As highschool college students in Broward County return to courses on Monday, they’ll encounter a brand new layer of safety designed to reinforce security on campus.
Faculty officers are urging college students and oldsters alike to arrange for potential delays because the district rolls out steel detectors throughout a number of faculties.
Broward Colleges Superintendent Howard Hepburn showcased the brand new safety procedures throughout an illustration at South Plantation Excessive Faculty on Wednesday.
“That is a further layer of safety for our faculties,” Hepburn said. “To make sure the protection and safety of all workers and college students. In the event you’ve ever been to an airport or attended an athletic occasion, it’s an analogous scenario.”
The first aim of this initiative is to stop weapons akin to weapons and knives, together with different prohibited objects, from getting into faculty premises. Nonetheless, the steel detectors can also be triggered by non-dangerous objects, probably slowing down the screening course of. On a regular basis objects like cellphones, three-ring binders, umbrellas, and even onerous eyeglass circumstances can set off the detectors.
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Hepburn suggested college students to be proactive in minimizing delays. “Earlier than you get to the steel detector, you need to take away these things out of your backpack so you may go via with ease,” he defined. “There can be workers stationed adjoining to the detectors. You hand over your objects, stroll via, they usually’ll return them to you. If the detector goes off, there’s a secondary station for a fast scan to confirm you don’t have something prohibited, and you’ll go on together with your day.”
This district-wide implementation of steel detectors follows a profitable pilot program performed over the summer season at J.P. Taravella and Charles W. Flanagan excessive faculties.
No cellphone utilization at Broward faculties
Along with the brand new safety measures, the Broward County Faculty Board has launched a stricter cellphone coverage. S
tarting with the 2024-2025 faculty yr, college students can be required to maintain their telephones off or in airplane mode all through the varsity day, together with throughout lunch and different free durations.
The college board unanimously accepted the brand new coverage on Tuesday, increasing on final yr’s rule, which solely required telephones to be silenced or turned off throughout class.
Learn: Broward County introduces metal detectors at two summer school sites
