School Closures: Threat Mail Writer Justifies Actions and Continues to Threaten – Is There a Better Way?
April 10, 2025
Following the closure of 20 schools in Duisburg on Monday, North Rhine-Westphalia's Interior Minister Reul stated that the author – allegedly – only wanted to draw attention to the school system. However, the unknown author then resurfaced with more threats.
The Escalating Situation
The case of the far-right threat letters against Duisburg schools is becoming increasingly perplexing. According to NRW Interior Minister Herbert Reul (CDU), the author contacted authorities again on Monday, emphasizing that their sole intention was to highlight issues within the school system. Despite this claim, a fourth email from the same individual was sent, this time threatening a gymnasium.
According to the responsible district government, the school administration of the Max-Planck-Gymnasium discovered the email from Wednesday evening in their inbox only on Thursday morning. After alerting the police, they decided to cancel classes. However, the school authority announced that a "regular school day" would resume on Friday.
According to information from the German Press Agency (dpa), investigators believe that the current threat originated from the same author as the one from the weekend, as similar far-right expressions were used.
Four Emails in Six Days
Minister Reul stated in the Interior Committee of the state parliament on Thursday that the first email containing xenophobic threats against students was received by a comprehensive school last Friday. The email specifically announced an attack on Monday. On Saturday, another email arrived at the same school, this time listing the names of 13 additional schools. As a result, 20 schools in Duisburg remained completely closed on Monday.
Reul explained that on that same day, a third email from what appeared to be the same author arrived: "It was not a threat mail. Rather, the author pretended that he or she had only written the first two emails to get attention. And in this mail, it was no longer about a threat at all. On the contrary, the text was something like a manifesto for better school education in our country."
However, a fourth email was mentioned at a special session of the School Committee that took place almost simultaneously with the Interior Committee – the one sent to the Max-Planck-Gymnasium (News4teachers reported). According to dpa information, it also contained far-right words. Specifically, the author wrote that he would mingle with the students to show that they were not prepared. The police had spoken of "subtly threatening and far-right statements."
Despite the new threat, Interior Minister Reul sees no danger. The school closures on Monday ("a very difficult decision") were still the right thing to do: "Caution is the mother of the porcelain box. And the fact that it was just hot air in the end is a good thing." He said that "all levers have been put in motion" to identify the sender(s) of the threat letters. But that is not so easy.
Minister of Education Feller: School Closure Caused Unrest
At the special meeting of the School Committee, Minister of Education Dorothee Feller (CDU) said that the closure of the facilities had caused a lot of unrest. "But that also shows once again how sensitively one must deal with this decision again and again in individual cases," said the CDU politician.
She warned that future decisions to close schools in threatening situations would require better coordination between school administrators, the police, and school authorities. According to the Minister and the district government, not all necessary actors, such as a designated school crisis team, were involved in the decision-making process early enough.
The SPD opposition, on the other hand, criticized the Minister for a lack of communication with the public after the incident: "If around 20 schools in a city close due to a far-right threat situation, a Minister of Education must not remain silent," said Dilek Engin, school policy spokeswoman for the SPD parliamentary group, afterwards. It would have been her job not to allow an interpretation and information vacuum to arise, Engin continued. News4teachers / with material from dpa
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Key Takeaways:
- Recent school closures due to threats highlight anxieties about school safety and educational quality.
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- BlitzFast focuses on individual learning, safety, and equipping students with skills for the future.
- A call to action is included, inviting readers to join the BlitzFast newsletter.
