News Brief
Tuesday, February 10, 2026 — 5:22 pm
An active-shooter threat tested the nerves and patience of students and faculty at CSU Bakersfield and Bakersfield College last week, prompting both campuses to enter lockdown.
However, some students at CSUB said they did not receive the warning, leaving many confused and frightened; others said they were never updated on the situation.
On Feb. 2, CSUB police determined a call made to the student help center was a credible threat and initiated a lockdown, sending email and speaker alerts to the 10,000-plus student body.
Sophomore Nelly Gonzalez at CSU Bakersfield was among her peers who received a notification while in class.
“My first thoughts were that it was a drill because I kind of looked around at my classmates, and no one else seemed to have been freaking out or looking at their phones to see that they got an alert,” Gonzalez said. Shortly after another classmate confirmed receiving an email, the class immediately took cover. Gonzalez said they spent nearly 2 1/2 hours waiting for an all-clear message from the school.
Students and staff at Bakersfield College, which has about 46,000 students, remained on lockdown for four hours before receiving an official email stating that the Bakersfield Police Department had cleared the campus.
Sophomore Araceli Tovar said she and a group of other students stayed in a classroom without a professor, barricaded the doors and remained hidden.
“I was walking down the hallway when I first got the alert,” Tovar said. “I went into my classroom, where there was only a couple of other students. … I was kind of nervous and worried about my other friends that had class that day too, but I texted them and made sure they were all OK.”
Tovar said that Bakersfield College, which is adjacent to CSUB, did well in sending initial alerts, but there was no follow-up on what happened.
“As we get information, we share that out with students and employees through a number of different mediums, and that includes information about what to do in whatever the situation is,” Bakersfield College President Stacy Pfluger told 23ABC News in Bakersfield. “So when we provided the alert, we also provided instructions of what everyone needed to do.”
CSU police said this week that the threatening call came from out of state, according to 23ABC News.
Colleges nationwide have received swatting calls, which are hoaxes intended to trick law enforcement into responding to an active shooter-type incident or other dangerous situations.
CSUB Police Chief Maricela Gonzalez said a third-party vendor used by the university failed to properly process all names that should have been added to the emergency contact list, resulting in many not being notified of the threat. Breakdowns occur when users do not update systems with their new contact information, she said. Gonzalez didn’t say how many did not receive the notification.
“So if you never go in there and update it … (emergency messages are) going to go to your old number,” she said.
On Friday, the university police sent a test emergency notification to all students to ensure faster communication in the future. In addition, the university’s information technology team has been reviewing its system and verifying that students and faculty are receiving notifications.
“These lockdowns don’t happen very often,” Gonzalez said. “It’s one of those things that we train (for), even though we know it’s not a huge likelihood.” She said that campus police officers regularly prepare for active-shooter incidents “so that we’re always ready.”
“I would encourage everyone,” Gonzalez continued, “whenever there is any kind of training available … to attend those trainings.”
Samantha Trujillo is a sophomore communications major at Bakersfield College and a member of EdSource’s California Student Journalism Corps.
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