Santa Fe, Texas School District Has New Security Measures to Protect Students

Dr. Leigh Wall, Santa Fe ISD

One Texas school district isn’t waiting around for another shooting to occur at its schools before taking action to protect students.

Santa Fe ISD made some major changes over the summer that will hopefully insure that a shooting never happens in its district again.

Since the May 18, 2018 shooting in which a gunman left 10 dead and 10 injured the school has implemented major security measures.

Santa Fe ISD is serious about its students safety and they aren’t taking any chances.

Below is a list of some of the steps the district enacted over the summer:

• Hiring five new full-time police officers and four new part-time police officers.
• They’ve hired 10 new security assistants who will add security presence to the district and monitor campuses.
• An alarm and panic buttons were also added to the high school.
• The entire front entrance of the high school was renovated to create a secure vestibule, where metal detectors are now installed.
• The front entrance also has bullet-proof glass.
• Five-hundred cameras will monitor who is on district’s property, and 200 of those cameras will be at the high school.
• Interior doors were upgraded to include the capability to lock from the inside and outside.
• Metal detectors will be on every Santa Fe ISD campus.

In addition, other efforts have been made by the district to prevent a shooting before it occurs.

• The district announced new ways to report bullying, programs to stop it and an outside company that was hired to monitor social media.
• There will also be additional mental health and emotional support counselors, aids and comfort dogs available for students as they come back to school.
• Parents and are encouraged to volunteer at school campuses and identify mental health issues at home.

The $1.6 million investment is something that the district hopes will stop future incidences of gun violence and save the lives of innocent children.

Superintendent of schools, Dr. Leigh Wall prepared a video to welcome students back on their first day of school and to talk about what the school has done to make sure they are safe.

Perhaps other school districts around the country could take a lesson from Santa Fe ISD and the lengths to which it has gone to make school safety a top priority.