The Role of Climate and Culture in School Safety
Campus climate and culture are foundational in the creation and maintenance of a safer and more secure school for both students and staff.
Guy Bliesner began his career in education in 1994 as a high school teacher and coach. Moving into administration in 2006 as the Safety and Security Coordinator for the Bonneville School District. While serving in that position he was named to the Idaho’s Governor’s School Safety Task Force. Also, during his Bonneville tenure, he was named a finalist for the 2011 Campus Safety Magazine’s national Campus Safety Director of the Year Award. In 2013 he left the district to form, with a partner, the private School Safety, Security, Risk Management consulting firm of Educators Eyes. This firm developed and implemented Idaho’s first statewide school safety and security condition assessment. In 2016 he dissolved the firm to join, as a founding member, the newly created Idaho Office of School Safety and Security. He currently serves as the School Safety and Security Analyst assigned to schools in Southeast Idaho. His mission is to support the public and charter schools of southeast Idaho to bolster school safety through assessment, training, and planning assistance.
Campus climate and culture are foundational in the creation and maintenance of a safer and more secure school for both students and staff.
Planning, as well as using current training opportunities and plausible, realistic scenarios will enable most schools to greatly improve their safety training and exercise programs.
A school security analyst shares how Idaho schools worked with first responders to establish a common initial response platform for emergencies.
Consider framing your school security and safety programs via a detection-communication-response rubric.
The pandemic has shown we need to quickly engage a much wider group of professionals, including those in facilities management, HVAC, architecture, mental health and more.
Measures put in place to mitigate COVID-19 should not increase a school’s exposure to other threats, making multi-hazard planning more important than ever.
Schools must do all they can to mitigate the effect of COVID-19 on their school community. Equally, they must limit the liability exposure for their staff and the institution. These are not mutually exclusive goals.
Here’s what one community learned about reuniting students with their parents after it conducted an active shooter exercise with first responders and community volunteers.
Combining security cameras with adult staff who can intervene during incidents and provide pupils with “teachable moments” will optimize the effectiveness of cameras and personnel.
Schools must look at the risk management implications associated with concealed carry laws and the unintentional discharge of firearms.
In this webinar, attendees will learn the observable behaviors people exhibit as they head down a path of violence so we can help prevent the preventable.
This discussion will help participants analyze, understand, and assess their own program effectiveness.