Trident Manor, Andy Davis’ consultancy, is running a ‘protecting educational establishments’ workshop in Darlington on Wednesday, June 27. Andy, based in the north east, told Professional Security that the morning event has arisen from his speaking with a school in the region that sought security help.
That highlighted to Andy, a security and risk consultant and trainer, that school managers might not have enough access to security advice. The aim of the morning, he said, is to give knowledge so that schools can make informed decisions, not least in how to meet their duty of care responsibilities. Andy proposes to go through the principles of security; and the physical, technical and operational sides; taking in personal safety of staff, workplace violence (which is anything but confined to schools; Professional Security magazine has lately featured violence against convenience stores, and on campuses and in healthcare) and emergency planning.
The general official UK advice for a terrorist ‘active shooter’ attack, whether in a school or campus, public place or anywhere, is ‘run-hide-tell’. Again as reported by Professional Security, in a terror attack (or in cases of alerts that turn out to be unfounded, but in the meantime may feel like and be reacted to as a real attack) educational and other buildings may face difficult decisions, with little information to go on, as to what to do – whether to run (where is safe?) or to ‘lock down’, or ‘invacuate’.
Andy, pictured, says: “There’s a lot of confusion about the run-hide-tell versus the lock down procedure.” He suggests that schools have a ‘shelter in place’ policy, which allows for full or partial lock down; and for run-hide-tell.
As Andy suggested, schools also have a job of being able to explain to parents, who might not properly understand what security terms mean; and as Andy said, lock down can sound ‘quite a brutal term’.
As for who the workshop is aimed at, while fee-paying schools have bursars, who indeed have their own association, the ISBA, for managers who hold the purse-strings, many state schools now similarly have business managers, who are responsible for admin and management of buildings and what goes on in them.
For more on ‘run-hide-tell’ visit https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/stay-safe-film.
