Overview
- Riverside Middle School announced a cautionary lock and hold during a planned walkout, citing a rumor about safety outside the building and calling in extra police.
- The lock-and-hold protocol keeps students in their classrooms while instruction continues, which the school said was a precaution to protect students.
- Nearly 60 of the roughly 700 students walked out anyway to protest, chanting “Let them play” in support of the high school band.
- The protests stem from a 7–1 school board vote to block the Watertown High School Wind Symphony from performing “A Mother of a Revolution,” an instrumental honoring Marsha P. Johnson and the 1969 Stonewall uprising.
- District leaders have not answered repeated questions about the decision, and the spring concert remains set to go on without the piece as students and families press the board to reconsider.