Friday, March 29, 2024

School districts engage in proactive student safety measures

From Pateros to Mansfield

Posted

BREWSTER – Wednesday, March 14, marked the one-month anniversary of the school shooting in Parkland, Fla, that claimed the lives of 17 victims at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. To mark the occasion, students in the Wenatchee School District will participate in a nationwide National School Walkout.
In the Quad City coverage area comprising Pateros, Brewster, Bridgeport and Mansfield high schools, conversations, training, upgrades and planning are all part of a continuing review of student safety practices throughout the districts.
Maurice Goodall, Emergency Manager of the Okanogan County Department of Emergency Management said he has been working with several schools about emergency action plans and active intruder exercises similar to one held at Brewster High School last March.
“I can tell you that every single school in the district has been in discussion with their staffs (about student safety),” said Goodall. “How would we handle this? What would we do if it happened here.”
Okanogan County Sheriff Frank Rogers said that on the topic of school security cameras his office is hooked into the Okanogan School District network.
“We can monitor them in real time,” said Rogers, “and go back review anything that happens.”
Rogers said he has heard that Pateros and other schools are also discussing a similar linkup with his office.
“I think it is great and is a valuable tool to have,” Rogers said.
Rogers said his office will continue to train with the schools and he is aware that several are planning for training as they explore additional ways to make the schools safer.
“Bottom line it is tough,” said Rogers. “I really don’t know what you could do, unless you totally lock down all the schools with only one or two ways in, but that really isn’t feasible.”
Pateros School District
Principal Mike Hull said the school district is currently working through its security company to sort out issues of legality and disclosure as it pursues a linkup of its school security cameras to the Okanogan County Sheriff.
“We have a safety plan and chart of protocols and we are looking at what everybody else is doing to see what will work best for us,” said Hull. “Why reinvent the wheel when we can get good ideas from other places?”
Hull said parents “send their kids to the school in hopes that this is the safest place they can be, and we want to make sure it is. Whatever we can do to make the school safer, we want to do.”
Bridgeport School District
The Bridgeport schools will take a couple of significant steps toward heightened school security with the completion of a new building in 2019 that will incorporate updated security features and a school resource officer who will be on premises in next year as well.
‘All of our front office will be different,” said Bridgeport superintendent Scott Sattler. “There just won’t be free access to the building; there will be a secure vestibule at the entry.”
Sattler said visitors will be admitted from the secure area by office staff.
Sattler said that in addition to the video monitoring network the school has also considered scan cards for entry purposes.
“They are programmable throughout the district and log what card is coming into the building,” Sattler said.
The resource officer will be a proactive presence, trained and licensed to carry a weapon.
Sattler said the school has partnered with the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office and he is working on plans to allow DCSO to incorporate a summer security and intruder training program with the dismantling of the middle school building this summer.
Sattler graduated Brewster High School and has been superintendent at Bridgeport for the past 24 years so his roots and familiarity with the local community run deep.
“We haven’t discussed arming teachers,” said Sattler. We are not in a place to do that yet.”
Active school drills and staff training together with a close working relationship with North Central Educational Services District (NCESD) is another big part of safety measures.
“They are very proactive about safety,” said Sattler of NCESD, whose representative recently did a school walk-through.
Sattler maintains an open line with parents as well and has been speaking with those concerned about school drills and staff training.
“I feel rooted here,” said Sattler. “Anything we can do safety wise, we will do.”
Mansfield School District
Mansfield, the Town at the End of the Rails, is almost 20 miles distant from neighboring Coulee City to the east and Bridgeport to the north and more than 30 miles from Waterville to the south. Mansfield school, with student body numbering less than 100 students, also serves as the community center, of sorts, for its residents.
“One of the challenges we have is that we are so small,” said first-year superintendent Mike Messenger. “We play a different role than larger districts where there are resources to hold events at other locations. Our folks don’t have that option.”
Making the school community accessible and safe for students at the same time is a dual priority that Messenger is considering. Messenger served as principal at Tonasket for the past six years before taking on the role at Mansfield, so he is familiar with the small school environment.
“We have been having conversations going in lots of different directions, from training to procedures,” said Messenger. “We are carefully measuring our options and will be deliberate in our response.”
Messenger said the Douglas County Sheriff’s Department is a proactive partner and a deputy met with him at the school just last Monday.
“If we have a question or challenges, they are more than willing to make recommendations,” Messenger said.
Messenger said Mansfield school is also part of the consortium of the NCESD.
“They help a lot,” said Messenger. “I just recently had an ESD representative in my office.”
Messenger said there has been an abundance of good, productive conversation on safety issues as the school works its way to decisions it will make in the future.
 “We are carefully measuring our options and will be deliberate in our response,” Messenger said.
Brewster School District
Brewster superintendent Eric Driessen is the closest to home as a 1980 graduate of the school he is responsible for keeping safe.
While he acknowledges his deep roots in his home town Driessen is first to admit that “the community has changed a lot over the past 30 years.”
Brewster School District hosted its own multi-agency training exercise (MATE) last March 27 that involved the Brewster Police Department, Washington State Patrol, Chelan, Douglas, and Okanogan law enforcement, Douglas-Okanogan Fire District 15, local EMS first responders, Three Rivers Hospital, WADOT, and Brewster Public Works, along with school staff.
“Our staff really learned a lot,” Driessen said.
The school district hopes to begin work on a new middle school later this spring followed by a remodel of the elementary and high schools.
“When it’s done, security will be state of the art,” said Driessen. “Buzz-in key cards and a single entry where users will be buzzed through the next door.”
A new security camera system will upgrade those already linked to the Brewster Police Department.
“All officers have the ability to log onto our camera system,” said Driessen
Brewster Police Department
Brewster Police Chief Nattalie Cariker graduated Tonasket High School and now has school-age children of her own attending Brewster.
“I have been to all the schools for sports,” said Cariker who wants her officers to know the layout as well.
“We have a new officer check out the main entry and access points at the Pateros school,” said Cariker. “We want out staff to know about the other schools.”
Cariker organized last year’s MATE project and is planning another such scenario for next year because “it can help us to realize what we need to work on,” Cariker said.
“Whenever the school has a lockdown drill or fire drill, they notify me, and I am there,” Cariker said.
“There is no true easy solution,” said Sheriff Rogers to the challenge of school safety. “One that does help us is if you hear or see something, report it. We can’t do anything if we don’t know about it.”
“No threat is too small,” Rogers said.

brewster, school, student safety

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