NANTUCKET – Children on Nantucket are back in classes today after the island’s school system closed Monday over a threat.
Superintendent Michael Cozort says a social media rumor led them to call off classes until the Nantucket Police Department could fully investigate the matter.
“As we investigated, the issue quickly became a “social media firestorm” that we struggled to put out,” Cozort wrote on the school system’s website. “Needless to say, the first necessary step was to find out if there was, indeed, a specific threat.”
According to Cozort, Police Chief William Pittman told him that detectives are “absolutely convinced” that there is no danger to students or staff.
“The detectives working this ‘case’ interviewed a number of sources and determined there was nothing new or definite, but rather a chain of misinformation or information taken out of context and shared down the line,” Cozort said.
“We as individuals that make up a community must be very careful in how we use social media. it can be a powerful force for good, but we must carefully scrutinize and assess information before we pass it on. Had that happened in this case, I believe that it would have been determined that what was shared was rumor and/or speculation rather than facts,” Cozort added.
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