Dear Editor,
re: WPS incident
We are parents of a (just graduated) student from WPS.
We reported another similar incident (during this past summer vacation), that occurred within the village to our child’s friend as they were travelling on their scooter to our home for a play date: an unknown adult male approached and asked if they wanted ice cream. The child knew what to do, kept their head down, answered no and kept travelling as fast as possible. Once arrived and very shaky, they immediately reported the incident to us. We informed the other parents and asked permission, and received it,-to seek out the individual or at least try to see if we could spot them based on the description, report the incident to the police and maybe post a calm alert to a well-known local social media group-mentioning no names, no personal details of the child and just a gentle suggestion to go over ‘what to do’ as children are maybe out in the village playing with friends etc. We thought people, parents need to go over this again…
The post was initially accepted but then removed. (The other parents noticed this)..we shrugged it off thinking that perhaps they (the group moderator) didn’t like ‘negative news’ and in the end, we (most importantly) had made an official report to local police.
Before reading the article, as parents still on the school email list-we were already aware of the incident.
Nevertheless, thinking about it again brings it back. We have not breathed a sigh of relief-this person wasn’t ultimately identified or cautioned that we know of. We (both sets of parents) drive the children to each other’s houses nowadays.
This is a sad reminder of the importance of keeping our children alert and safe no matter where we live-it doesn’t just happen to kids in cities.
Kind regards
A concerned parent
