CHARLOTTE, N.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — A snake shut down Unity Classical Charter School in Charlotte on Thursday.
Parents got a message in the middle of the day, forcing them to come pick up their kids early after a teacher found the snake slithering in a classroom.
That message read:
“Good morning families. This urgent message is to inform you that we will have to close the school due to the discovery of a snake in one of the classrooms.
We are asking families to please come as soon as possible to pick up your children until we can resolve the situation with Animal Control. Thank you for your patience and understanding as we work together to ensure the safety of everyone at Unity.”
The snake was caught, and the school will be on a regular schedule come Friday after Thursday was anything but ordinary.
Queen City News doesn’t have any pictures; still, Sheila Reddick, the school’s executive director, painted a pretty good one of what a teacher discovered in her classroom right before her kids came back inside after recess.
“She saw something move. It’s every woman’s probably worst nightmare to see something that looks like it’s slithering,” said Reddick. “So she did what she was supposed to do. She shut the door, kept the kids safe, and called administration right away.”
Reddick says the snake appeared to be a venomous baby, so they took extra precautions to clear the classrooms and have parents pick up their kids early.
“The potential of having a class with a venomous snake or possibly even more around the premises is ridiculous,” said Reddick.
The snake wrangler came in, captured the snake, and ensured no other serpents were around.
“He (the snake expert) didn’t think it would ever happen again, but lightning does strike twice,” said Reddick.
“This is the second time this has happened,” said Shannon King, a parent. “I don’t know if snakes like the school or what’s going on.”
Reddick says a cleaning crew found a snake on campus several weeks ago.
“They said that the kids were safe, and they were just doing this as a precautionary measure, so I feel like the communication was fairly calming in a way,” said King. “I’m a little concerned that I’ve picked her up twice already for this.”
The executive director says they got an all-clear, and the school is now snake-free.
“To have maybe one venomous snake inside a school is just crazy to me, but to have two,” said Reddick.,
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Reddick says she isn’t exactly sure what kind of snake was in the school, but since this has happened twice, the snake expert recommends spraying down the school with a copperhead repellant, so the school will do that soon.
