So.....What's Next? A 'Brady Bunch' Approach to School Safety? Seems About Right....

Who remembers a TV show in the 1970's called The Brady Bunch? For that matter, does anyone besides me remember the start to The Brady Bunch? It begins by saying "this is a story". The show, for those too young to remember, is about a blended family that includes three boys (sons of the father in the series) and three girls (daughters of the mother in the series). It took place in the 1970's, so I wouldn't be too surprised if some folks don't remember it.

Anyway, the show featured a lot of family dynamics going on. Some might even call those family dynamics dysfunctional. Things often got a bit chaotic at times by standards of the time. But the things I remember about the show include how the lessons learned by the children from their individual parents before being blended into The Brady Bunch influenced how they reacted to their new lives as The Brady Bunch. Morals of the stories presented? There was always a happy ending with lessons learned somewhere along the way in each episode.

Well, this blog post will use The Brady Bunch as an analogy to emergency management in an effort to help define the role emergency management should have in the school safety arena. I use The Brady Bunch in this analogy to try and help illustrate that school safety can be dysfunctional. That school safety doesn't always reflect lessons learned. That school safety can be chaotic. That school safety requires 'family dysfunction'. It's a short story of how difficult it can be to help people understand emergency management, and hopefully prompt them to get involved in it. The process can be chaotic at times. It can involve interpersonal dysfunction at times. In emergency management, there aren't always happy endings either. Sometimes there's even lessons learned that aren't really lessons learned.

Take the Margery Stoneman Douglas (MSD) school massacre as just one example. In their final report, the authors cited the Columbine massacre final report and lessons learned therein as an example that guided their research and results/recommendations. That's a problem. Why, you ask? Because the findings from the Columbine massacre final report were intended to have been a school safety guide for EVERYONE, including MSD officials, responsible for their school's school safety efforts PRIOR TO an incident occurring. In other words, the Columbine massacre final report should have been used as a template, so to speak, for other schools, including MSD, to address the issue of school safety BEFORE their massacre, not after.

There have been quite a few school massacres since MSD. Virtually the same song has been sung following each and every one of them. That song reflects the same song sung following the MSD massacre. A quote often attributed to Albert Einstein (some say it wasn't him, but it doesn't really matter) goes: “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” When it comes to school safety, this rings so true, it's scary (even if Einstein wasn't the author). I've been at this a very long time. To keep seeing the same things over and over and over with little to no change is frustrating beyond measure!

Bottom line? Emergency management is not rocket science. Anyone can do it and engage in it. But first, those who do engage in it must also become knowledgeable about what it is and what it does.

Way back in 1990, I began my job with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (BUREC). This government agency owns and operates over 300 dams in the western half of the U.S.

I was hired to work in their Early Warning Systems Program. This program theoretically consisted of 5 separate and distinct components:

1. Detection: Crap! Something's happening, and it don't look too good!
2. Decisionmaking: What the hell do we do now?
3. Notification: Well, maybe we should let someone know what's going on.
4. Warning: Up to them to notify their community, not us! Not our responsibility.
5. Evacuation: Up to them to get folks out of harm's way, not us! Not our responsibility.

Anyone see anything wrong with this approach?

First of all, Detection: What's happening? Is it a flood? Is there a structural problem? How bad is it?

Second, Decisionmaking: Is there a reasonable threat to the structure, and, if so, is it also a threat to anyone downstream?

Third, Notification: If you, as the owner of the hazard, don't know what to do about what's happening, where does that leave everyone else?

Fourth, Warning: There's a population at risk. Who should be notified if you, the owner of that risk, don't know who to contact downstream?

And, fifth, Evacuation: Who should be evacuated? Is this a dam failure in progress or something less? What if an order to evacuate is given and the potential threat isn't all that much to worry about? What if an order to evacuate is given and whatever happens to the dam is bigger than the area of evacuation and lives are lost?

Lot's of questions, no real thought given to answering them.

As the owner of a hazard (dams - Grand Coulee Dam, Hoover Dam, Glen Canyon Dam - any of those ring a bell?), the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation ethically, morally, and legally has a responsibility to consider the population at risk downstream from its dams.

