In 2023, there were 11,311 security services businesses in the United States, according to IBIS. Campus leaders tasked with making security purchase decisions have to choose what solutions they want to prioritize and then decide who they want to buy them from. So, how can the options be narrowed down?
Rich Payne, safety director at Academy District 20 (ASD20) in Colorado and a 2024 Campus Safety Director of the Year finalist, has used lessons learned from major school incidents, including first-hand experience, to both enhance internal best practices and navigate the complex world of choosing security vendors, particularly as it relates to perimeter security (2:45).
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“With some of the best practices, lessons learned, we’ve seen things where interior doors of schools aren’t even locked. And so now every teacher should have that opportunity to lock the door so that if an intruder does get in, that each kid is safe. Also, making sure if you have pass-through doors from classroom to classroom, that those are locked as well, so that an individual couldn’t get into one classroom and then just continue through multiple classrooms,” he told Campus Safety, referring to the Robb Elementary School tragedy. “And so that part, just the basics of locking your door, I think is very important. We lock our homes, we lock our cars. Those are all tangible items that insurance can replace, but we can’t replace lives if some were to get into an unlocked door, which takes a couple seconds to make sure that the door is locked.”
Choosing Security Cameras for K-12 Schools
Aside from the critical best practice of keeping doors locked, Payne has invested in what he calls “secondary tools,” which include security cameras (3:55).
“Our schools have close to a hundred cameras, so what you have is systems in place that if you need them for evidence, you’re looking at them back, you’re always going back to evidence or having a system in place that actually is live,” he said. “From lessons learned, we saw that there were officers being sent in Parkland to where they thought the individual was, and I think there was a 12- to 15-minute delay. So the officers were getting there and the individual wasn’t there, and that was on an auto playback system.”
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While Payne recommends AI technology with facial recognition capabilities, he believes what many companies offer isn’t enough, and that a more emergent AI technology is the way to go.
“But to add some AI technology into your cameras, to have the ability to just put a box around a person, a lot of people like to say, ‘We do facial recognition.’ Well, facial recognition only works if everybody’s picture is put into the system. It’s not going to pick up somebody who’s not,” he said. “So that’s why you can get systems to where you can actually just put a box around that individual and then that maps that individual wherever they walk in the building, it actually follows them on the cameras. Traditionally in schools, your camera systems were set and done by your IT support system in the district, but they were built off of data ports. It’s very hard to navigate that, you’re constantly having to drag and pull cameras. And so there’s newer systems out there that — I was able to do this in Douglas County School District in 80 traditional schools in 20 charter schools – put a system in place that you could put a box on a person and that box will follow that individual through the whole building.”
Payne also says while many surveillance camera companies will tell prospective customers that they can share the feed with law enforcement, responding officers are often traveling at high rates of speed to get to the scene. This is where the importance of having connections and conducting training with law enforcement comes into play (5:51).
“They don’t have time to look at their laptop, and then from that little screen to determine where the bad person is in the building,” said Payne. “Having a system that speaks the same language as law enforcement, such as having the building and all your cameras numbered into a law enforcement tactical response. Your number one side is always your front of the building. Then it goes clockwise, and you’ll have your two, your three, four side, and then your interiors, your five cameras. That way, if an officer is dispatched to a certain location, they know if the bad guy is sitting at the front door waiting for the officers to come in. With [some] camera systems, you can now tell your officers, ‘Approach on the three side.’ They know the language. Instead of saying, ‘Go back to the east door,’ they’re going to know where the front is and the back is.”
Choosing Window Film Solutions for K-12 Schools
Glass vulnerability has also been spotlighted during several high-profile school security incidents, including Sandy Hook Elementary School when the gunman was able to gain access into the building by shooting out a large window next to the locked front doors (9:54).
“If you go back to lessons learned, bad guys have gotten in either from prop doors or by breaking glass. And so after Sandy Hook, the big push across the country was for everybody to put some type of protective window film. So that’s kind of back to the basics of 101 is you secure your buildings with locks, and then from there you should have that protective film put on your buildings,” Payne continued. “But then if they do get into your building, we also learn from Parkland, to see if you can have the funding to make sure all your classroom windows have the protective film on there so the bad guy cannot get through like what happened.”
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While there are many reputable window film companies, Payne’s advice is to choose a company that has a federal cage code, which means their product has been vetted through the federal government. He also urges school leaders to ensure that the product being sold comes directly from the seller or their distributor (12:37).
“I’m a firm believer you go with a product that is put on by the company that owns it, not something you can buy off of Amazon. There are lots of products you can buy off Amazon and put it on yourself, but it’s better to have a product where it’s the actual company that owns it, has patents, and that’s the company that you go with that you focus on,” he said. “I’ve done several million worth of protective film with Clear Armor Company, and I sat there and I’ve watched every single demonstration, and then being there when they’re installing it and actually touching that product. Not where a company comes in and sells you this and then puts something different on there because it makes a big difference if it comes down to having to defend those type of things when you have a lawsuit or anything that happens.”
While Payne makes safety and security improvements based on lessons learned from other school shootings, he has first-hand experience as well (15:20).
“I’ve had a school shooting, I was a director up in Douglas County when I had the STEM school shooting, and there was loss of life. There was other children that were injured. And you never want that. You never want that to happen,” he said. “And so anything we can do from looking at best practices and using research-based programs and things like that, that we can talk and network and say, ‘Hey, have you used this? Did you try this?’ Get those things in place because you don’t want to live through that. There’s many years of litigation that happened after that just to show that we did what we could do, what we had, the capability from the school side, and that we’re always trying to. It’s a continuous process improvement. How can we improve? What can we do better?”
During this discussion, Payne also shared:
- His overall philosophy on school safety (1:13)
- How he involves local law enforcement in school trainings (7:51)
Watch the full interview here or listen to the podcast on the go on Apple or Spotify.
