“It’s one of those things that it’s better to be prepared and hope we never need it than to bury our heads in the sand thinking it’ll never happen,” said High School Principal Adam Sherfield of the active shooter training that school employees had on Friday, August 6.
The training was provided by Justin Blackshear, David Haley, and Jesse Pette of Watchmen Defense, a company that teaches groups how to defend against armed threats. Members of the school’s staff received information that was specific and designed for their environment.
Watchmen trains groups with videos, reenactments, and hands on tactics designed help them respond in the event of a threat. The group’s mantra is “avoid, hide, or fight,” and they teach which response is correct for the situation at hand.
The training included all school staff members.
“I think it really opened our eyes to a lot of things that go on,” Sherfield said. “We’ve become complacent, you know. We’d like to think this would never happen to us, but we’d rather be prepared, because the truth is, you just don’t know. These types of things happen frequently, but unless it’s huge, you don’t even see it on the news. This training highlighted for us the need to be prepared, even with small things we can do in our classrooms and around campus to protect our kids.”
In the coming weeks, the district’s safety committee, which is made up of members of administration, faculty, staff, students, and other community participants, will meet to discuss the impact that the training will make on their safety plan, which is used to help keep the district as safe as possible. The safety committee meets in conjunction with local law enforcement officers periodically to keep the plan up-to-date.
“We realize that if something like this did happen, there would be chaos,” Sherfield explained, “but on a district level, training like this helps us know how to respond not just during the incident, but after, too. Being as prepared as possible and knowing what to do goes a long way to help.”
The Watchmen Group will be returning to the district for further training and consultation.