Mr. Andrew Pollack, grieving father of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School student Meadow Pollack, who died at the horrific school shooting in Parkland, Florida three weeks ago, recently met with President Trump at the White House. Mr. Pollack said he couldn’t understand how, while authorities “protect airports, concerts, stadiums, and embassies,” we still don’t protect our children at school. He asked Mr. Trump, “How many schools, how many children have to get shot,” before they get adequate protection?
In the wake of this latest horrific attack on a school, we cannot and must not be complacent. When terrible events like the Parkland shooting happen, it is all too easy for those of us not immediately touched by the tragedy to feel that “there is nothing we can do,” “it’s not up to us,” or “this won’t happen to us.” But there is a great deal we can and should do, as individuals and as a community. We need to realize that even with all our tefilos (prayers) and bitachon (faith), it is also imperative for us to do our hishtadlus (action). Even one change to a school’s security measures can save a life.
For example, a detail about the death of one of the 17 Parkland victims was especially painful to hear, since this tragic loss might have been prevented by specific suggestions detailed in my guide, Keep Your School Safe. The school’s athletic director, Scott Beigel, died after ushering students from the hallway into his classroom to make sure they were safe. He was trying to lock the students into the classroom by using a lock on the outside of the door. Honorably yet tragically, Beigel was shot and killed when he couldn’t get back into the classroom before the gunman spotted him. Keep Your School Safe specifically states that safer alternatives to inadequate ordinary door locks – such as internal bolting, lock-down door magnets, or built-in door barricades – should be placed on every door in the school. Though we don’t yet know all the details of the tragic part of the loss of life that day, we can infer that if this one change had been made in the classroom doors of Douglas High School prior to Feb. 14, at least one of the lives – that of Mr. Beigel – might have been saved.
In response to the Dec. 2012 events in Newtown, Connecticut in which 20 children and six staff members were shot dead by another gunman, I felt it was time for the Jewish education community to act. I published Keep Your School Safe and distributed 10,000 copies free to Jewish schools throughout North America. The guide was endorsed by major organizations, such as Agudath Israel of America, the Orthodox Union, Torah Umesorah, and the Secure Community Network (SCN), nationally recognized by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. But although most schools have started to increase security, there is much more work to be done.
Keep Your School Safe covers critical topics, such as lockdown procedures, evacuations, staff security training, security equipment, grounds, building, and classroom-specific recommendations. Many measures can be applied regardless of whether a potential shooting occurs due to terrorism or a mentally ill gunman. The guide can help any school be prepared for any type of event. Recognizing that there is no one solution that fits every scenario or school, Keep Your School Safe provides methods which can address as many potential issues as possible.
This guide was developed to help schools conduct their own thorough security review to evaluate and improve their school’s safety. Since professional security reviews can cost thousands of dollars, Keep Your School Safe shows how smaller schools with limited security budgets can use a small group of people to make security upgrades and bring about effective changes affordably. If a school has had a professional security review, the guide can be used after the professional review as it contains important issues that may not yet have been addressed, which impact student and staff safety on a day-to-day basis. For example, if a school has difficulty affording the cost of a security upgrade, Keep Your School Safe provides leads and resources for government grants to help cover the costs of some security upgrades, and details some security measures that are free to implement.
Keep Your School Safe also shows how key measures can be spread out over a period of time, such as one year, to help mitigate associated costs and effort, and make the process easier for busy school officials, teachers, and staff. The guide recommends that the school appoint one individual, a “Security Coordinator,” to lead and oversee security initiatives and ensure their completion. Keep Your School Safe also suggests that schools advise parents to review safety and security protocol with their children at home.
As I’ve stated in past issues of WWW, parents play a key role in helping schools turn these ideas into actions. Parents must hold school administrators accountable to maximize the safety of their children while at school. [See sidebar.] Parents should work with their children’s school, even as volunteers, to encourage or help them to implement upgraded school safety and security measures. Schools also need to keep parents in the loop, keeping them informed of new security measures. Both parents and school officials must communicate with each other about how to make students as safe as possible.
Although some books on the market cover some school security issues, their stiff technical language and structure can be hard for non-experts to follow. The guide is written in a user-friendly format that anyone can understand and follow, whether s/he is an administrator, teacher, or parent. An especially helpful feature is the guide’s thorough checklist to help busy school leaders track the progress of upgrades from start to finish, as well as key follow-up measures. Keep Your School Safe can help reduce pressure on busy school administrators by making the process of increasing school security less daunting and more doable.
In the past five years, since Keep Your School Safe was first distributed, we have seen both a major spike in anti-Semitic incidents, as well as an alarming rise in mass shootings at public places. As a community, we must wake up to this new reality and take decisive and effective action to protect our children as much as we can. There is always room for improvement, and we don’t want to gamble on our precious children’s lives. For a free download of Keep Your School Safe, visit www.chesedfund.com.
Sidebar
How Does Your School Score in Safety?
Concerned parents, teachers, and staff can begin upgrading their school’s security with the following list. A version of this list originally appeared in WWW after the 2012 Newtown massacre, in which I urge concerned readers to ask these questions of their schools.
The questions will help you assess how safe your child’s school is and whether all the critical measures are being done to prevent and respond to potentially violent emergency situations. The higher the number of “yes” answers, the more your school is prepared.
- Does the school regularly conduct safety and security drills, including lockdown drills, during the school year?
- Are there full-time armed security guards at your school? If so, are they adequately trained to de-escalate potentially violent situations?
- Does the school require that visitors sign in and out and wear visible visitor’s passes when on school grounds?
- Is a person in a position of authority the designated Security Coordinator of the school who can be contacted immediately should any issues arise?
- Are school staff members trained in the early detection of potentially violent behaviors?
- Has the school created clearly-defined roles and responsibilities for each member of school staff during an emergency?
- Are all school’s personnel – including the many part-time and substitute teaching staff and activity leaders who may be in charge of groups of students on any given day – adequately trained in emergency response?
- In case of an emergency, are students taught both internal and external evacuation routes?
- Does the school have easily accessible emergency supplies and first aid kits?
- Do teachers have easy access to their cell phones to call 911 in the event of an emergency situation?
- Do the exterior doors to the school building remain locked throughout the school day?
- Do classroom doorknobs have secure locking mechanisms controlled from inside the room?
- Are there practices in place to ensure classroom doors and windows are locked at appropriate times throughout the day?
- Are there lockdown checklists clearly posted in each classroom and office?
- Are security and safety protocols updated annually and reviewed with staff and students?
