School Security Doesn’t Have to be Scary or Ugly

 As a high schooler, I was studying in an age after the school shooting at Columbine High School in 1999. At the time this was shocking; a fluke. Very few people believed school shootings would become a social contagion. According to writers for Security.org, Aliza Vigderman and Gabe Turner, on July 6, 2022, there have been 304 school shooting; with little end in sight. For many conservatives, there is a simple answer; to protect America’s most precious treasure (children), as well as you would Fort Knox and its gold. Some people are concerned with schools becoming militarized zones. They believe schools should appear welcoming and not a prison. This is an obsolete argument with new technology available. 

 

In the article by Vigderman and Turner, A Timeline of School Shootings Since Columbine, “According to the K-12 School Shooting Database, a publication of the Naval Postgraduate School’s Center for Homeland Defense and Security (CHDS), a total of 118 active shooter incidents have been reported at K-12 schools in the U.S. since 1999. These shootings are defined by the CHDS as situations where the perpetrator killed or wounded targeted or random victims within the school campus during a continuous episode of violence.”

 

School shootings have become a reality, too often, to the point that this writer’s own high school, Campbell County Comprehensive High School, experienced its own school shooting. This was a  small Appalachian town with school guards yielding little power over real security enforcement.

 

Kenneth Bartley, Jr., was 14 years-old. On November 8, 2005, he entered my high school armed with a ,22 caliber pistol.. He was ordered to the school office after students complained of the weapon. Telling principal Gary Seal, “Yes, it’s real. I’ll show you. I never liked you anyway.” Bartley then shot Mr. Seale. 

 

In total Bartley shot three principals; Gary Seal, Ken Bruce and Jim Pierce. Seale and Pierce were flown by the local Life Flight to the University of Tennessee Medical Center of Knoxville. Unfortunately, assistant principal Ken Bruce was pronounced dead at the local St. Mary’s Hospital in La Follette, Tennessee.

 

I was heartbroken for my principals and their families. I worried for my dear friends and their siblings that were present. From then on our town took school safety seriously. The small town no longer felt like a place you could leave your doors unlocked. The school system invested into new schools with emphasis on security. The school system implemented new procedures and building designs. Using discrete technology allows schools to continue to be a welcoming environment.

 

Why does Fort Knox, and its treasure, deserve more security than America’s children? Why do public officials deserve private security with guns? Does this really make sense? If it does to you, then you’re not being honest with yourself. 

 

Arguments against strong security include: dangers of weapons being accessed by the wrong person and the belief that the use of technology and procedures will give children the impression of a prison. There is some validity to the first concern, but the latter argument is outdated and liberals know it.

 

People of the elite class use security systems in their own homes. Their homes do not appear militarized. If you refer to the events at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, two men approached the large Capitol door from the inside. The men waved upward to a security camera; while pointing toward the door. This action led to the person viewing the camera unlocking the Capitol’s door. Is the Capitol building ugly with its use of technology to unlock doors from a distance? Is it a militarized experience?

 

Schools are able to be secured without making children feel like they are within a prison system. Gone are the days of large boxed metal detectors and fencing used within the school building for security of certain rooms and offices. We are no longer living in the 1990s. School shootings were just beginning during a time when technology was not developed enough to make such elements discrete.

 

I attended Mount Miguel High School, of Spring Valley, California, in 1997-1998. I saw the change our school went through implementing security measures. A student apparently stole a surgical knife from the school science laboratory and attempted to stab another student. By 1999, while attending CCHS, my school’s dress code policies included only the use of mesh or clear backpacks were allowed. Student lockers with sealed, unlikely to be used again. Left like abandoned ancient relics; with modern inhabitants walking among walls of lockers unaware of the deeper meaning of their ended use. 

 

According to Buildings article, Building Safer Schools That Don’t Look Like Prisons, authored by Janelle Penny, on July 26, 2021, discusses the myth that schools must appear like prisons if certain security measures and technology are used. She writes the reason schools appear uninviting and sterile is due to economics. 

 

“Unfortunately, this often translates into designs that rely on cinder blocks, heavy metal doors and imposing gates, giving the school an institutional feel. This design style is not only cold and uninviting, it’s short-sighted—the lack of windows in doors, for example, can actually make it harder for staff to spot negative behavior,” wrote Penny.

 

Julia McFadden, an associate principal with Svigals and Partners and project manager for the new Sandy Hook Elementary, a victimized school in the past, stated, “It costs a lot less to put up steels doors with no windows than it does to have glass doors and windows.” 

 

McFadden makes clear the architects hired by schools aren’t always creative and limited by resources. McFadden said, “When you’re hiring the architect, you’re also buying the least creative architect who might balance some of your security concerns with aesthetic concerns… Communities are unfortunately being forced into the untenable position of trying to make a good environment when the dollars aren’t there to support it.”

 

Penny described an element I recognized was used in the building of a new Campbell County, TN, school. In Penny’s paragraph referring to “Layers of protection”, she described using specific designed entry ways to schools can aid in identifying and delaying an intruder. 

 

The new Campbell County elementary school included bulletproof glass protecting the front office. All doors to the secretaries had electronic opening mechanism. An intruder would not be able to enter the school through the front office. Before a person can use the door entering the school hallway the office staff would have to unlock that door. 

 

Using a single entry point, it has two partitioned areas that can be locked; able to contain an unsuspecting intruder. I was thrilled and fascinated with the common sensical design. With my soldier’s eye, I recognized the sophistication of its design. 

 

“Schools across the country are creating these types of entry vestibules with double-locked doors,” McFadden explained. “Once you’re in the vestibule, there’s a transaction window with a security officer or the administrative office. In [Sandy Hook’s] case, it’s similar to a bank teller window with ballistics-rated glass.”

 

McFadden urges schools to take a more aesthetic approach to school design. She believes there are options that are financially feasible to mix security with a pleasurable environment for students. Schools do not have to be sterile and uninspiring. Schools do not have to sacrifice comfort to implement strong security measures.

 

In conclusion, schools are able to use security options found in the homes of the wealthy and politicians. Beauty found in our secured nation’s Capitol building can be achieved on a lower scale to make schools welcoming and secure. As a nation we must reimagine school security through the eyes of the present; and present technology.

 

Please stay tuned for more information on the topic of school shootings. I plan to address the technological advances, mental health, and an argument for armed teachers within the school system. This topic is a very controversial one. Emotions run high. Victims of school shootings have different individual responses to their collective experience. Some believe schools should be armed, because an intruder could be immediately put down. Others demand for a ban on all weapons; believing criminals will follow gun laws.