What NBC Did With Danbury High School Prank

This is a news broadcast that ran on Comcast channel 4 Monday night of incidents Friday at Danbury High School.

Principal Robert Rossi, Ed.D., was not at school Friday for the senior prank. He said he was home sick.

"It was not a vacation. It was a sick day. I was at home sick for the first time in two years," Rossi said on Tuesday. "I was on the phone with my assistant principal and at the same time, I was on the phone with a reporter from District Administrator," a New York-based education publication. Rossi said the two phone calls were in striking contrasts to each other.

On the one hand, he was talking to the assistant principal at the school about the water prank in the morning, the food fights at lunch and the lock-down after water bottles and other objects were thrown after lunch.

On the other hand, he was talking about improvements going on at the school, such as the Freshman Academy, open enrollment in Advanced Placement classes, de-tracking the students and re-writing curriculum in 17 areas.

"The prank wasn't malicious at all. It was cleaned up in 30 minutes," Rossi said. "What happened after the senior prank was a complete anomoly. We have no idea of where that came from or why it turned so nasty. It was not a normal day."

In the video above, students are playing keep-away with balloons and beach balls in the cafeteria, followed by dozens of students tossing items in the courtyards.

Rossi said he thinks students broke into the school using underground tunnels below the school. One entrance to those tunnels is located at a locked door near the tennis courts.

Another city official said some evidence suggests that students broke off or somehow removed a padlock at the tennis courts entrance to the tunnels, and replaced it with their own. By doing that, they gained access to the school whenever they wanted. By going through the tunnels, they bypassed motion detectors near the schools doorways where most of the school's security systems are focused.

Superintendent of School Sal Pascarella, Ed.D., could not be reached for comment, despite repeated attempts to speak (calls) by both parties Tuesday. (Phone tag.)

Irving Fox, chairman of the board of education, said he is gathering information about the incident from parents, children, administrators and the news media before drawing any conclusions. Until he has more information later in the week, he said he doesn't know if it will be an agenda item at next week's Board of Education meeting. He declined to comment on it without more information.

"I want a full picture. I want to triangulate what actually happened. Until you get all the different angles, it's hard to know what happened," Fox said. "Is the resolution satisfactory? Maybe we need to hear more?"

Fox said the board agenda will be ready by Friday.

"All I know is pretty much what was in the newspaper," said Board member Robert Taborsak. Taborsak said he had not yet seen the NBC video when he spoke. "I think the penalties were appropriate for the prank. Sometimes they destroy property. Disrupting a school day is going beyond a prank. I think it was appropriately handled."