By Candice Geier
Bomb threats should never be taken lightly, but a hoax by students isn’t overly concerning to some at CSU-Pueblo.
“I trust that they (police and school authorities) had enough information that the threat was not imminent,” Carroll Langer, department chair of social work said. She was teaching a class when she received a text message warning a bomb threat.
A number of students wanted to complain, Langer said. She said she only wished there were instructions on what the faculty and students should have done following the original message. There was a man looking for anything out of place and someone should have said that there was someone checking the building, she said.
Aaron Wolking, a 25-year-old student attaining his master degree in general business, said it was interesting to watch how people reacted to the threat, and thought the local law enforcement and the university responded quite well.
“They obviously did their homework, and came to a conclusion it was not a threat,” Wolking said about authorities. “They defeated the purpose of the threat and did not create more mayhem.”
“There should be definite consequences,” Wolking said concerning the perpetrators. “There needs to be a precedence set to cover this type of situation. There is no room to behave like that in an academic setting.”
Nick Fraduke, a 25-year-old Biology student, said he wasn’t affected by the bomb threat at all. “I was a little surprised; you don’t hear that every day.”
“The college did a good job of getting the message out,” Fraduke said, “I was surprised they didn’t shut down the college. After Columbine, you think they would lock the school down.
Kendra Sutton, a 20-year-old history student was on campus when she received her text message notification.
“It was an odd way of letting know there was a threat, and I wasn’t really sure what to do. I didn’t know the severity and it created more questions. They let us know, but it was confusing,” Sutton said. “It didn’t seem like too big of a deal because they weren’t making a big deal out of it.”
Asia Sanders an 18-year-old computer information student said this wasn’t the first time she had to deal with a bomb threat at school, and said she wasn’t scared at all. The last time she had to deal with a bomb threat was at Carson Middle School at Fort Carson.
Sandi Orbin, the Administrative Assistant to the Dean for The College of Science and Mathematics, said she was a little bit afraid.
“Just knowing that it could possibly happen here, that’s kind of scary,” Orbin said. “You hate to close everything down because it feels like you’re giving in on a whim, but on the other hand you want to keep everyone safe.”
Orbin also said that there could have been more security patrolling the buildings to make students and staff members feel safer.
“Making a uniform presence known would have been that one step further they could have taken,” she said.
Nekole Rayme, a 19-year-old social work student thought the school should have shut down in the interest of everyone although she didn’t have any classes scheduled for the day.
“A lot of people felt threatened. We shouldn’t have been at school, it was a dangerous situation,” Rayme said.
Andrea Pritchard, a 21-year-old nursing student thought everyone should have gone home too.
“When they sent the message they did not take it seriously. How did we know everything was alright? People could have started panicking.”
Shelby Dewberry, a 20-year-old liberal studies student, is a work-study at the university bookstore and lives in the campus dorms.
“I’m from a small town, Cotapaxi, and we’ve never had something happen like that. I was shocked because everyone knows about it, but no one thinks it can happen to them.”
Megan Henderson, a 24-year-old Sociology student, said she believed the threat was a “stupid attempt to get some attention.”
“I heard it was a prank. How can somebody throw their life away or spend 20 years in prison for a prank?”
