When a student at Douglas County’s Chaparral High School warned administrators she had seen an unfamiliar man get out of a car and try to enter the building Thursday morning, safety protocols zipped into motion.
Not only did Chaparral secure its own perimeter, but other nearby schools also secured theirs. Minutes later, everyone exhaled – it was just another student trying to return to class.
“Everybody’s a little jittery today, so we probably erred on the side of caution – which is just fine with us,” said Larry Borland, executive director for safety and transportation for Douglas County Schools.
The aftershocks of 53-year-old intruder Duane Morrison’s murder-suicide Wednesday at Platte Canyon High School in Bailey rolled across the Denver metro area as school officials checked doors, revisited their own safety procedures, and sought to reassure students and their parents.
At Englewood’s Sinclair Middle School, principal Randy Johnson chose Thursday to perform his school’s monthly “threat drill.” Teachers secured students in classrooms, turned off lights, shut exterior windows and pulled blinds.
“We have it to where in about 30 seconds, the building looks empty,” said Johnson. “The idea is you can’t just walk down the hall and look into a classroom window and see anybody. This was a very quick drill. The kids were dialed in.”
At Denver’s Bromwell Elementary School, principal Jonathan Wolfer walked the school grounds with the custodian to evaluate building security and sent an e-mail to parents assuring them that many safety precautions, from closed-circuit cameras to lockdown training, have been put into place.
Securing access points
“But what happened in Bailey reminded me that it doesn’t hurt to walk around a few more times a day and make sure all the access points are secure,” Wolfer said.
On the same day the hostage-taker in Bailey forced Platte Canyon High into its evacuation procedure, a school lockdown was underway at Polaris at Ebert, a Denver program for gifted students in kindergarten though fifth grade, while police sought a suspect in a gang shooting.
As principal Diana Howard drove home that evening and learned of the Bailey tragedy, she anticipated that some of her students’ parents would link the events. So she sent them a message explaining what happened and that she would be meeting with teachers to review safety precautions.
The school, located hard by an unsavory enclave of vagrants and drug-dealing, can’t afford to be lax, Howard said.
“Because of our rather vulnerable spot, we’re always vigilant,” she said. “Our doors are always locked, unlike many schools I’ve walked into day and night – and I’m shocked. I don’t think you should walk into any school nowadays with open doors.”
She took the added step of instructing the school custodian to restrict morning access to the building until more staff have arrived.
“Some of the best hypervigilance comes right after an attack,” said Ron Stephens, executive director of the National School Safety Center in California. “In my view, schools have made tremendous strides. But there’s not a campus in America you can protect against the committed and disruptive attitude of someone who wants to come on the grounds and commit an act of violence or harm.”
Park County Sheriff Fred Wegener said his officers had run emergency drills earlier in the summer with Platte Canyon High’s teachers and administrators.
“The school district and their protocol that we have for a lockdown situation were working,” Wegener said. “We did isolate the students. We had them locked down in classrooms. The officers then went classroom by classroom and evacuated the classrooms away from where the shooter was.”
What didn’t work, he acknowledged, was that the shooter entered the school in the first place.
Except for the period between classes when students need to enter and exit the building, the school’s interior metal doors normally are locked and visitors must pass through the main office.
Morrison may have entered the school during one of those transition periods, Wegener said.
“Hopefully we’ll be able to find out exactly what happened. And then maybe be able to shore up whatever security measures there are,” he said.
Access issues are common across the country, as most schools have regular school personnel, and not law enforcement, watching the doors, said Stephens.
“This is a vivid reminder that schools everywhere continue to have a level of vulnerability,” he said. “If you see someone on campus who doesn’t belong, that person needs to be challenged.
“And students need to feel comfortable reporting this.”
A failed test
Two weeks ago, a plainclothes Englewood police officer tested three schools in the district by walking into the buildings and strolling the halls to see whether anyone would challenge him.
Although the department wouldn’t name the specific schools or detail the findings, the bottom line was not encouraging.
Englewood schools Superintendent Jim McCabe said he had been told the officer had “easy access.”
“It means we’ve got to tighten up how we let visitors in,” he said. “If there’s an issue, we’ll correct it.”
But McCabe also noted that since Columbine, schools are “the safest we’ve ever had.”
“Could you up the level? Of course, but we have to balance costs,” he said. “In our district, with declining enrollment, there’s a trade-off of what you do away with. We cut a million bucks out last year. It comes down to people and choices.”
Security is a tightrope walk in a school environment, added Douglas County’s Borland.
“Nobody can 100 percent guarantee anybody’s safety,” he said. “Schools are schools – public places, not prisons. There’s a certain amount of openness and a certain limit to the protections you can offer. The real trick is: Where’s the balance?”
Staff writer Steve Lipsher contributed to this report.
Staff writer Kevin Simpson can be reached at 303-954-1739 or ksimpson@denverpost.com.
