As school districts across the nation look at ways to ramp up security and emergency preparedness in the wake of the Parkland school shooting, one California school district used its Facebook account on Wednesday to post a picture of a “lockdown kit” with a unique set of ingredients.
“As part of our emergency preparedness measures, all classrooms will be getting ‘lockdown kits’ to aid students and staff in the event that they shelter in classrooms for extended periods of time,” the post read, ending with the hashtags #schoolsafety and #LVUSD.
The post has since been removed by the district’s Facebook page, but the pictured homemade toilet kit included a bucket, cat litter, duct tape, towelettes, garbage bag, toilet paper and gloves.
“Some of the things we’ve done recently are custom locks on all of our classrooms, strategic fencing, and a sophisticated camera systems at all of our schools,” said Las Virgenes Unified School District Superintendent Dan Stepenosky in a video posted on the school district’s web page.
The district has also partnered with the National School Safety Center to “carry out the campus-by-campus evaluation.”
In a phone interview with The Daily Caller, Stepenosky explained his district’s approach to school security.
“Big picture for us is to keep the gun from showing up at the school,” said Stepenosky, a former Navy officer with an extensive background in school security. “If we can keep the gun away from the school, we win. If the gun shows up at the school, it’s going to be bad.”
“We work closely on creating softer schools, not harder schools,” said the superintendent, admitting that the approach was “counterintuitive.”
“Turns out, gates, guns, guards is not the answer. The answer is to keep the gun away from the school,” said Stepenosky, whose “soft” approach involves dealing with kids on an individual basis to stop trouble before it starts.
“You don’t want kids isolated,” he said. “You want kids to reach out to a trusted adult if they need help.”
The district does employ an armed “juvenile detective team” of three that covers the 14-school district, but Stepenosky doesn’t believe arming teachers is the answer.
“I can’t think of any teachers with ex-military experience. Some staff, but less than 10 of us,” he said. “I don’t think that’s the answer, for a lot of reasons.”
Instead, the district emphasizes locked classrooms with a “piece of flip metal” that teachers can easily lock from the inside and “lockdown kits” that include the one pictured above in case students have to be in the classroom “for extended periods of time.”
Prolonged lockdowns may not necessarily entail a school shooter, and usually doesn’t, explained Stepenosky, but can sometimes be “off campus situations that you don’t want to reach on-campus.” The district works closely with the sheriff’s department as to when they are to “go to lockdown.”
