Schools in the U.S. are spending millions of dollars to boost their safety systems, including the installation of panic buttons that will alert the police in case of a school shooter or other emergency scenarios.
According to CNBC, multiple states are mandating or encouraging schools to buy panic buttons in the hopes of preventing another tragedy. This is on top of the spending on security cameras, metal detectors, alarms, door-locking systems, and bullet-proof windows.
At the Olathe Public Schools in Kansas, $2.1 million was recently spent on tangible security systems. Brent Kiger, the school's safety director, defended the expenses by saying that this was not a knee-jerk reaction to the Uvalde school shooting as the purchase was planned years ago. He believes that the panic button from CrisisAlert will be helpful and useful.
Mom Lori Alhadef of the advocacy group Make Our Schools Safe has advocated for the panic buttons. Alhadef lost her 14-year-old child during the Parkland shooting in 2018.
States like Florida, New Jersey, New York, Las Vegas, Oklahoma, Texas, Nebraska, Arizona, Virginia and the District of Columbia have laws requiring schools to have a panic alert system. The demand has risen to 270 percent between 2021 to 2022.
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Not the most effective prevention
Critics, however, thumb down on the panic button installation in schools. Ken Trump of the National School Safety and Security Services and Mo Canady of the National Association of School Resource Officers said that these are nothing but "security theater" to give parents and the school community a false sense of security.
Speaking with the New York Post, Trump said that people are looking for tangible things to assure them that the kids will be safe in school. However, Trump pointed out that the reality is that the less visible security measures are the most effective.
The uselessness of a panic alert system was highlighted during the Uvalde school shooting. Robb Elementary School had an alert app that informs the school of an active shooter so the classrooms can go on lockdown. However, the system was problematic because the school staff did not send the alert on time. Not all teachers also received the notification because of poor WiFi services or because their phones were locked away in their drawers.
Sen. Cindy Holscher said that while she supports and understands the need for panic buttons, these tangible safety measures are not enough to prevent mass shootings in school. The root of the problem is still access to guns.
"If we make it way too easy for people to get their hands on guns, it's still a problem," the senator said.
Uvalde kids shifting to online classes
Meanwhile, the children who witnessed the Uvalde school shooting have shifted to online classes after telling their parents they do not feel safe going back to school, per Daily Mail.
Kendall Olivarez, 11, who was hit by the shooter's bullets but survived after five surgeries, is still reeling from the trauma. Andrea, 10, who saw her brother and teacher massacred before she got out of a window, is scared to go back as well. Their parents have let them sign up for online classes.
The House has been probing what went wrong with the police's response in Uvalde after it took more than 90 minutes to move the kids to a safe place. The general assessment was that the law enforcers failed to adhere to their training thus 21 died in that massacre.
