As a teacher, I am all for strong measures to ensure school security. But must we really reach this point?

Like some others in the Washington area, Loudoun County schools soon will greet all visitors with something new: a locked front door, a video camera and a button-activated intercom to request entrance. Inside, office staff will screen the visitors and decide whom to buzz in.

The video intercom, common in apartment buildings around the world, is turning up increasingly in public schools. After the 1999 Columbine High School shootings and subsequent school tragedies, limiting access is a top concern for every school administrator.

Loudoun's $550,000 video intercom solution, to be installed beginning this summer, was proposed after the Amish schoolhouse shootings in Nickel Mines, Pa., in October, in which a gunman killed five students and himself. The proposal, included in the school budget, won overwhelming approval days after the Virginia Tech shooting rampage last month that left 33 dead, including the gunman.

"I realize that schools cannot provide fortification against the crazy events that occur in society," Loudoun School Superintendent Edgar B. Hatrick III said. But he said school officials can at least take steps to secure buildings.

"By using the intercom video system, we can control who actually comes in the front door," he said.

I'm all for uniforms and IDs for students, but can does putting schools on a perpetual lockdown effectively deal with security issues, or does it really constitute an illusion of safety? And what is the cost to the psyches of our children?

Posted by: Greg at 10:02 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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