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Wake County Public Schools weighs their options on how to keep students and staff safe and secure.
Violence in NC schools has been on the rise since the pandemic, and Wake County schools are no exception. Shortly after 11am on Monday, Nov. 27, two students were stabbed in an altercation at Southeast Raleigh Magnet High School. The 14-year-old perpetrator has since been charged with fatally stabbing a 15-year-old student and wounding a 16-year-old student with nonlife-threatening injuries.
On Nov. 28, the school board’s safety and security committee held a meeting scheduled well in advance of the fatal incident, originally intended to discuss a clear bag policy at athletic events. Following the stabbing, the committee revised the agenda to talk about “confidential security updates,” but did not disclose any details to the public—due to NC laws surrounding discussions about school safety—despite skyrocketing concerns from parents about how a knife got on school property.
Various NC schools have pursued multiple safety procedures—from school resource officers to clear bag policies. Johnston, Halifax and Granville counties are among the many in NC that have opted to install metal detectors in schools to ensure children’s safety. Wake County School Board Chair Lindsay Mahaffey and Superintendent Robert Taylor didn’t rule out the possibility of metal detectors, issuing a joint statement stating plans to “review all our safety processes and protocols to determine what happened and what changes may need to be made.”
The statement continues: “There is nothing more important than the safety and well-being of our staff and students. Please know we are committed to continuous improvement to school safety.”
Speaking at the National Conference on Active School Threats Nov. 29, retired chief of the Sarasota County School District Police Department Timothy Enos did not recommend metal or weapons detectors as a foolproof way of keeping schools safe. According to Enos, in order to catch all types of weapons, they would need to be sensitive to the extent that detected jewelry and belts might set the detectors off and require a student search.
Not only do most schools not have the staffing to ensure lines and searches move quickly, but metal detectors could open the school up to liability problems if a weapon does make it through. Opponents also point out that metal detectors are costly—Winston-Salem and Forsyth County dropped over $300,000 on outfitting all their schools—not to mention less effective at preventing violence than other measures. Alternatively, Enos recommends a school resource officer, real-time camera access for law enforcement, shooter response training and threat assessments, among other crucial initiatives.
WCPS already updated the rules for visiting schools in July in an attempt to curb violence on campus, but these safety protocols only screen visitors for previous sex offenses and domestic protection orders—not for weapons. The screening also doesn’t extend to students, despite the growing number of NC juveniles charged with violence crimes from 2021 to 2022.
Mahaffey and Taylor said they have taken proactive measures for several years to “support and enhance our safety measures by authorizing an independent security assessment of every school,” but parent concerns are still mounting after these proactive measures failed to stop this tragedy. Despite the committee meeting, decisions on how to best keep Wake County students and staff safe have yet to be made, and further protocols have yet to be put in place. Stay tuned for continuing updates.
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