Idaho lawmakers last week decided not to tackle legislation on school security. The state’s Department of Education had supported it, calling it a first step toward making students safer. Improving school security now falls to the Department and its task force. That group - made up of educators, first responders and law enforcement -started meeting in January.
Matt McCarter leads the Idaho School Safety and Security Stakeholder Group. He says the task force will soon have a tool called a threat assessment finished. Think of it as a guide for a superintendent or principal examining a school.
“Look at bricks and mortar, look at lighting, communications, door locking mechanisms, emergency operations plan, school climate, school culture, issues of drug and alcohol use, bullying, harassment, violence,” McCarter says, “to assess where each building is relative to readiness to prevent and respond to crisis.”
The threat assessment tool comes from the Texas School Safety Center. McCarter says the task force is working to adapt it for Idaho schools. He'd also like to see an Idaho School Safety Center modeled on the Texas one. It’s a state entity housed at a university that coordinates school security programs. In Idaho now, McCarter says, many different agencies have a hand in school security but no one has ultimate responsibility.
The task force is also working on how to connect schools to Homeland Security’s state emergency operations centers. And the group wants the state’s Division of Building Safety to include security issues in school inspections. McCarter says much of what the group has identified won’t be easy.
“At the state level we’re not there. At the local level they’re not there,” he says. “So what does that look like in terms of resources, funding? So part of it, the group has to make some recommendations around, ‘here’s what it’s going to take.’”
McCarter says task force recommendations will likely lead to legislation next year but he doesn’t know what that might be.