Weapons of Mass Good
By Elissa-Beth Gross
Herein lies a challenge, as well as a huge opportunity. Once the inventory of shields and shield-piercing swords is taken, there will always be some security gaps. The more self-sufficient the campus can become, the less it needs to rely on limited, and unpredictable lifeline resources. As an epicenter, it needs to know its own strengths and weaknesses, partners and adversaries. Once shortfalls are accounted for, the community can get to work to find solutions. I strongly recommend honing campus administrators’ grant writing skills. Alternatives can be found for costly products, and temporary controls deployed until permanent solutions can be obtained. Where resources are acquired, user training and refresher training will likely be needed. Also, any assets being relied upon should be well-maintained and replenished. Tracking and accountability are key. Does anyone at Uvalde know if there were more, or less protective resources last year or this year, or which new threats are a priority? No doubt about it, the counter-strike has to be more well-coordinated and succinct than the next active attack.
©2022, Campus Risk Solutions®, LLC
As we see with Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas a school isn’t an island. The greater environment spills onto campus, and the campus relies on the larger community to do its job. We’re reminded yet again, that faculty, staff, and students are the “true” first responders on the scene before help arrives, and the stakeholders with the most to lose. There are literally thousands of protective measures that can be applied before an emergency, many of them complementary and vetted. These measures need to be applied in advance of 9-1-1 calls for emergency response. The courageous, well-trained students of Uvalde did not have the benefit of an airtight security framework backing them up. Protective resources and processes have to be identified, inventoried, and organized to produce favorable outcomes when seconds count. Likewise, threats must be identified, and matched with solutions or controls, before incidents occur.