Today marks the last day of school before the Christmas and New Year’s holiday break. It has not been, to say the least, an easy month.

District officials and employees have been on the front lines when it comes to the renewed surge of COVID-19 cases and last week, they faced a different problem: threats that were made locally and others tied to social media outlet TikTok.

Both Southwestern and Gowanda closed out of concerns on Friday while other districts were open with lower attendance numbers. No decision came easy.

“Most of the concern came from the national reports that were picked up on social media yet they were also unsubstantiated,” Sheriff James Quattrone said last week. “Schools and law enforcement needed to take the necessary precautions out of an abundance of caution to ensure the safety of the students and staff. Most schools likely saw an increase in police presence in the area as a precautionary measure.”

No matter how you look at it, Friday was a stressful day — for those schools that stayed open or closed. With technology, education has become more complicated. Some of it for the better, but — as was seen Friday — some of it for the worse.