ST. LOUIS – Staff at Lyon Academy in St. Louis sent an anonymous letter to the teacher's union this week after they say a gun was found outside of the school.

"In this case, the district has done everything they were supposed to do. They followed policy," Local 420 teacher's union spokesperson Byron Clemens said. "If there's any fault that all of us had, it's communicating more about what these threats are."

As area schools see an increase in threats lately, the union says it visited with Lyon Academy to address communication concerns. But it is also trying to take a proactive approach.

"We have been doing training in conjunction with the district. We call it AVERT training. We have a national expert from Washington, D.C.," Clemens said.

It is just one of many threats in the area so far this school year. The Missouri State Highway Patrol has been tracking threats that come in through its Courage2Report hotline.

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"We really have noticed an increase in the amount of tips that are coming in, especially after the unfortunate events in georgia. We typically do see an increase after an actual act of school violence occurs," MSHP Lt. Eric Brown said.

The hotline handles any kind of public safety concerns at school. It has received 615 tips since July 1, 2024. 135 of those tips were considered duplicates. But. Lt. Brown says the numbers are likely higher because these only include threats reported to the MSHP. He says in a typical year, Courage2Report gets between 1,400 and 1,500 reports.

"We're also seeing an increase in the number of tips each year as well just because of public awareness and usage by schools in the program has increased significantly over the last 2-3 years as well," Lt. Brown said.

The teacher's union says that if you see one of these threats online, be sure to report it the right way.

"Don't spread these messages yourself. Don't be part of the problem. Report it. Take a screen shot and report it, but don't share it," Clemens said.

You can contact Courage2Report by calling 1-866-748-7047 or text "C2R" to 738477.