Moms Complain of Bullying at Urbandale's Jensen Elementary School

Three Jensen moms told Urbandale school board members Monday night that bullying has long been a problem at  that has not been adequately addressed by school officials.

Kim Yoblonski, 4110 69th St., is circulating an online petition asking school officials to either enforce or revise its weapons policy after a second-grade boy brought a pellet gun to school last month.

Urbandale school officials sent an email to parents the day of the incident telling them that the gun was unloaded and was taken from the child and that no child or teacher was ever in danger.

However, Urbandale Police spokesman Randy Peterson told the Des Moines Register that police, in investigating the incident later, found the gun off the school grounds and that it was loaded.

The boy's mother has pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of interfering with the police investigation, but Peterson would not discuss the specifics of how the gun, which the boy surrendered to the principal, ended up out of the school building.

"I just learned that the gun was actually loaded. The fact that the school actually lied to parents is abhorrent," Yoblonski told the board Monday.

Jody Coenen, 4529 70th Place, said, "I feel betrayed. I'm sending my children to these schools. What bothers me is that the parents were not informed correctly."

Lori Williams, 4402 62nd St., said her son, who is in high school now, was bullied at Jensen and school administrators did nothing. "What he had done to him was brushed off."

She said her experience as an Urbandale parent is that bullying is not well addressed at the elementary level, although she said she believes it is handled well in the middle school and high school.

The women spoke during the public comments portion of the meeting, but were not on the agenda, so board members did not discuss the issue.

Superintendent Doug Stilwell told Urbandale Patch after the meeting that he was surprised to hear Yoblonski say the gun was loaded.

When he heard that, he said he messaged Urbandale Activities Director Bill Watson who was involved in responding to the pellet gun incident. He said Watson messaged him back "when we were shown the gun by Sgt. Lang, it was not loaded."

"That's what I know at this point," said Stilwell.

He added the school officials would not intentionally mislead parents because "that undermines the trust and confidence."