Security, supervision of students top list of concerns
Security and supervision of students were two of the main issues discussed at Monday night's meeting of the Marion-Florence USD 408 Board of Education.
The school district has a crisis plan in place that served it well during an Aug. 28 incident, said Superintendent Gerald W. Henderson.
A Florence man made death threats to school officials before coming to Marion Elementary School that day, where he was arrested without incident.
Board member Chris Sprowls said people, even parents of students, should have to check in at a school's office, to heighten security. "Slow them down
Ken Arnhold, Marion High School principal, said people "don't usually stop at the office," so it's difficult to secure that building. They should check in, but they don't, Arnhold said.
Board Vice President Gene Bowers said if people give in to paranoia, and we go to locks, badges for admission, etc., then the bad guys win.
"We have to live with a certain amount of risk," Bowers said. You can't anticipate everything, he said.
Board member Keith Collett said, "They ARE public schools." He asked, "with a security door at Marion Elementary School, how do you get the kids out in a real emergency?"
Collett said the district needs to keep on with what's worked for it for 130 years.
Board member Kathy Meierhoff said the children would be able to get out of MES even if there were a "security door," as it would be locked from the outside, but openable from inside.
Sprowls said he hated "to overreact, but there's got to be a balance."
President Rex Savage said that a few years ago, people were saying they "didn't feel welcome in the schools
Tod Gordon, MES principal, said visitors could use lanyards placed around their necks during temporary visits, then put them back on the hall tree they found them on when leaving.
Henderson questioned whether the district might not wander into the area of "overkill." "This is not a big city school (district)," he said. "This is not Columbine."
Savage encouraged the two principals at the meeting, "If you have ANY doubts in a situation, pull the trigger," that is, act, sound the alarm, call the police."
Board members will have five weeks, until their next regular meeting, Oct. 13, to think about possible crisis/security policy changes.
Arnhold said there are no padlocks on students' lockers in the hallways at MHS. In the rare case in which a student does have one, the office must also possess the combination that will open the lock, he said.
The transition between classes would take too long if students stopped and unlocked their lockers after every class, Arnhold said. Students in P.E. (physical education) do have padlocks on those lockers, he said.
Henderson said the security policy does not encourage holding any funerals in school gyms, but does not absolutely prohibit it, either. If a funeral were held there, it would have to be on a Saturday or Sunday, he said.
"Kids want their lives to continue," Henderson said, and having a funeral on school property is "disruptive and at odds with that."
Supervision
Henderson said Marion High School football and basketball games are not a playtime for the district's administrators and other staff to baby-sit younger kids who are dropped off at the games.
He spoke of "pickup" football games at MHS gridiron contests and kids running in and out of the gym at basketball games.
Gordon, who is also the district's activities director, said he supervised volleyball and football games last week. At one point Friday night, he found a kid on a trash can outside the MES gym.
Another kid nearby threw a rock at a car, and an adult nearby said to Gordon, "Ah, let 'em go, they're just kids!"
Hoisington's school district tries to "police," i.e. supervise, these kids, but other schools in Marion's "new" league, the Mid-Central Activities Association, say it's impossible, Gordon said.
Hoisington doesn't allow youngsters to play inside the fence at football games, he said.
Collett said, "It's a hard line to draw."
Arnhold said, "I know now which sacred cows to shoot and not to shoot." He said he conducted a "one-man crusade" against unsupervised play during his first year here after a student suffered a broken arm. Some community leaders called him, he said, and told him to lay off, or words to that effect.
At plays and musicals, it's a problem, too, Arnhold said. Kids running around, up and down the aisles, to the restrooms, are disruptive to those trying to watch the show.
He said those of less than high school age are now forbidden to sit in the balcony of the auditorium. "They would meet for a date up there," he said, after being dropped off separately by their parents.
Also discussed was the possibility of telling people that they cannot come back in if they leave the building or event, unless they want to pay the admission price again.
Bowers said it all boils down to "simple good manners. Plan to go to the restroom, or to the concessions stand, at the quarter break, or at halftime." Consider others, in other words, a sort of golden-rule concept.
Henderson warned that if a statement saying parents or others should keep track of their kids and not let them wander without supervision were placed in the event program, it should be enforced.
"Why have a policy if we're don't enforce it?," he asked.
He said he could tell the consensus of the board was that the basketball gym was a much larger problem than the football field, as far as unsupervised play and roaming by children.
People go back and forth, bothering serious fans. Administrators, or someone, can use their cell phones to call parents and tell them their child is misbehaving.
Henderson said the district needed, however, to hire a person or people to do this, because Gordon and Arnhold had enough duties already without burdening them with one more such as this.
Gordon said Marion-Florence is the only district in the new league, the MCAA, that does not have separate people filling the principal and AD jobs (he serves in both capacities).
It was also noted that it's illegal to smoke on any school property, even outside a gym or stadium. That law is not being enforced, Henderson said.