A colleague and I immediately began to question why a robust emergency management program hadn't been considered instead of just early warning systems? Early warning systems had their place within an emergency management program, but were no substitute for them, that's for sure! Just as drills have a place within emergency management programs for schools, but are NOT a substitute for them.

Ever run into a brick wall? No one wanted to hear this emergency management program question. "Our dams don't fail!" was the retort we always got. Here's a snapshot of a typical conversation with BUREC personnel:

ME: If our dams don't fail, might they still pose a threat to populations at risk downstream if normal operations exceed normal operations?

BUREC: Good Gawd, man! We aren't responsible for anything downstream if that happens.

ME: If some of our dams can release huge quantities of water without even spilling from the spillway, what do you do then? Call someone and tell them to inflate their rafts (by the way, this actually happened way back in 1976 when the Teton Dam in Idaho failed and caused death and massive destruction downstream).

BUREC: Well, maybe. But warning and evacuation still aren't our responsibility!

ME: Never said they were.

BUREC: But, that's what you're implying!

ME: No, I'm not. I'm simply trying to get you to recognize that everyone has to work together in order to most adequately provide for the safety of the public in areas downstream from our dams.

BUREC: But that would mean we'd have to talk to those folks, wouldn't it?

ME: Yep. Let's get on it!

BUREC: Nope! If we do that, they'll think there's something wrong with our dams. We don't want to risk that!

ME: If something goes wrong at one of our dams, and the folks downstream aren't adequately trained on the system to begin with, and lives are lost, and there is damage to their property, who do you think they're going to blame? Y'all better be prepared to repel a horde with torches and pitchforks if anything like that happens.

Now, apply the above conversation to so many conversations that take place following any number of school massacres. You should be able to see a defintie pattern of what happens following just about any disaster, including school massacres.

Anyway, I could go on and on about this. But, suffice to say, my colleague and I weren't able to make any progress on getting emergency management programs accepted within BUREC until one day sometime in 1993, the Assistant Commissioner of Reclamation (second highest chingadeta in the organization) was standing on the crest of one of our dams alongside the project manager responsible for the operation and maintenance of that dam, looking out over a sprawling community of somewhere around 75,000 people, most of whom resided, along with the business district, in the already mapped "probable maximum flood" floodplain. He turned to the project manager and asked if "those people down there" were prepared if something bad should happen at the dam.

The project manager's response? "I don't know."

Well, that certainly didn't go over well! Although, for those of us promoting emergency management programs for our dams, perhaps it was the right answer because it certainly set things in motion for us.

Within days, our small group of emergency management specialists was tasked with developing a comprehensive set of emergency management program guidelines to comply with a new U.S. Bureau of Reclamation policy requiring full spectrum emergency management programs at every single one of our dams. And so it began.

It wouldn't be until 1995 that those guidelines were finally published. Even though it isn't rocket science, it is very difficult, frustrating, time consuming work to design, develop, and implement full spectrum emergency management programs. Sort of like establishing emergency management programs for schools, eh? But I digress.

I bring this up simply from the perspective that in Colorado, we have a state law (I've mentioned it before) known as SB 08-181 that requires every single school in the state of Colorado to design, develop, and implement full spectrum emergency management programs fully compliant with the National Incident Management System (NIMS) and the Incident Command System (ICS).

So, now we keep seeing these types of objections to emergency management programs for schools coming from school administrators:

• "What? You're kidding! Right? Right?"
• "Where's the money to do this?"
• "We don't have the expertise."
• "Where's the guidance?"
• "But it's not our job! First responders are supposed to do this stuff!'

Is it really any wonder that many schools in Colorado have failed to fully comply with this underfunded, understaffed mandate? Now apply that to schools nationally, and we are faced with an astonishing school safety failure. 

Sure, there's been moderate attempts at implementing new technology, security systems, and even different looks at what to do in the event an active shooter tries to cause havoc in a school. But there's no national standard.....yet. 

And that's where parents, students, communities, first response organizations, emergency managers, and other key stakeholders come in. The expertise is there. There's no need to re-invent any wheels. There's no need to spend a fortune. This can be done, and done very well, at very little cost except for a commitment of time and effort. The key to success in emergency management, as it is in life as far as I'm concerned, is the ability, and more importantly, the willingness to not only be able to listen to what's being said, but also to actually hear what's being said. Not an easy thing to do. So, if anyone is looking for a moral to this story/blog post, there it is.

