Incident at Game Prompts New Policy

After a few incidents involving middle school students last week during the Olathe East game, the administration made an announcement over the loudspeaker asking all middle school students to return to their parents or leave the stadium. Dr. Karl Krawtiz, principal of Shawnee Mission East, said that they had several problems at the game that prompted the announcement.

“At the game last week, and a few others, we’ve had problems with large numbers of middle school students being dropped off by parents,” said Krawitz. “The problem is that parents drop these students off, then return after the game to pick them up. So during the game they’re left unattended and it becomes a burden on our administration as well as security to supervise these students.”

Some of the students have also been engaging in inappropriate behavior, such as throwing things off bleachers and spitting on patrons.

“During the Olathe East game, we had some students that had migrated to a part of the stands that was unoccupied, and were just generally causing trouble,” said Krawitz. “We had middle school students throwing items down the stands, spitting and pushing each other around. Just childish behavior.”

Shawnee Mission East campus police officer Richard Pacheco said it’s more an administrative concern than a matter for the police.

“It’s an issue with getting students and parents to follow the rules,” said Pacheco. “More than anything it’s about the safety concerns we have with a large number of unattended students.”

Indian Hills Middle School administrators have been doing their part to inform students and parents of the new rules, principal Karla Allen said.

“We’ve been reminding our students they need supervision to get into the games,” said Allen. “We’ve been sending home the information in news letters and emails, and have been working with [Shawnee Mission] East administration to resolve any conflicts.”

The new policy of requiring middle school students to be with an adult will be enforced at the gates for all home games. If a parent transports a group of students, as long as they are seated with the students they can count as the supervisor for those students.