You probably do it at your children’s school all the time.
As you walk through the front doors, you see someone coming in behind you. So you hold the door into the school open after you have been buzzed into the office.
You’re trying to be polite, but also are not following the procedures set up by schools to keep children safe, school officials said.
That’s why school officials try to remind parents every year of their safety and security measures and how they are being used to keep children safe. The precautions, including speaking through an intercom to be buzzed into the building, aren’t always convenient, but they are in place to be sure schools know who is coming into and out of their buildings, officials said.
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For example, at every Greenwood school, visitors are buzzed in and go straight to the office, where they need to sign in and leave their identification before they go into the school building, Superintendent Kent DeKoninck said.
The procedure is similar to what most schools do, officials said.
When Franklin schools first installed systems that required visitors to be let into the building, officials had lots of discussions about the procedures, including reminding people to not open doors for other visitors, Superintendent David Clendening said.
Years later, more reminders are likely needed to make sure those procedures are being followed and that the schools are as secure as they can be, he said.
The issue is one schools across the county have dealt with.
At a meeting at a Greenwood elementary school last school year, the principal discussed the issue, saying parents were the biggest rule breakers, DeKoninck said.
But school officials also know that people are going to let other visitors in, and that is why they take other precautions, officials said.
At Indian Creek schools, office staff also watch cameras of visitors coming and going. And with the size of the school district, with an enrollment of about 1,800 students, they know pretty much everyone, Nineveh-Hensley-Jackson Schools Superintendent Timothy Edsell said.
If someone is coming into the school they don’t know or that they know shouldn’t be there, they are going to immediately alert administrators, and police if necessary, Edsell said.
“We want to be a welcoming and friendly campus, but first, we need to be safe,” Edsell said.
At many local schools, classroom doors are also locked as an additional security measure, and dozens of cameras keep watch on the entire school, officials said.
In the past, Clark-Pleasant school officials have found issues of doors being propped open, such as at the high school to let students in returning from the Central Nine Career Center, Superintendent Patrick Spray said.
That issue was addressed by school officials installing an alarm on the door, he said.
Staff at Indian Creek schools are asked to check the entrances near them whenever they are walking around the school, making sure no doors have been propped open or not fully closed, Edsell said.
Parents opening the door for the people coming in after them isn’t as much of a concern, since they have to check in at the office and leave their identification there to get into the rest of the building, Spray said. That way staff knows who is in the building and when they leave, he said.
But officials do need to constantly review their procedures to make sure they are being followed, Spray said.
Parents also need to be reminded to have a bit more patience, school officials said.
Often, people get hurried, wanting to drop off their child’s forgotten lunch or get their child into the school when they are running late, Clendening said.
“We remind them to have patience; we are going to buzz them in,” he said.
But parents also need to remember that letting them into the building isn’t the only task for their office staff, and they may have to wait a few moments. But they don’t want doors propped open or the door held open for a line of people because that isn’t following procedures, Center Grove Schools Superintendent Richard Arkanoff said.
They just ask that parents and visitors remember everyone is working together and to try to support each other, Arkanoff said.
“Be understanding that it’s not a perfect system, we all need to work together to make it a better system,” Arkanoff said.
“Everybody wants the same thing, a safe, secure place to go to school.”
