Parents frustrated over Oakland school's response after students ingest chocolate with magic mushrooms
OAKLAND — A handful of students at Westlake Middle School ate candy from a classmate on Nov. 13 that parents say turned out to be chocolate with magic mushrooms.
The Oakland Unified School District said most of the students who ate the candy only had a small portion, but one student ate enough of it to get sick.
"In my case, my daughter was drugged, because she took something without the knowledge of what was in it and the staff didn't alert anyone. I feel like if a child is exposed to drugs whether knowingly or unknowingly they should call the parent immediately," said Bryttney, a parent who declined to give her last name.
Bryttney said thankfully her daughter didn't fall ill, but she's disappointed she didn't hear from the principal until about two hours after staff members were notified.
"I was upset for one. I was concerned, highly concerned, because she does have allergies, so if she could have taken that and she would have had some type of reaction to it, I know she could have possibly died. I know that she could have lost her mind and never came back from it so I had a lot of thoughts, and there really was no empathy," she added.
Veronica, who also didn't want to show her face on camera for privacy reasons, is frustrated.
"Even if you don't know what's going on, I should be immediately notified that my underage daughter is at school high off something that she didn't know she was taking," Veronica said.
She said after staff members asked if the students felt OK, they were allowed to go about their day.
"I'm pissed I haven't been notified. You let my child unsupervised, so I feel like they should have kept them all in a room with adult supervision. These are kids. They don't know what it is to be high off this. And even if not, they're under your responsibility," Veronica added.
She said she took Bryttney's child and her daughter to the hospital to get checked out as a precaution but was told hallucinogens do not show up on common drug tests, and too much time had also passed for shrooms to show up on a specific test.
In a statement to KPIX, the district said:
"Once we were alerted to the issue involving that sick individual and all the others, we immediately started investigating and called the families of all involved. Several young people went home, and the rest stayed on campus and continued their day as normal."
As far as the student who brought the candy, the district said it's addressed the person appropriately, and asked families to pay close attention to what their kids are consuming.
Veronica said the child was suspended for a few days, but she wants the student expelled since she has a prior record of similar actions.
"I'm worried, what if this led her to want to chase that high, and now it leads her to other drugs. It's scary, I check on her every day. Now, I'm worried about my kid where she's supposed to be safe at," added Veronica.
For Bryttney, this incident also offers her daughter a lesson of trust.
"I just explained to my daughter you know regardless of who it is everyone's not your friend, because in this case, that isn't a friend," she said.
