Urban schools improving security

DEBORAH YAO
Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA - At the Samuel H. Daroff Elementary school in West Philadelphia, students must pass a security officer who uses a metal detector wand to search for possible weapons. A network of cameras pans the grounds and beyond for any sign of trouble.

It's a typical scene in a city where schools have become a refuge from drug-fueled gang shootings.

It's also a scene in sharp contrast with schools in suburbia, rural America and at the one-room Amish schoolhouse an hour west of Philadelphia where a gunman struck Monday.

The attack, which left five girls dead, was the latest school shooting far from an urban center, illustrating for some experts that city schools have often succeeded in making themselves safer.


http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/breaking_news/15675679.htm

a cheaper and easier way to do it is to remove all lockers..
students can only carry notebooks..no purses or backpacks..

If each desk has a textbook assigned to it and each student has a duplicate AT HOME, there is no reason for lockers or backpacks..

students could easliy pass through security areas by emptying their pockets..

If girls' bathrooms were properly stocked with hygeine products, they have no need for a big ole purse..

in cold areas, they could have a cloakroom with an attendant to hold coats for students..

It would be cheaper and calmer..

But the cost of the textbooks alone would be way beyond most school districts' budgets.

equipment, security guards and metal detectors at every door.. and the kids' postures would be improved too if they didn't have to lug 50 lbs of books around all day..

and no kid could ever get out of homework by saying they "forgot their book at school" :evilgrin:

the security equipment. We just bought a new Science series. The 3rd grade books are over $50 apiece. So figure the high school tests are at least $100.

I do love your idea though.

Every class room had a book on every desk, and we had a set at home..

I never even saw a backpack until my own kids went to school..I don;t know how they managed to carry all that stuff around..

than to expect kids to carry books around.

I often have a vision of textbook publishers bathing in champagne with tophats on while smoking big cigars and drinking martinis, lol.

And yes, they do wine and dine us as we shop for new textbooks.

That way there will be much less complaining when there are 'security' cameras everywhere and the concept of personal privacy is a thing of the past. Oh and that pesky Fourth Amendment is removed from the Constitution. Hell, when the whole Constitution is scrapped, at least we'll all be 'secure'.

for keeping kids safe at school?

or perhaps create more walled communities? in case it isn't obvious: :sarcasm:

i think the solution of not allowing kids to bring bags or purses to school is ridiculous and won't work. I think that metal detectors and guards and cameras everywhere is very creepy.

the problem is obviously a deeper one than what's going on in schools and needs to be solved outside that arena. i suspect some of it is 'class warfare' - groups of people living in such poverty and pressure that it's spilling over to schools and children. I suspect some of it is a 'culture of fear' fostered by news networks, as Micheal Moore suggested in Bowling for Columbine.

If we can solve these issues it would probably be much more effective than turning public schools into jails.

It really is a society problem.

Desegregation.

I've NEVER understood why the issue of tying property taxes to school funding doesn't get challenged. It's out and out class warfare - Children of wealthier families get to go to better funded schools and get better educations. How is that a fair and even start for Americans?

We need schools to be funded evenly, from national taxes, not property taxes. And college should be free or affordable while we're at it.

by Jonathan Kozol? It is an excellent book and addresses the very thing you just mentioned - the inequity in school funding.

I would love to see this become an election issue (and i'm someone no children). It has serious implications for the future of our country, whether we remain 'competitive' in the world.

Pretty much all of Kozol's stuff is good.

They tried to solve it in the 70s with desegregation and lost massive numbers of kids to private schools.

And I commend you for your attitude. If all citizens were as committed as you are to solving this problem, it wouldn't be a problem anymore.

But this school violence is clearly not isolated to poor areas. In fact, the vast majority of the shootings in the last 10 years have been in suburban and rural schools. The schools in crime infested neighborhoods in the urban core have had very few incidents.