School districts prepare for bioterror
By Lottie Joiner
Special to School Board News
2/18/03 -- Since Sept. 11 and the anthrax incidents, school officials have increasingly focused on security issues associated with terrorism, and now the potential for war with Iraq is raising more concerns about the possibility of bioterrorism and chemical attacks.
The nation's school-based police officers are urging Congress to enact an "Education Homeland Security Act." This legislation, announced by the National Association of School Resource Officers (NASRO) Feb. 10, would provide terrorism training for school officers and education staff; increase funding for school law enforcement officers to prevent terrorist attacks on schools; and provide funding for school security assessments, emergency planning, and security-related information sharing with public safety officials.
Some districts have already taken steps to address these issues. The Fairfax County, Va., school district, for example, has adopted a plan called "shelter in place." The concept involves keeping students locked indoors, shutting down the HVAC system, and sealing doors and windows to prevent outside air from entering the building.
The procedure "forms an invisible barrier to outside contamination," says James McLain, the district's security coordinator. "It's the safest way to prevent kids from being exposed to chemical or bioterrorism."
Shelter in place was initially developed for communities near chemical plants or hazardous waste areas, says Mark Scott, president and CEO of the National Institute for Chemical Studies in Charleston, W.V.
The Metropolitan School District of Wayne Township, a suburb of Indianapolis, Ind., is located near a number of chemical and processing plants and has had to use the shelter-in-place technique on several occasions.
After Sept. 11, however, the district sought ways to improve its safety procedures.
"We've had the basics in place. Now we are finetuning our response," says Chuck Hibbert, the district's coordinator of safety and transportation services.
Schools have been made a priority in the county's emergency planning policy. As a result, the district has access to state and county resources. District administrators and school leaders have been working closely with county emergency management for additional training.
Hibbert says the most important thing is to be prepared without overreacting. "We certainly hope that we never have to activate any of these contingencies."
"The reality is, it's going to happen somewhere. If it does happen here," he says, "we want to say that we did the best we could with the resources we had."
Scott says although schools are safe environments, they should take the new threat of bioterrorism seriously.
"It's another risk we unfortunately face in our society. It's hard to predict where it will happen and how it will happen," he says. "In this uncertainty, it's just good emergency preparedness to plan for those events and be ready for them."
Ken Trump, president of National School Safety and Security Services, says the nation's homeland security plans neglect schools.
"We talk about other critical infrastructure -- bridges, planes," says Trump. "We need to look at schools as potential targets."
Trump says schools focused on safety after the 1999 Columbine shootings, but with the emphasis now on raising test scores, safety issues are being pushed to the back burner.
"Schools have a tunnel vision focus on academics," says Trump. "Though academics are important, school leaders can't afford to be complacent when it comes to school safety."
Trump points to a 2002 survey by NASRO that found schools are ill-prepared to deal with terrorism.
The majority of school-based officers surveyed had received limited training in preparing for a terrorist attack on schools and reported that school administrators and staff had received virtually no terrorism-related training.
In addition, 95 percent of survey respondents felt their schools were vulnerable to a terrorist attack, and 79 percent felt their schools were inadequately prepared to respond to a terrorist attack.
"Without being alarmist, people are missing the boat on this," says Trump. "They talk about no child being left behind, but all of our schools have been left behind in homeland security planning."
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| Reproduced with permission from the Feb. 18, 2003, issue of School Board News. Copyright © 2003, National School Boards Association. Opinions expressed in this newspaper do not necessarily reflect positions of NSBA. This article may be printed out and photocopied for individual or educational use, provided this copyright notice appears on each copy. This article may not be otherwise transmitted or reproduced in print or electronic form without the consent of the Publisher. For more information, call (703) 838-6789. |