
Several weeks ago, as the nation anguished over the shootings of Amish children in Pennsylvania, school board member Bruce Richardson shared a gripping dilemma from his district in St. Louis Park, Minnesota. Here’s the first part of the story, which he’s given me permission to repeat.
“Last week,” he writes, “we learned of a threat of violence in the high school on a Sunday afternoon. We investigated and found it to be baseless.
“But that evening a second rumor of violence reached the administration. By this time it was 10:30 at night. The high school principal along with the superintendent and the board chair decided to close the school on Monday.
“To get the word out quickly, the superintendent contacted the media and said that the high school would be closed due to a broken water main. The second rumor also turned out to be false. The public was then informed that it had not been a broken water main but a rumor that was investigated. The media got upset, however, and some parents demanded the superintendent’s resignation.”
His note goes on to ask, “Was there a better way to handle the situation?”
Recast, his question is: Did we succumb to a right-versus-wrong temptation, or resolve a right-versus-right dilemma?
For the moment, treat it as right-versus-right — since otherwise there’s no reason for further discussion. On one hand, it’s right to keep sensitive information confidential. On the other hand, it’s right to speak honestly.
As a public entity, a school board regularly has both obligations. It is legally prevented from publicizing some things (like medical records) that, while true, could damage individual students. But it also has a responsibility to voters to speak candidly, particularly on issues of large public moment. One of its highest obligations is to ensure student safety — a task taken very seriously across the United States given trends of school violence for which the Columbine High shootings in 1999 have become the archetype.
In the current case, several facts are salient. First, at the time of the announcement, the latest threat remained genuine, and there was a fear (so Mr. Richardson said) of “tipping off the people who potentially were involved.” Second, the decision was taken by top administrators and the board chair, not by the full board in ways that might have required a vote at a public session. Third, there wasn’t much time: Monday classes were just hours away, and the announcement couldn’t wait until the details were clear. But fourth, there was no broken water main; the public was deliberately misled.
This dilemma might be described as truth versus loyalty (going public versus preserving confidentiality) or as short-term versus long-term (putting everyone immediately on high alert versus gathering intelligence toward a future arrest). Each position has strong moral arguments … and powerful downsides. The moral case for honesty above all else is so clear that it needs no repeating. But there are times when secrets must be kept. In this case, is a community alerted a community prepared or a community panicked?
There’s also a short-term mandate to tell people promptly about things that directly affect their well-being. If a deception about the shutdown raises doubts about the veracity of these public educators, will their future explanations be regarded with suspicion? Will they be comfortable if their students, too, learn to dissemble at key moments? And isn’t it patronizing to assume that you know best and must keep others from being upset?
But if immediate, full communication leaves a real perpetrator undiscovered, might not students be even more significantly endangered in the long term? And if such full communication signals that every threat, real or rumored, can shut down the school and panic the community, might not a spate of copycat threats ensue?
Ends-based, utilitarian thinkers, seeking the greatest good for the greatest number, might say that, in the interests of uncovering the larger truth of the situation, deception is in order. If silently hunting down a perpetrator seems more beneficial than slavishly holding to a principle, then disinformation may be taken to produce the best consequences.
But rule-based, Kantian thinkers, seeking a universal standard that everyone in the world ought to follow in similar situations, would argue that persistent honesty trumps any benefits that might flow from falsehood. Might is crucial word: Since outcomes are so uncertain, the only safe course (Kantians would say) is to hold to truth, trust the public to handle uncomfortable facts, and let the consequentialist chips fall where they may.
Meanwhile the care-based thinkers, asking what you’d want someone else to do to you, could go either way. As a student at risk, I might want the school to use everything including deception to round up my threateners. But as a community member, I might want to know the threats, make my own judgments, and help correct the situation.
What should the good people of St. Louis Park have done? What policy should the school board have for sudden media announcements? Email me, and I’ll share my views (and yours) next week — and tell you how it turned out.
©2006 Institute for Global Ethics