If you, or someone you know, is willing to dive into getting emergency management programs for schools going, a good place to start might be to find the resources that can help you, or someone you know, get started. I've put together a comprehensive, but by no means complete, list of School Safety Resources for anyone to access. Most are free of charge. There's another one at the Readiness and Emergency Management for Schools Technical Assistance Center (REMS TA Center). Most of those are free, as well.

Folks, somebody's gotta do this. If someone else won't, then why not you? That's not a rhetorical question, either.

My two cents....

* Comments on this blog are moderated.

Columbine Stories Need To Be Told

Today is the 24th anniversary of "Columbine". It just doesn't seem that long ago when so many lives were irrevocably altered in a manner that a lot of folks have said they just cannot imagine happening to themselves.

We'll be seeing a lot of remembrances on a lot of people's social media pages today. That's as it should be. After all, 13 precious lives were taken that day.

I usually share some kind of remembrance on this day, as well. This year I'll also focus on a "thank you". 

Thank you to everyone engaged in talking about their own experiences and memories of that day. Thank you for doing that no matter how brief you decide to be or how lengthy, no matter how traumatic it might be for you emotionally to share your thoughts and your feelings about what went on that day.....for you.

That's something that I believe all too often gets kind of lost in the story that quite literally defined the way in which this particular massacre is presented....that the ripple effects go far, far, far beyond those families whose children were so violently wrenched from them that day alongside the families whose children were so violently and critically injured, some of which injuries required extensive hospital stays, months of rehabilitation, and a lifetime of working toward a level of healing, both physically and emotionally, that many of us cannot even begin to wrap our own heads around.

The ripple effects simply do not end there. Those ripples extend out far beyond those we've become very familiar with. Those ripples extend to everyone there that day: students, teachers, administrators, first responders, parents, community, nation, and even the world, itself. 

The spotlight, as it were, has rarely been focused on the stories of those not there that day or on those who were there that day but not physically injured or their families. 

I belong to several community pages and support groups, the members of which have been sharing those very memories and experiences.

They weren't there that day, but they knew someone who was.

Or they knew someone who knew someone who was.

They may not have been there that day, but the images they saw affected them deeply on an emotional level. They hugged their own kids a little tighter, and whispered an "I love you" in their children's ear as they tucked them into bed that night.

They may not have been there that day, but they were so affected by what they saw that they decided they had to make a difference....somehow.

Or, they were there that day and were left physically unharmed but emotionally scarred by what they saw, by what they experienced.

Those are the stories, the experiences, the memories that are so often not being told.

I can't remember how many times I've seen posts about Columbine in groups I belong to whose members talk about these very things, I sit back and marvel at how brutally honest these folks usually are. I marvel at how this event affected THEM. It almost makes me cry. 

The raw emotions that still swirl around the events of April 20, 1999 are palpable still. I've learned something I don't ever want to forget....that empathy is alive and well after all.

I'd known in my heart of hearts this massacre had affected people outside of that inner circle of folks directly affected by this massacre. Even today, folks talk about it as if it's some kind of bellwether event for other mass school shootings. My experience in talking about it and inviting others to do so is emotional in and of itself. That experience helped me to realize none of what happened is about any single individual or group of people. What happened that day is about everyone. How could it be any less?

So, it is to those folks I say thank you. Thank you for doing that. Thank you for sharing your stories. 

Your stories need to be told. Your stories matter.

We are ALL Columbine!

My two cents.

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Active Shooter Drills are NOT School Safety!!!!

Active Shooter Drills are NOT School Safety!!!!

I could write a book on this one, but suffice to say if people (parents especially) want safer schools, they're going to have to invest themselves in the process to get there instead of being passive/aggressive about it.

Frankly, I'm tired of people who keep condemning and vilifying active shooter drills while offering nothing as an alternative especially as presented in this article from April 14, 2019:

Active shooter drills are scaring kids and may not protect them. Some schools are taking a new approach.

