1. Safety
& Security
UPDATE
January 8, 2019

2. CW HERE
School safety has always been a top priority at Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools.
The focus in our schools should be on education. Weapons and violence in schools isn’t just a school problem. It’s a community problem and each of us has a role to play in school safety.
We must work together to keep weapons out of our schools and reduce violence in the lives of our young people.
CMS approaches safety and security through a comprehensive approach and a wide range of tools including increased student support, more technology, active survival training, enhanced background screenings, “see something, say something” programs, more CMS-PD officers, social media responsibility campaigns and partnerships with CMPD and other law enforcement agencies in Mecklenburg County. 
The CIrcle of Safety includes supports and inputs for safety from the personal/individual level to the school, district and community levels. Each of these is critical and supports the overall safety and security of our students and staff within our facilities and in the broader community.

3. Enhanced measures
Random safety screening including wanding, portable metal detectors, bag searches and gunpowder dog.
Expanded video surveillance
Crisis alert cards and response systems
Digital entry access on front entrance at every school
One or more digital entry access on every major building at all schools
Increased social media monitoring
Increased investment in student supports
Strengthened crisis communications and Director, District Crisis Response position
Active survival video
CMS increasing security measures to help keep weapons out of schools. These new measures are in addition to a network of existing protections in the district’s Circle of Safety that Dr. Wilcox just discussed. There is a district-wide team of leadership and supporting staff to conduct best practice research, develop and deploy these plans. I will provide more detail on each of these in just a moment, but a summary of new measures is on the screen:
The district will begin random screening of students conducted by trained security personnel. Program managed by CMSPD, led by Chief Lisa Mangum, who have worked with local law enforcement and conducted best practices research to develop protocols and procedures to help boost safety without compromising our students’ rights. Screenings will not be announced in advance in order to promote a deterrent effect that we believe is critical in this effort.
Cameras/video surveillance are being enhanced to capture all mobile classrooms and playgrounds.
Crisis alert card systems are being deployed; these systems will enable all school staff to send instant emergency notification to district employees, law enforcement and emergency personnel.
Electronic, keyless entry-access system are being installed on every front door and the primary entry point for remote buildings on school campuses.
Resources, platforms and procedures for social media monitoring are being reviewed and added to ensure families and the public are informed about threat assessment and early warnings.
Additional significant investment in social/emotional/mental health supports for students, including budgeting for additional more counselors. CMS added 60 counseling positions this year but remains well below student-counselor ratios recommended by national mental health organizations.
We are working to make crisis communications more robust by increasing the frequency of updates and wider messaging to families, including instant text messaging. In addition, the district will hire a District Crisis Response Director within the next few weeks. That position will be tasked with coordinating the district’s response to crisis events and will also provide relevant training to staff in crisis response and threat assessment. The district is also working with staff on updates of school safety plans, entry/access procedures, emergency procedures, crisis teams, communications and incident reporting.
The district will also hold a series of community town halls to share safety and security information and gather input from the public. The first, with CM PD and Chief Putney will occur on X.

4. Physical Upgrades Cameras/Monitoring
Priority on elementary schools first
Focused on enhanced views of playgrounds and mobiles
Upgrades completed at 11 schools
Additional 15 estimated for completion by end of January
Work continues through June for completion at all schools
Overall goal to capture all mobiles and playgrounds
Surveillance monitoring hardware upgrades at all high schools
$1.75 million for video camera enhancements

5. Physical Upgrades
Fencing – Repairs and/or upgrades completed at 13 schools identified as most in need. Work ongoing.
Door locks – in progress at 45 sites, work continues on additional locks through April.
Vestibule physical security assessments and plan development.
$1.8M for door locks
The goal for camera and monitoring upgrades is Focus on front door and primary entrances.
The budgeted amount of $1,800,000 for additional electronic locks projects to (45 included in this number) additional locks.
The first priority of 44 locks was to address main front entrances that did not have access control.
The next phase will address multi-building high schools.

6. Training Active survival training Detective (trainer) hired October 22
Complete
7 HS
3 MS
5 ES
5 other (i.e., ASEP staff, SROs, all Security Associates, etc.)
Scheduled
13 HS
5 MS
8 MS
Other includes: Smith (After School Enrichment Program) Kevin Earps Group Safety, environmental health and risk management, SA's All SRO's Spaugh Administration
We are making quick progress, with substantial work in the last two months

7. Crisis alert systems Crisis alert system installed in pilot school.
January: eight additional schools
February/March: approximately eight more.   
Crisis Alert Advisory Group being formed to plan and finalize best practices and designate training guidelines 
Includes cameras.
Audio being installed this week but that is unrelated to security.
Installed in high schools first, then middle, then elementary
CELA chosen as pilot school as there was money remaining in the construction budget for that school

8. Social Emotional/Mental Health
District-level threat assessment training January 9
Over 80 registered participants
Face-to-face training of school-based teams using practice scenarios and identifying next steps
Experts recommend that social/emotional/mental health supports are critical for success of school safety efforts.
CMS uses an established threat assessment protocol to investigate the seriousness of information presented by students, usually in the form of expressing injury to another person and or self-injury.
An interview of the student by trained school-based staff and data collection and review determines the "threat" level of the information provided. Teams will be asked to evaluate scenarios, determine the level of threat and execute on established next steps to include a range of things from developing a crisis plan, contacting police or mental health agencies as appropriate.

9. Safety screening
Serve as a deterrent to prevent students from bringing weapons into schools
Keep focus on teaching and learning in a safe environment
Pilot three screening models
Our goal again in including safety screening involving wanding, metal detectors,

10. Safety screening – model 1
Full school screening
Randomly selected schools, not randomly selected students
Core team of 30 +/-
Training provided by outside experts
Every student screened
Students will be staged inside the school.
GOAL is that every student will go through screening
Reiterate SCHOOLS are chosen at random, NOT individual students
We want to ensure that screening is respectful of student rights and privacy while also effective in deterring weapons from our schools
Wanding and bag search procedures will be similar to graduations, athletic events, etc.

11. Safety screening – model 2
Single building screening
Randomly selected building on campus
Every student in that building screened
This model designed to accommodate screening on multi-building campuses

12. Safety screening – model 3
Gunpowder dog classroom screening
Classroom(s) randomly selected from all classrooms
Every student screened in hallway
All bags screened in classroom by dog
Dog does not make contact with students
This procedure is same as used for Gage, our drug dog.
Typically, 4-5 classrooms in visit

13. Safety screening
Principals working now to identify entrances for bus riders, car riders, walkers
Principals developing plans for staff deployment
Incorporated into School Safety Plan
if selected as site for any type of search – to be incorporated into School Safety Plans
Similar to lockdown process, everyone will have a role

14. Safety screening Communications Plan
Goal is for students, families and staff to know what to expect step-by-step
Messaging to students, families, staff
Share through social media
Share to area media outlets
Words and images
Start this week
Starting tonight
Families, students and community notified AT START (morning) and AFTER (after school) screening in selected school