old student after the girl’s mother said the teen was beaten on a school bus by another student -- an attack that was captured on video. A district spokeswoman confirmed Thursday that school officials had opened two separate investigations – of assault and bullying – into the Oct. 18 incident on a school bus leaving Katy High School. view article

Elementary school students from Godley ISD delivered hand-made pillows for cancer patients at Baylor Scott & White All Saints Medical Center Fort Worth. Eight 1st graders were on hand with Godley ISD teacher Stacy Brown, who was diagnosed with breast cancer in April. When Brown found out she had breast cancer, she turned to Kristi Evans, a former GISD teacher and friend, who now is a breast navigator for women undergoing breast cancer treatment. view article

Cellphone video recorded Wednesday shows a faculty member at Campbell Middle School forcefully removing a student from detention. The student in the video is 13-year-old Za'Naiya Poullard. The seventh-grader said she was in detention for being tardy and was being bothered by another student. She said she tried telling that student to quit but claims she was asked to leave by the faculty member for talking. view article

After a unanimous vote, Manor ISD’s Board of Trustees approved the creation of the Manor ISD Police Department earlier this week. The new police department will provide officers to support all 17 campuses in Manor with an increased police presence. Manor ISD has also already began the process of providing additional security to schools in the meantime. view article

School districts across the country mark fall with a week-long celebration that takes a fun approach to a very serious message. Red Ribbon Week has arrived in Liberty Hill ISD and every campus in the district used a different theme each day this week to help engage and begin a conversation with students on the dangers of drug use. Liberty Hill Junior High Principal Travis Motal said the themed days aren’t simply to make it fun. view article

When Damon Burns decided to confront the Santa Fe Police Department, its officers literally could see him coming a mile away.  Last October, following a series of agitated phone calls in which he’d demanded to speak to the chief, Burns resolved to seek a personal audience. A combination of medical and legal issues has prevented the 59-year-old from holding a driver’s license. In recent years his only transportation has been a deeply broken-in red Craftsman 917 lawn tractor.  “It looks old,” he said. “But lots of people have older-style cars.” Traveling at 5 mph, he estimated the trip to the town’s justice center took about 35 minutes. view article

Beginning next year, Austin ISD students will, for the first time, have an opportunity to learn about gender identity and same-sex relationships from trained adults in a classroom setting. On a unanimous vote in the early hours of Tuesday, Oct. 29, the AISD Board of Trustees gave final approval to new lessons in the district's updated Human Sexuality and Responsibility curriculum. The vote represents a step forward for a district that has struggled to live up to its slogan of "All Means All." The progress made, and the impact it will have for future generations of AISD students, was embodied in the hopes shared by Concetta Pil­grim, a third grader at Ridgetop Elementary who identifies as gender nonbinary. Before the meeting, Concetta told the Chronicle they were there because "[some] people don't want us to learn about other genders, or about what other people are." view article

“We had an eighth grade Maverick tonight go into cardiac arrest on the field,” Griedl wrote on Twitter. “Praise God our trainer put her hours of training and education to work, doing everything in her power to resuscitate him (using CPR and AED. He is currently stable in the hospital. Send your prayers to him and his family.”  Gibson said the student was released from the hospital later that night. view article

A brief lock-out was lifted for Bullard ISD after authorities apprehended a suspect who abandoned his vehicle during a chase. According to the district’s Facebook page, the school was placed on a lock-out at about 10:19 a.m. due to a “situation in the community.” The lock-out was lifted ten minutes later after the situation was reportedly resolved. view article

A report of a bed bug infestation disrupted classes at an Austin ISD school on Wednesday. The district tells KXAN that students at Bertha Sadler Means Young Women’s Leadership Academy were moved to another part of the school for 30 minutes. They called in a pest control company to look into it. view article

In the wake of tragic school shootings, Senate Bill 11 requires every school district in the state of Texas to put together a team to focus on school safety. Training on how to put those school safety plans into action was held today for region nine. Superintendents and board members from all over the region showed up for the training, which was led by the Texas School Safety Center (TxSSC). view article

What happens when a school has to be evacuated? Where will students and staff go? How will parents be reunited with their children? These are a few of the questions 28 La Vernia Independent School District “stakeholders” sought to answer at an Oct. 23 district safety meeting. Participants included county and city law enforcement, first responders, school district staff, community members, and one La Vernia High School student. Even the La Vernia News was represented. view article

The City of Austin's Public Health Department has launched a webpage to provide local updates on the national investigation of lung injuries associated with e-cigarette use. According to the City, the webpage, AustinTexas.gov/ECigarettes, will be updated every Friday with new local case numbers. As of Friday, Oct. 25, the Austin Public Health epidemiology and disease surveillance unit was investigating 12 cases of Austin or Travis County residents with vaping-related lung injuries. view article

A brief lock-down of Bullard ISD campuses Wednesday morning was the result of a law enforcement chase of a suspect who had abandoned his vehicle in Bullard, but has since been apprehended. According to Cherokee County Sheriff James Campbell, the driver of the pickup “was chasing his mother while he was in his pickup, but then abandoned it” after a pursuit by law enforcement agents. CCSO Captain Fred Butler said the chase initiated in Cherokee County mid-morning, and not long thereafter, the driver was apprehended in Bullard. view article

Denton ISD is reminding parents to talk with their children about safety following a report of a suspicious incident Tuesday afternoon. According to a letter sent to parents by Bell Elementary, located in Little Elm, a student told her parents that an older man grabbed the girl’s backpack as the girl was walking home from school in a neighborhood near the campus. view article

There's a relatively new health threat on the rise in Wise County: underage vaping. view article

Last April, a study came out from researchers at the University of Toledo and Ball State University that said the fortune being spent to “harden” public schools to make students safer from gun violence is creating a “false sense of security.”  The study, published in the journal Violence and Gender, looked at the literature on the subject from 2000 to 2018 and could not find any program or practice with evidence that it reduced firearm violence.  So what should schools do? John S. Carlson, professor of school psychology at Michigan State University, answers that question in the following post. Carlson is also a licensed psychologist in Michigan and a nationally certified school psychologist.   view article

After years of decline, the number of uninsured children is at the highest level since the Affordable Care Act’s major provisions went into effect in 2014. And the largest share comes from Texas, with Tarrant County ranked fifth nationwide, according to a report released Wednesday.  The number of children without health insurance increased by 400,000 nationwide between 2016-18, the nonpartisan Georgetown University Center for Children and Families found, causing advocates to fear that years of progress is in jeopardy. Over 4 million children lacked health insurance last year in the U.S., and more than one in five were in Texas, according to the report. view article

A federal grant totaling $649,999 has be awarded to the Waco Independent School District to enhance security measures at elementary schools. “If the children and teachers can feel safe then we’re going to get a lot of learning and teaching going on, so our job is to make sure that they are safe so we are going to go to whatever means that we have to, to make sure our learning environments are safe,“ said Waco ISD Police Chief David Williams II. view article

The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley has finished clearing a clinic in Brownsville that forms part of the school of medicine.  view article

The Little Elm Police Department is investigating after a Bell Elementary student told her parents that an older man grabbed her by her backpack on her walk home from school Tuesday. In a statement released by Denton ISD, the district stated that there will be a spike in police presence at the school during arrival and dismissal times. view article

Police arrested three people Tuesday in connection to a threat made against Lancaster High School shared on social media, the district says. Lancaster ISD said it was made aware of the threat Monday and prompted the district to add security to Lancaster High School Tuesday morning. view article