In a 1A story today, staff writer Matthew Hensley reported that school officials say that they have identified two people responsible for vandalizing Scotland High School the night before the homecoming game.

The suspects are accused of some childish antics such as painting "Go Raiders" in green and gold on an outside wall at the high school and rigging a fountain so it would generate dye-colored bubbles.

If school officials have the responsible parties, we commend them for getting the matter resolved quickly.

What is less commendable is how this incident was handled publicly from start to finish.

This newspaper began hearing rumors about the Oct. 22 incident a few days after it occurred. Much of the talk at the school and in the community centered on an allegation that a school official's child was involved.

We have been told in the past that public statements on school matters will need to come from schools spokesman Andy Cagle. When a reporter asked Cagle about the incident, Cagle said that he had already been asked about it by a radio reporter, but had checked with police and discovered there was no report.

When we reached School Superintendent Rick Stout, he said he was aware of the incident and provided many details.

But Stout said he had been in the dark about the possibility that the child of a school official might be involved. To his credit, he said the guilty party would be punished no matter who it was.

The day after the initial story ran, tips from students helped school officials identify the suspects. But we only learned that the alleged vandals had been caught when we inquired about the status of the case on Tuesday, three days after the incident had been wrapped up.

We don't want to elevate the incident into something larger than it was — a silly prank — but how it was handled does raise questions.

Why has a gag order been placed on school officials talking to the press? We can understand that the school system wants to speak with one voice, but it also means cutting off dissenting opinions and real information. If we had gone with what we were told initially, we would have never written a story and school officials may have never gotten the tip. We should add that when we asked police about the school incident, they also told us no report had been filed, but they said they had heard the suspect was the child of a school official.

Why isn't the superintendent aware of the rumors about his own personnel? Regardless of whether the rumor was true or not, there was grumbling at the high school among teachers and students that the prank was being swept under the rug because of who the culprit was.

Finally, why didn't school officials let the public know the matter had been resolved?

We're not sure what the big deal is. But if the small stuff gets this kind of treatment, we hate to see how the really big issues are dealt with.