Ralston Valley will never forget Thursday afternoon, August 27, when every phone was booming with tweets, emails, and worried texts from parents about #Beargola.

Students were rushed short during passing period; doors were locked down without much information distributed on what was happening on the outside of Ralston Valley’s brick walls.

And no matter who was asked, eyes started to peep through window shades, and comical tweets and texts were flying out of phones rapidly when it was discovered that a full-grown bear was walking around the RV campus.

#Beargola became RV’s top trending hash tag, and hilarious screenshots of worried parents were being shown across the twitter sphere until word went out that the bear was “peacefully neutralized”.

“I understood why they had to kill her, but on a larger scale it shows how people interfere with nature,” said senior Hope Clarke.

This brings some larger questions to the surface. Is Arvada endangering nature, or is nature a danger to us?

“The bear is in Arvada because we’re encroaching his land,” Clarke surmised.

Locally, bears have had a bad berry year, which is thought to be the result of global warming.

And, according to Clarke and many others, global warming is humanity’s fault. If the human population hadn’t caused global warming, the bear would have had good berries to eat, and thus would not have needed to search for food on Ralston Valley’s property.

Others, however, disagree.

“It’s dangerous to the school,” stated freshman Chris Glaze. And school officials agree.

But is “peacefully neutralizing” the bear the only option? Freshman Jason Yevak doesn’t think so.

“I think they should have put it in a sanctuary,” Yevak pointed out.

So did the officials just take the easy way out? Or would leaving her to die in the wild or a sanctuary be worse?

“Her last minutes were surrounded by fear,” said Clarke, claiming that she believed that letting animals die naturally is always the way to go. According to Clarke, humans are too involved in nature, and nothing good ever comes from it.

Whether neutralizing the bear, letting it back into the wild, or finding a sanctuary, was the “right” thing to do, RVHS students will never forget the day they saw #Beargola through the window of their second block class.