Lockdown drills coming to Swan River School
In the wake of the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary, the Swan River School board joined the ranks of school boards across the country in assessing their safety procedures for similar events during their regular board meeting on Jan. 8. The board reviewed current safety measures and discussed procedures for lockdown drills.
A lockdown drill is when the school locks all their doors, shuts blinds and has students hide as quickly as possible if a suspicious person is inside the school or within the general area. However, concerns regarding communication and making sure all students are accounted for during such drills or emergencies were the primary concerns.
According to Principal Marc Bunker, SRS has performed lockdown drills in the past but it has been a long time and some of the newer faculty members have not experienced one yet.
Bunker also told the board members he recently contacted the Flathead County Sheriff’s Department about suggestions for lockdown drills and to see if there was a standard procedure. However, because each school is designed differently, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to lockdowns.
Currently, SRS keeps their doors locked periodically throughout the day and guests are required to check in at the front office. Recent upgrades to SRS’s facilities included classroom doors that can be easily locked from the inside rather than by using a key from the hallway. The school is also outfitted with camera equipment, which is mostly intended for looking back at previous events.
“I thought about what we can do more, we are as safe as any public school can be,” Bunker said. “But I think there are a lot of people across the country wondering if more can be done.”
Because tragedies such as Sandy Hook’s can occur at any time, Bunker plans to run frequent lockdown drills at inconvenient times such as during lunch so that quickly funneling the students to safer areas of the building becomes second nature for the students and faculty.
“It takes five minutes, so it’s not too much to ask that we practice several of these in January in several situations,” Bunker said. “Really, our goal for January is we want to practice lockdowns in different situations so staff and students are comfortable with that.”
The board also discussed the possibility of utilizing the attendance sheets kept near the classrooms’ doors to account for students during lockdowns. This is where communication became an issue for the board as the school has sections that lack cell phone reception.
One of Bunker’s other suggestions was to move the school’s office so visitors had to go past there before entering the elementary school wing of the building.
Board member Dawn Dowellgrim suggested looking into the cost of installing a door buzzer system where visitors had to be let in by faculty after seeing them on camera. Dowellgrim also asked for input from the teachers when forming the school’s lockdown procedure.
“Everything we have in place I think is helpful,” Bunker said. “But as far as considering the incident in Connecticut, I have heard people say it could never happen here and I don’t believe that, but I hope it doesn’t.”
No official lockdown procedure was decided during the meeting, it will be an ongoing process of collaboration among the staff in the upcoming months as they consider all of their options.
“It isn’t like it’s happening everyday, it just feels like it is,” board member Tamus Gannon said. “It is only because it is focused on so much by the news right now.”