SCHOOL SECURITY

School Security

School Security

Introduction

Since last few decades, educational institutions have looked to security technology, including electronic access-control equipments and video surveillance, to work out on and resolve security-related issues. Nevertheless, how many equipments are put in place, the technology is merely one instrument in a broader security plan for the schools. It is an unfortunate and troubling fact that many children have more to be concerned with at school these days than simply whether or not they will pass their latest test. While the last thing they should have to worry about is their own safety at school, violence on school grounds is an all-too-common occurrence that can happen in many forms. According to Indicators of School Crime and Safety, deaths are decreasing in the school since last three years.

School-Associated Violent Death Summary Data

Discussion

Security threats can be consequential events, non-criminal or criminal. A criminal security threat includes a vandalism, arson, burglary, theft, etc.; a consequential event is a situation that fashions a risk to the facility and a non-criminal threat is any behavioral act that creates a threat to the facility, including the students' disruptions. This could be something as simple as an election polling place that is within a school building; a drug treatment facility; a neighboring sex offender's check-in point; or a nearby railroad that transports highly flammable liquids (Dillon, 2007).

It is unavoidable that the mainstream of students would experience violence of some type throughout their careers as students. However, research indicates that the likelihood of a student experiencing an incident of violence that will gain the attention of the media is very rare. In spite of the fact that students are likely to encounter violence at school, many teachers, parents, and students believe that they will fall victim to a Columbine High School like attack within their own school districts. Parents, teachers, and students fear through excessive media coverage of school shootings, which creates a belief among those individuals that an attack of Columbine's caliber could occur anywhere. Researchers have reported that “the shootings and acts of violence in schools are definitely notable and distressing; fortunately, however, they are not the norm the media would have us imagine” (Whitehead, 2001, p. 23). Therefore, fear induced by the media can skew people's beliefs about the chances of a shooting within their own school districts.

Although violence varies in severity, it is important to address all conceivable forms and provide safety ...