Back to school, back to drills: Students, teachers, leaders must stay ready for anything

As school shootings continue to plague the country, school district leaders have to make sure plans are in place to ensure the safest possible conditions through preparation and drills.

While it turned out to be a false alarm, Plymouth Elementary School had a scare on Sept. 11, when an alarm for an active intruder was accidentally activated. A letter was sent out by Principal Linda Green to the families, saying the alarm prompted an immediate response from first responders.

She wrote officers from various police departments responded. Plymouth police cleared the building and confirmed all students, teachers and staff were safe.

“We appreciate the swift and professional response from everyone involved,” she wrote.

Plymouth Regional School District Superintendent Kyla Welch said all schools responded to the alarm since the elementary school, high school and district office share a campus. Welch said the local police and State Police were on scene within 90 seconds.

“They were super helpful, and it was resolved fairly quickly,” Welch said. “It just couldn’t have been worse timing being 9/11.”

With the anniversary of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, Charlie Kirk’s assassination and a school shooting in Colorado the previous day, Welch said it was very unnerving for everyone, including the parents who were contacted.

“It was accidental, but we respond just like there was an actual intruder, like it was a real scenario,” Welch said. “The high school kids were a little nervous, which is justified.”

She commended the school community for handling it well and noted this was due to proper training throughout the school year. The school has a policy of “avoid, deny, defend,” which is much like the ALICE Training — Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, Evacuate — used by other schools.

The district uses a private app which connects to the local police department to streamline messages and provide updates and scenarios. She said most districts do not use a lockdown system anymore, but instead have a procedure for everyone to get out of the school and go to a “reunification spot” off campus.

Welch said there are a variety of drills the district uses, and some are unique to the region. It depends on the situation as to whether they remain inside the school or evacuate. A scenario where they would stay inside would be if there was a bear on the grounds, which she said happens due to the geography of the school.

“The training we conduct is to respond based on the scenario, and the teachers have the best authority to keep the kids safe,” Welch said. “It really depends on the threat.”

Welch said the district has emergency plans they work on with the Department of Homeland Security, as well as state and local police.

“The intruder drill is practiced a couple times a year, but we have fire drills, bus drills and others,” Welch said. “All in all, we have about 10 to 15 drills a year, with different procedures for each.”

Logistics in Laconia

The Laconia School District uses the ALICE Training system, which Interim Superintendent Amy Hinds said is a proactive approach for critical situations or incidents that could occur in a building, including an active shooter or intruder.

“In today’s world, we have to practice these drills,” Hinds said. “We practice these as part of our annual drills. We do some with staff and some with students, and it is part of the annual mandatory staff training.”

Hinds said the district works with Laconia police and student resource officers, and once a year they perform ALICE Training. There are about 10 drills that can be both scheduled and unannounced throughout the school year.

She explained in ALICE Training, there is an alert to recognize the danger and make sure students and staff don’t just shelter in place in a locked classroom. Districts and police departments have learned over the years from school shootings nationwide.

Hinds said they have learned how to inform students in real time if the situation is changing. For example, if an intruder is at one end of the building, and the other end doesn’t need to be locked down, they will evacuate.

Like Plymouth, Laconia has a secure location for people to go to off campus.

Hinds also said there is an aspect of the drill where they speak with staff and students about learning skills to distract an intruder if encountered.

Guarding against threats in Gilford

Gilford Superintendent Kirk Beitler said ALICE Training is used in all three schools. A safety committee meets monthly involving the police, fire department, school administrators, the buildings and grounds workers and others, to “get everyone at the table together.”

ALICE drills at the high school also involve a debriefing with students, and parents are involved to be apprised of what is happening.

“We have a safety assessment completed in all our schools next month that the Department of Homeland Security does every three years,” Beitler said.

Beitler said if the state has grant money, the district needs to be up-to-date on this to qualify. These funds can be used to address anything that comes out of the assessment, including things like cameras, or controlled access to the entryway of the schools.

Gilford has several drills, but Beitler noted the focus has been on active intruder safety due to the state of the nation.

“We haven’t really had fires in the schools for a long time, but it sure seems like there are shootings happening across the country,” Beitler said. “We try to balance it. We have six or seven fire drills, but we mix in a lot of the ALICE drills.”

Beitler said Gilford is fortunate to have two SROs who move about all three schools. The district has a “great relationship” with the police department, and he added students and staff take this subject very seriously. He said this is something they are very aware of, and everybody does their best to ensure safety.

“Often, the students take the lead,” Beitler said. “It is a serious situation. Shootings happen all the time, every week, across the country.”