Capitol News

In the wake of the recent Michigan State University shooting, officials from the Lansing School District sat down to examine their school safety efforts.

Superintendent Ben Shuldiner started the discussion at a recent school board meeting by going over some of the systems they already have in place.

The district has minimized the number of entrances accessible at their schools and visitors must get buzzed in and then come into a secondary area before gaining access to the rest of the building.

“We also have our wonderful school safety officers who, unlike some districts, our school safety officers are our employees. These are not police officers from a police department,” said Shuldiner. “These are not a private security force. These are our folks, many of which were trained by our wonderful Cordelia (Black) when she was head of public safety. But you're talking about a group of people that are part of our community that are there.”

Black, the executive director for school culture in the district, also elaborated on safety protocol.

She said that all schools in the district are doing the state mandated emergency drills for fire, tornado and shooter lockdowns. They have instituted hall monitors in the high schools and continue to focus on relationships in security programs.

Moreover, cyber security initiatives not only protect their own systems, but also alert them if students are searching or viewing any alarming content online. Black said there is a pilot program at Everett High School that had metal detectors installed in January that has yielded promising results.

The high school acquired some portable metal detector posts that allow students and their bags to be scanned as they enter the high school. The system can scan through over 600 kids under 30 minutes.

Officials said that at first kids were uneasy letting officers go through their bags, but now they know if they set off the alarm that they just want to ensure there’s nothing dangerous on their person and they won’t be snooping. After discussing the merits of the metal detector, the board approved expanding the system to their two other high schools.