University of Missouri leadership released a mass campus email Wednesday afternoon stating in part “Our campus has experienced significant turbulence, and many within our community have suffered threats against their lives and humanity. These threats are reprehensible. “
In a separate statement to media, leadership added that currently, there are no threats to campus safety, and that MUalert.missouri.edu is the only campus source for emergency information.
The statements followed a tense day on MU campus Wednesday, as many students did not attend class following an anonymous online threat against black students at the university. Some instructors cancelled classes or said there would be no penalty for missing class.
Alicia Alviles Quinones is an assistant teaching professor in the romance language department at Mizzou. She says some students sent her emails detailing the threats last night.
"I think that the series of emails that the students started forwarding me last night were strange and made me concerned and dismayed at the same time," she explained. "So if they don’t feel safe, and I don’t feel safe, I think it was the right thing to tell them that they wouldn’t be penalized for being absent."
Early Wednesday morning, MU Police arrested Hunter Park in Rolla, Mo. for making a terroristic threat on social networking site Yik Yak, but did not confirm what threat is attributed to Hunter.