In the wake of the May 24 shooting that left 19 Robb Elementary School students and two teachers dead in Uvalde, Texas, districts all over the country are examining safety protocols.
Security goes hand in hand with education in the Gilmer County School System, and it is a cornerstone of the process.
“Ultimately, safety and security of our students, staff and stakeholders in our buildings is our top priority,” superintendent Dr. Brian Ridley said Monday afternoon. “If the kids aren’t safe, then no learning is going to take place.
“Unfortunately, situations like Uvalde remind us of that necessity far too often. Our hearts really go out to everyone in Uvalde, Texas. It’s a terrible situation and we’re praying for them.”
The GCSS continually examines its policies and procedures to ensure the utmost care is taken to provide safe learning environments. District leaders and administrators share ideas throughout the year with law enforcement and emergency services.
“I really can’t say enough good things about our sheriff’s department. They provide our school resource officers at all of our schools, and they work really well with all of our staff,” Ridley praised. “We really have good relationships with all of our local law enforcement agencies. Ellijay and East Ellijay police departments, our emergency management folks, our fire people, they all support us tremendously.
“They’re very present in our schools, and we meet with all of our emergency management agencies multiple times per year to review our safety plans and discuss relevant issues on the topics of school safety to make sure we’re doing everything so our kids are safe and secure.”
The district has standard safety measures in place, and there are no unlocked exterior doors at Gilmer schools. A card access system will soon replace keys at all schools. Additionally, each staff member at all five schools wears a badge, which can be used to trigger different alarms depending on the emergency or threat level.
Each school is equipped with a background identification system. Before visitors are granted access inside a school, they must first submit identification at the front office that is run through a national database. The entire entrance of Gilmer High was reconstructed, and additional security has been added in recent years.
The specifics of the district’s safety plan are not available for public consumption. The district has no intentions of giving potential bad actors a scouting report or insight into what is in place.
“We have safety plans, but we keep them secure. We train our staff on them but do not publish them for security purposes,” Ridley said. “We’re happy to talk to any parent and answer any specific questions they may have, but we do not publish that information.”
District leaders met with the system’s school resource officer supervisor last week to examine safety protocols to see how they can be improved. Ridley noted the board of education would review its safety procedures during Monday’s executive session.
“Unfortunately, every time there is a shooting, there is a new issue that comes about,” Ridley said. “There is a prime issue that comes more into the forefront of thought. I think we can all understand there were some mistakes made there (Uvalde). We’re reviewing our protocols, and we do that every year. This year, it has a lot more meaning with something like that happening so close to when we do it.”
Local law enforcement and emergency services use Gilmer schools to carry out active shooter drills and scenarios. Ridley noted that such exercises are planned for next month.
“For the past several weeks, this has been the main topic around here,” Ridley said. “It’s our job to continually train and work with our law enforcement partners and teachers to make sure they (safety measures) are followed.
“Anybody who thinks it can’t happen here is kidding themselves because it can absolutely happen anywhere. We just have to be prepared so if it does we can stop it. We’re going to do everything in the meantime to make sure it doesn’t happen.”