SANTA ANA, Calif.—It was one week after a gunman in Uvalde, Texas murdered 19 children and two teachers at Robb Elementary School when Mater Dei High School in Santa Ana received a “credible threat” that resulted in the shutting down of the campus.
Students at Mater Dei High School will return to campus Thursday—one day earlier than previously anticipated—to finish out the short remainder of the school year, officials announced.
“Today, we learned of a credible threat to the Mater Dei campus and contacted the Santa Ana Police Department,” Mater Dei President Michael Brennan and Principal Frances Clare wrote to parents and students on Tuesday. “Safety and sweep protocols were implemented.
“We acknowledge the alarming nature of this message; however, we at Mater Dei take all threats made to the school seriously.”
The threatening message released to the school is currently being investigated by the Santa Ana Police Department as being created by a former employee of Mater Dei, but it did not target any specific children at the high school which has over 2000 in attendance.
Once the threat was received by administrators of the school, the staff made contact with the Santa Ana Police Department who sent in offers to sweep the campus for potential threats.
Upon completion, it was determined by officers that there did not appear to be the threat of a shooting, but that an investigation would be underway as students attended their classes online for the remainder of the week.
“We are not on campus, so it is tough to gauge how everyone is doing. We’ve been down the online learning road before,” Mater Dei spokeswoman Allison Bergeron told The Epoch Times. “Our community is strong and resilient though.”
Additional security will be activated in patrolling the school while Santa Ana Police Department officers increase their presence in the area, according to Bergeron.
“We are most grateful to the [Santa Ana Police Department] for their partnership with [Mater Dei High School] in determining that we are in as safe a space as humanly possible, and to our Diocesan personnel for their support as we have worked to determine the most appropriate way forward,” Bergeron wrote in a letter to the Mater Dei community.
“While these few days have been difficult for all members of the community, know that all educators are here to ensure the safety and well-being of our students.”
The threat to Santa Ana’s Mater Dei High School also comes with other schools within the city, which recently include a bomb threat at Santa Ana High School in March, along with an incident last week when a man drove onto a sidewalk injuring three children at Santa Ana’s Taft Elementary School.
School shootings have also returned to the United States at pre-pandemic levels of violence but are also reported as increasing, according to Sandy Hook Promise, an activist group formed after the Sandy Hook elementary school shootings that took the lives of 27 people, 20 of which were children aged 7 and under.
