'We Need Transparency': Bridgewater-Raritan Parents React After Student Knife Incident

BRIDGEWATER, NJ — Parents once again addressed and called on the Bridgewater-Raritan School District for more transparency after an elementary school student brought two large kitchen knives to school.

"I am here as a concerned parent. I am not just worried about my child’s safety but about the safety of every student and staff member in our district. I never thought I’d have to talk about something so serious as weapons being brought into our schools let alone the lack of communication and accountability that followed," Giovanna Quintana of Raritan said at the Feb. 4 Board of Education meeting.

Another parent from Raritan named Joe also recounted the incident that happened in December 2024 at John F. Kennedy Primary School. He then proceeded to read out the district's policy for handling firearms and weapons.

• Related: 10-Year-Old Student Brings 2 Large Kitchen Knives To Bridgewater Elementary School: Parent

"I am not suggesting that this student be charged criminally but that the Board of Education recognize the severity of the situation and protect all students involved. I am aware of other families who have left this district because of a lack of action of this Board as it pertains to HIBs(Harassment, Intimidation, and Bullying)," said Joe.

Parent Melissa Fernandez said that while she is glad the school district notifies the community of every fire drill, cyber security breach, and threats, she felt there were "apparent shortcomings in addressing" the December incident.

"Based on the information I have a student brought in two knives, clearly weapons, into school during school hours when children were present. While I recognize the challenges involved in managing such incidents, the situation was not handled appropriately as no district-wide message has been sent. It is never too late to send an email and address the situation," said Fernandez.

Parents ultimately asked for transparency, accountability, and more trust from the district.

"I'm asking this Board to investigate why parents weren't notified. What steps will be taken to prevent this from happening again? And how we can rebuild the trust that has been lost," said Quintana. "We trust our children to these schools every day believing they are in a safe environment. It’s your job to make sure that trust isn’t misplaced."

"The personal details of who is involved is not the issue and is not even being asked to be communicated," continued Fernandez. "This could have possibly been catastrophic if it wasn’t for the brave parent reporting it. Superintendent Beers, members of the Board you have the ability to evoke real change and support this great community. I love Bridgewater Raritan, I went here, it's a great community, it's been falling off but make improvements with transparency and policies it could be better. Please hear us and please be better. The plan in place is not working. The safety of our children must always be our top priority."

Superintendent Robert Beers addressed comments from parents at the meeting pointing to a federal law called FERPA - Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act - which protects students' education records.

"Any notion that this issue was brushed under the rug is patently false. As with any disciplinary matter consequences are given out and protocols are established to ensure the safety of all students," said Beers. "Unfortunately, this is not for public consumption and that seems to be the major block here. It does require a level of trust from the public. But we’re not able to share this information nor will we ever share this information."

Beers added that he knows that people got "pretty excited" over the incident but that he is also a father and understands.

"We just can't provide that information and practically speaking the situation has been handled. We can as a community disagree on how it was handled — maybe some folks would have done things differently — but we continually work for the safety and security of all students and we appreciate your feedback but this is not something that we broadcast to the community," said Beers.

Board member Rebecca Hassouna asked Beers to clarify what type of alerts must be broadcast to the community.

"If there is a school threat or some type of threat towards the school — we can disagree about this and I don’t want to get into the specifics — but this one does not fall into that category," said Beers.

Board member Jennifer Loughran also asked Beers if the districts' decision on what alerts to broadcast to the community is consistent with other school districts, which Beers said they were.

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