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Safety and Security - Physical Safety in Our School Buildings
Lock interior and exterior doors. Keep doors locked throughout the day.
The “Why??”
One of the protocols CCS adheres to is keeping all exterior doors locked, and keeping interior doors locked in classrooms.
Very few question the purpose behind maintaining all exterior doors locked at all times. This is to keep people from walking into our school buildings without proper authority or permission. We should never prop open doors, or use wedges or other items to block the doors from closing securely. When this is necessary to keep a door open for bringing items in or out, please work with a second individual to hold the door open no longer than the time needed to move the item in or out. This will ensure that the door doesn’t go unattended or forgotten, leaving the perimeter of your school building unsecured and potentially creating a dangerous situation for anyone inside the building.
When deliveries or larger items need to be moved into a school building, it is always suggested to have the School Resource Officer stand by while the door is unsecured for any extended period of time.
So why do we need to lock interior classroom doors at all times?
Because as human beings we make mistakes, and we always want to introduce redundancy into our planning and daily operations where safety is concerned. This is why we continually check the status of our doors, interior and exterior, throughout the day.
Should an exterior door be left unlocked or left open, the classroom door to your room would be your last line of defense should an individual with bad intentions come into one of our school buildings. This is why having your doors locked but not closed is ineffective. Should an intruder come into the building through an unsecured exterior door, the likelihood of a teacher being able to close the classroom door before an individual came into your room would be very low. This is why all doors should remain locked and closed when students are in the classrooms. Using wedges or items to prop open a door is a bad practice, as they are often forgotten and left in place.
The importance of the relatively simple task of maintaining locked exterior and interior doors is one of the best safety protocols we can adhere to. In the wake of the tragedy at Uvalde, Texas we have learned that the shooter entered through an unsecured exterior door, and that there was likely an improperly functioning interior classroom door lock that contributed to the shooter having access to commit the acts he did.
As we have discussed in training, a locked door serves as a time barrier. A properly locked classroom door consists of a solid core wooden door, hung on a steel frame, with an industrial strength locking mechanism. These doors are difficult to defeat when locked. As a time barrier, these locked doors provide valuable time for law enforcement to respond. History has shown us that 90% of violent school threats are over in 10 minutes; 70% are over in 5 minutes.
What about empty classrooms?
Empty classrooms should remain locked at all times as well. Any unlocked space (classroom, storage space, custodial closet, electrical room, etc.) provides a location for an individual to lie in wait or elude detection. In the event an intruder enters our school building, we want there to be no access to classrooms with staff and students, and want that individual to have no place to hide from law enforcement or to have a place to wait for a classroom to fill with students and staff.
So when an SRO or other staff politely closes your door, please don’t take offense. We all just want to keep our schools as safe as possible, and locking doors is one of the best ways to accomplish that.
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