Your school lockdown stories?
The other day at school, some douchebag pressed the emergency lockdown button for a joke. I was in the library at the time and the librarian was still scanning my books. Nobody was doing anything like locking the doors of anything and i know i should have done soething but i was in a state of shock so i ran out of the library, took my books with me and fell down the stairs :/ I didn't break my arm or anything so that's good. I was pretty damn scared. Can you tell me your school lockdown stories?/ I'd like to read them (also, a lock down is like when all the doors and stuff have to be locked and you have to hide in something cos there is a danger going on outisde)
What happens during a school lockdown?
at my school all the administrators lock the school doors leading to the entrance of the school. and the teachers in the classrooms lock their doors. and we sit there doing nothing. but i think that's if there's a school threat or if there's something crazy going on outside. for drug busts i dont think they do anything at my school since they have drug dogs come and they just take the person to the officer to get arrested for a drug bust. so yeah every school is different.
Why do we have lockdowns in school?
E (the most wonderful know-it-all, beautiful bestower of knowledge, her word is law) says that we have lockdowns when there is a threat inside the building. Honestly, if there is a threat inside the building, people are grasping at straws to keep everyone safe. Being inside a locked classroom seems safer and more productive than allowing students to run in the halls.Also, during the school day, not all classrooms are in use (well, this is true at my school). If all the classrooms look empty, the threat has to choose which to go into, and hopefully they don’t choose the one you are in. I guess the point of that is to lessen the chances of the threat catching you/your peers. If it takes the threat a long time to find a classroom with people in it, the longer time there is for police officers to get to the building.But overall, this is just standard procedure that is demanded by the government. I don’t think much of it, but the lockdown drills are more fun then trudging outside in the middle of winter because of a fire drill.
What are school lock-downs, and why do they happen?
Lockdowns are intended to keep students and school staff members safely inside school buildings and intruders out. If an intruder enters a building, students are locked into classrooms or other lockable spaces to keep intruders from harming students and staff members.In my career, lockdowns occurred when police action occurred near a specific school. Law enforcement wanted to prevent the possibility of activity moving from the involved location to that school.
In a real school shooting, would the lockdown procedure really be effective?
Two scenarios:Note: before either of these happen, the shooter has to get inside the school, which is locked at every entrance. But let’s say he gets in, somehow (maybe an accomplice opens a door for him):1) Shooter is detected in the school. Students run everywhere and nowhere, cowering under desks. Shooter methodically kills them until the cops arrive and kill him/her.2) Shooter is detected in school. Someone (any teacher can do this) comes on the intercom and declares a lockdown. Teachers immediately barricade their door (we have devices in our school which render the doors inoperable unless someone is really determined, has heavy equipment, and about 15 minutes.) I barricade my door (which, by the way, is a very heavy fire door), then herd students into the instrument room - another fire door, which is locked.Here are the devices we use (there are several types for different door configurations):Barracuda Intruder Defense System - Model DSI The shooter has to get through the outer door (impossible), THEN the second door, THEN get through ME - I’ll be the one throwing the tuba at him - all within the 3 minutes or so he has before the entire WORLD of law enforcement arrives.Is the 2nd scenario perfect? No. But it allows for flexibility and common sense. If it makes more sense to get outside the building, we can do that too. However, we won’t just “cower in place” and wait to be shot.The idea is to hold off the shooter until help arrives, not to hold them off indefinitely. Most school shootings are over in a very short period of time.If you’re one of those who think lockdowns don’t help, please do the following:1) Volunteer at your local school, get a feel for the environment and vulnerabilities.2) Come up with a better way and save our children.
What drills does your school conduct? (fire, lockdown, etc.)?
my school does fire, tornado, and lockdown drills. in fire drills we evacuate the building, in tornado drills we go into the hallway and cover our heads, and then in lockdown drills we hide in the corner with the lights off in and the doors and windows locked and shut and the shades pulled. the alarm for a fire is a high pitched beeping, and the alarm for a tornado is a long blast of a siren. a lockdown is an an up and down siren.
Why do teachers huddle students in the corner of a room during a lockdown drill? Call me crazy, but I find it to be extremely stupid to have a bunch of targets all gathered in one area, literally cornered. Shouldn’t we try to get out or fight back?
This is a strange protocol. My school doesn’t use it. We have “Shelter in Place.” Our protocol is to lock your door (from the inside, since we have “Columbine-style doors”), turn off the lights, move away from the doors and window, and make sure all your blinds are drawn.The idea is that if everyone does this, it will be more difficult for a shooter to tell which rooms have personnel and students in them. They have a limited window of opportunity with a police officer on campus or nearby. They’ll waste a lot of that breaking into one person’s room.Why stay away from the walls and doors? If this person has explosives, that’s the best place to be. My guess is that the purpose of hiding in a corner is to get everyone as far from the door as possible, though I could be wrong.Finally, we’re taught that if someone does come into your room, you are to attack. You are to do so with no compunction. You are to be savage. You are to hurl things and advance. This is really your only chance to survive.Unfortunately, my school has so many false alarms, it is difficult to get us to actually pay attention to alarms anymore. When a fire alarm goes off, we usually ignore it for up to two minutes before starting to leave the room. We’ve gotten better about it, but there was a time when we would have three or four alarms per day.I also have an old hockey stick in my room along with some wooden swords for playing various roles in dramatic productions (like Shakespeare or Sophocles). It isn’t as good as having my own handgun, shotgun, or rifle to defend myself and my students, but it is much better than nothing. I recommend that every teacher have something they can similarly use, like a heavy wooden dowel for blocking their window closed or anything they can have which looks completely innocent but which can do some good in an emergency.We keep our manual online: Emergency Procedures. It’s a pretty convoluted document.That being said, we’ve recently adopted “Catapult EMS” which allows us to send and receive updates to wherever the command post on our campus is (usually the front office).