Since then, nothing has really changed other than even more subject matter experts, psychologists, and psychiatrists weighing in and saying virtually the same thing.....repeatedly - that active shooter drills are harming kids.

Folks, I'm here to tell you there's an entire process involved in designing, developing, and implementing an effective active shooter drill. Too many folks don't use that process, though. And that's why we keep seeing scared and sometimes traumatized kids and even school staff who've been forced to go through active shooter drills gone wrong! And, by "gone wrong", I'm talking specifically about unannounced drills, poorly planned drills, or drills that have no prior planning before being conducted. 

Truth is, there's a better way that actually works: An emergency exercise PROGRAM that's part of a broader emergency management program. Please note I did not say active shooter drill program. I said "emergency exercise program"! And that emergency exercise program must be an integral part of an overall emergency management program designed specifically for schools.

There are detailed guidance documents available that are even specific to schools. One very good site to go to for this type of info is FEMA's Multi-hazard Emergency Planning for Schools Site Index. If all you're looking for is some info on drills and exercises, scroll down. Drills and exercises have a whole list of things you can access......for FREE!

There are a whole bunch more I've listed on my own blog site: School Safety Resources. My page is also FREE to access, but a few of the resources listed are not free.

And there’s one more that’s probably the single most underused website of all that provides free materials and guidance on school safety: Readiness and Emergency Management for Schools Technical Assistance Center

Bottom line is:

Folks, YOU need to start asking questions of your school districts. You have every right to do so, and arguably have a responsibility to do so.

Questions like:

• What process is the school using to design, develop, and implement an emergency management program?
• Does each individual school in the district have an emergency operations plan?
• If not, why not?
• If so, what standards were used in its design, development, and implementation?
• If policy is specified in the plan that certain procedures are to be followed for any of these kind of activities (including response to actual incidents) and that policy has appropriate signatures, is that policy being followed (signed policy may have full force and effect of law according to solicitor general of agency I used to work for) during response?
• What other types of practice activities besides active shooter drills are being used?

That's just to start, but the list could go on.

Parents need to be advocates for their kids' safety before an incident happens. Doing so after an incident is what I call reactive activism:

I'm not talking here about parental involvement in school curriculum, either. I'm talking about parents being proactive in their kids' safety by inserting themselves into the school safety PROCESS by actively volunteering to help keep their kids safe while in school.

Confrontational attitudes won't work, but the types of questions I posed in this shortlist are questions that need to be asked and answered.

That's the point, hopefully, at which multiple disciplines will realize they need to work together to make anything viable come together, and work together for the common goal of safer schools.

Rant over.....well, almost.

And, after all the questions above are answered, here's a few more that parents and/or members of a community need to consider:

• What can you, a parent or member of the community, do to enhance safe schools?
• What do you, a parent or member of the community, need to know in order to enhance safe schools?
• What should you, a parent or member of the community, look for related to school safety at schools in your community?
• What do children think about safety in their school?
• How comfortable are you, a parent or member of the community, with methods and procedures for reporting safety concerns at schools in your community?
• Is access to schools in the community controlled and monitored?
• Do schools in the community have established policies and procedures on security and emergency preparedness?
• Do schools in the community have ‘living’ school safety teams, a safety plan and ongoing process, as well as a school crisis team and school emergency/crisis preparedness guidelines in place?
• Do school and public safety officials use internal security specialists and outside public safety resources to develop safety plans and crisis guidelines?
• Are school emergency/crisis guidelines tested and exercised?
• Have school employees, including support personnel, received training on school security and crisis preparedness issues?
• Do school officials use outside resources and sources in their ongoing school safety assessments?
• Are you, as a parent or member of the community, honestly doing your part in making schools in the community as safe as they can possibly be?

Now my rant really is over.

School administrators often times have a very full plate. So, often times (see what I did there?) school administrators will opine publicly that your kids' safety is their top priority. But, in reality, they don't know where to start except that they're required by law to conduct drills that are, without proper preparation, harmful to the very kids they say are their top safety priority. So, GET ON IT parents and community members. Nobody else is gonna do it for you!

Colorado passed a law in 2008 (SB 08-181) that actually requires emergency management programs at each and every school in the state. All y'all might want to consider using this law as a model for your own school emergency management program.

My two cents.

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