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Schools beef up security: Internal threats considered as well as external
(Chattanooga Times (Free Press, TN) (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) Apr. 26--DALTON, Ga. -- The Whitfield County Career Academy, which opened on Maddox Chapel Road in August, has 36 surveillance cameras trained on the critical areas around campus.
Deputy Jason Keown of the Whitfield County Sheriff 's Department patrols the hallways and parking lots, and a card swipe system will be used to monitor the entrances and exits starting next school year.
"Over the last 12 months, we've had a number of breakins at various schools, so it's made security more of a priority for the system," said Mike Ewton, director of safety and security for Whitfield County Schools. "We've had a total of 13 burglaries this school year, since August."
Other North Georgia school systems are looking to address security issues, too, including potential threats from within.
Several bomb threats scrawled on the bathroom walls at Dade County High School last month necessitated quick-fix security measures that administrators hope to replace with more permanent solutions, they said.
In response to the threats, the school confiscated cell phones and installed metal detectors and security cameras at the high school.
Superintendent Patty Priest said Dade County Public Schools plans to use funds from the third education special purpose local option sales tax passed in November to purchase permanent security equipment for all schools in the system.
"Hopefully, we'll be able to get (a security system) purchased and have it up and running by fall," said Ms. Priest. "We had planned on this all along, but it's moved even closer to the top of the priority list because of the bomb threats that we've had."
Many security measures have become standard in North Georgia schools, administrators said. Most have school resource officers and surveillance cameras, and many are moving toward the card swipe systems at all doorways. Most lock all doors but the main entrance, channel all visitors into the central office and require people to sign in or out at all times except at the begin- ning and end of the school day.
School boards figure security systems into the cost of construction nowadays, said Mr. Ewton. He said that Whitfield County is equipping Beaverdale Elementary and New Hope Middle with security systems similar to the Career Academy's. It is also working to improve security at the system's older schools, he said.
Outbreaks of violence across the country in recent years, and more recent incidents of threats against students or schools on the Internet, have pushed school security to the forefront of administrators' minds, they said.
The April 1999 shooting at Columbine High School in Colorado, during which two student gunmen killed 12 students and a teacher before committing suicide, and the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centers and Pentagon of Sept. 11, 2001, changed the nation's mindset, school administrators said.
"The seriousness with which something like (a bomb threat) is taken is much larger than before Columbine and 9/11," said Donna Street, assistant principal at Dade County High. "The laws have changed, the world has changed, and we have to take everything seriously, whether we feel it's serious or not."
Sharon Vaughn said that as principal at Ringgold High School, she thinks about school safety more than anything else.
"We know we can't take anything for granted," she said. "It would be stupid to do that. We can't ever say, 'It wouldn't happen here,' because that's what the people at Columbine said. You have to be real about it."
Students and faculty at the Whitfield County Career Academy said they feel the security equipment has proven effective -- as much for controlling student behavior as warding off external threats.
"From the beginning of the year to when they found out we had cameras, behavior changed dramatically," said Deputy Keown. He said students are now less inclined to pull stunts such as smoking in the bathrooms and opening shaken sodas in the hallways.
"They know we can go back and pull video footage now and bust whoever's doing it," he said.
Hannah McTaggart, 16, a sophomore at the Career Academy, said she doesn't mind being watched by cameras.
"I don't pay attention to them because I don't do anything I'm not supposed to do," she said.
Dwayne Daniels, chief executive officer of the Whitfield County Career Academy, noted that high-tech security systems can only protect a place so much.
"Having open communication inside the building is worth as much or more than any camera system," he said. "Having the relationships and trust there (between students and faculty) is irreplaceable."
E-mail Christina Cooke at ccooke@timesfreepress.com
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