Students across South Jersey are worried about their safety after a TikTok video posted on Sunday, September 8 displayed a shooting threat to five local schools – Woodbury Junior-Senior High School, Bowe Middle School, Holy Angels Catholic School, Haddon Heights Junior-Senior High School, and Oak Valley School.
The TikTok, posted by an account named “Anonymous,” displayed text in the middle of the screen stating: “THESE ARE THE SCHOOL THAT ARE GOING TO BE SHOT UP” with the list of targeted schools. The TikTok received a few likes and saves, but garnered almost 100 shares, according to a screenshot from NBC10 Philadelphia.
According to NBC10 Philadelphia, Woodbury City and Deptford Township school districts, as well as the Holy Angels Catholic School, decided to close on Monday, September 9. Haddon Heights and Glassboro school districts remained open but noted that extra enforcement would be stationed at the schools.
NBC10 Philadelphia reported, “Early Monday, officials with the Harrison Township Police Department said that at least three juveniles were taken into custody after these threats were made.” The arrested students are from Woodbury, Glassboro, and Mullica Hill, and are all between the ages of 12 and 15.
Additionally, a student at Bunker Hill Middle School posted a shooting threat online and was arrested that same Monday morning for “false public alarm and making terroristic threats,” according to NBC10 Philadelphia. Despite the threats of gun violence posted over the weekend, all districts had reopened their schools by Tuesday morning.
Hannah Butler ’25, a senior at Haddon Heights Junior-Senior High School, found out her school was on this list from a screenshot of the aforementioned TikTok post sent to her by a peer. Butler was surprised to see her school on the post’s list. She noted that most students seemed aware of the situation by the time they entered school on Monday morning.
Butler commented, “It just seemed like something [could actually] happen, so I was a little scared.” On Thursday morning, Haddon Heights Junior-Senior High School was sent into a shelter-in-place procedure, during which students were told to hide in the corner of their classrooms. “We all thought it was a drill until we looked out the window and saw cop cars pulling up,” said Butler.
The students were not told anything during or after the event and were told to proceed with class as usual. “We had no idea what was going on,” added Butler. The students later discovered that a student was overheard making some sort of shooting threat to another student, and was subsequently arrested, causing the shelter-in-place that Butler recounted.
Haddon Heights is less than 15 miles away from Moorestown, meaning that the threats were not far from the MFS community.
MFS student Abby Fog ’26 discussed how she felt about safety at MFS and shared, “I think we have a pretty safe and secure school environment, but it definitely is scary to hear about [what has happened at] other communities in the area.”
Fellow MFS student Azaria Coleman-Stokes ’25 agreed that she wasn’t too worried about her safety, but added, “I feel like [MFS is] just expecting that it’s not going to happen to us rather than having extra security measures.”
When asked if there was anything more MFS could be doing to help students feel more secure given the threats in nearby areas, both Coleman-Stokes and Fog noted that more discussion and education about local occurrences is needed.
Fog shared, “Talking about it might be the first step, because we haven’t been informed much about [gun violence].”
These sentiments of spreading awareness were echoed by Coleman-Stokes who added, “If we’re able to talk about [gun violence] and we know that these things are happening in our community, then we can all be extra aware of things that are happening around us [and] … alert people sooner.”
MFS Assistant Athletic Director Bryan Wright, who previously served as the Juvenile Officer for Moorestown Police Department, which included work as a School Resource Officer, gave a faculty perspective on the situation. “Our school administration is very aware of everything that goes on in the county and in the state… There’s always the thought of safety on our minds every day that we come to work.”
Given his experience as an officer in a local school district, Wright noted, “When kids hear about things on social media, they should report it up the chain to their parents, and then to school officials so they’re aware of things. Then, it is the job of the police to determine whether the threats are credible or not.”
Wright explained that reporting anything that may be a security threat is imperative because “most of the time … there’s signs or signals that are never reported so it’s hard to protect or prevent them.”
