HANCOCK COUNTY — Hiring mental-health counselors. Updating equipment. Making small charges to policies.
As kids across the county continue to settle into their classes for the new school year, district leaders say these are just a few things they’re doing to help kids feel safe while at school. In some districts, the changes to security might go unnoticed by parents and students as they walk through the halls of county schools. Others will be visible right away. Still others will reveal themselves as the school year continues.
But school leaders across the county want to assure parents that student safety is their utmost priority and at the forefront of every change they elect to make.
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In a direct response to the shooting at a Parkland, Florida high school — where a gunman pulled the fire alarm to draw students into the hallways before shooting — Southern Hancock Schools has opted to change how it handles fire drills, Miles Hercamp, the district’s safety coordinator, said in a video posted to the district’s website.
Southern Hancock has now instructed its teachers to check the hallways for suspicious activity before ushering kids outside, especially when an alarm sounds unexpectedly, he said.
Teachers will line up their students for evacuation; but they will now check the hallways before releasing the kids, he said. If they notice anything concerning, they’ll call down to the front office to make sure it’s safe to leave their classrooms, he said.
And as student mental health continues to take a front seat in the discussion of school safety, some districts are working to bolster services offered to its students.
Harold Olin, superintendent of Greenfield-Central Schools, said his district has partnered with Hancock Regional Hospital to hire a counselor to work in Greenfield-Central’s high school and junior high to supplement the work already being done by the guidance department and social workers within the schools.
The additional hire is in step with recommendations released last week by a state school safety committee that was convened earlier this year by Gov. Eric Holcomb. In addition to imploring state leaders to make more money available to schools to make security updates and requiring districts to offer active-shooter drills in schools, the committee suggested schools make mental health services more accessible to kids.
Once the position at Greenfield-Central is filled, teachers and administrators will be able to refer students to the on-site counselor immediately rather than suggesting they visit the hospital or a counseling center, Olin said.
“It’s one of the most proactive things we can do,” he said.
Some schools have updated technology at the front door and within the building in an effort to increase security.
Mt. Vernon has moved its LobbyGuard security systems — a device that scans an ID and takes a photo of visitors — out of the front office and into the vestibules in its five school buildings, said communications director Maria Bond.
Since LobbyGuard compares visitor information with the sex and violent offender registry and prints badges identifying visitors, this means all visitors will undergo a background check before ever interacting with a staffer or student.
Every Southern Hancock Schools building is now equipped with a buzzer at the main entrance that visitors must use to access the building during school hours; and all visitors must sign in at the office and be issued a pass before being allowed into the main school building.
Each buzzer has a camera that allows office staff to see outside and communicate with the visitor, Hercamp said. If the person seems suspicious in any way, they will not be allowed into the building and the school resource officer on duty will be called.
The buzzers had been installed previously at the middle and elementary schools; but they are a new addition to the high school, where visitors had previously been allowed to come straight into the building and into the main office, Hercamp said.
Now, all visitors, including tardy students or those taking classes off site, will have to be buzzed it. Hercamp said he anticipates some congestion for the office staff to deal with, but it’ll be minimal and worth the added sense of security.
In addition to adding more security cameras around its three buildings, Eastern Hancock Schools has installed new speakers in the locker rooms near the high school gymnasium to ensure that, if schoolwide directions need to be given, young athletes or those in gym classes can hear the instructions clearly, said Lisa Truitt, high school assistant principal and school safety specialist.
And parents and students can expect to see further changes unfold as the school year continues.
Olin said his district is finalizing plans to hire a fulltime school resource officer in partnership with the Greenfield Police Department. He expects the officer to be in place by January.
Leaders at each of the county school districts say they are still trying to work out how best to use the metal detectors state officials are providing to schools, which should arrive locally in the coming weeks.
The governor announced in July that the state would provide handheld metal detector wands to every school district that asked for them.
One device would be made available for every 250 kids enrolled, and each district in Hancock County took state leaders up on the offer.
Eastern Hancock Schools has received its four metal detectors. Greenfield-Central will receive 18; Mt. Vernon Schools will receive 16; and Southern Hancock will receive 14.
Local school boards are working with attorneys to try to decipher when the wands can legally be used to search students.
Olin told the Greenfield-Central Schools Board this week that the Indiana School Board Association, the Indiana Association of Public School Superintendents and Neola — an agency that provides school districts statewide with guidance on policies and best practices — has issued some guidance to districts about when the metal detectors should or should not be used; but each board will need to adopt a district-specific policy once the wands arrive.
Olin anticipates parents and students might see administrators carrying metal detectors with them more regularly, especially as they patrol the entrances at the start of the school day. But the protocols will need to be finalized before any plans can be put into action.