Episodes
Tuesday Mar 31, 2020
Tuesday Mar 31, 2020
Schools brace for brutal 20% (or greater) slash to funding as coronavirus crashes economies; Doc’s face validity check in; Washington State’s “report your neighbors” website; the basics of school funding; austerity measures for the 2020-2021 school year; what will get cut; what will get funded; what happens to school safety? HOW ARE SCHOOLS FUNDED? There are three main sources for school funding: federal, state and local. Schools receive roughly $12,000 per student per year. About half of that is funded by the state, 40% from local property taxes, and 10% from federal funds. Schools are funded for the fiscal year that begins on July 1 and ends on June 30. UNPRECEDENTED FUNDING CUTS FOR 2020-21. Doc notes that several sources have informed his statement that K-12 public schools in America will receive 20% less funding than the current year. He describes the variables in play that could cushion that figure or exacerbate it, such as use of fund balance, declining enrollment, tax-deferred business districts, or taxpayers demanding extreme austerity measures at the school district’s annual meeting - which is when the school board sets the tax rate for its homeowners and businesses. WHAT WILL BE CUT. More than 80% of school expenses are staff salary and benefits. As states rush to reduce the number of required student-contact days from 180 to 140 (or fewer), staff compensation contracts would subsequently be reduced by at least 20%. Everything is on the table. Expect the deepest cuts to be in these areas: Maintenance and unencumbered building projects; support staff; bus drivers; kitchen staff; office staff; athletic directors/coaches; public/community relations positions; staff professional development; and student mental health. IMPACT ON SCHOOL SAFETY. School safety is a $3 billion a year industry with 80% spent annually on fences, bollards, barricades, window films and surveillance. Expect school safety funding to plummet by 50% - and if students do not return to in-person schools, that figure will be closer to 75% as schools won’t fund bullying, harassment or threat reporting systems. School safety is important, but it will be heavily de-funded in this time of education austerity. WHAT WILL GET FUNDED? Virtual learning platforms; technology staff, individual Chromebooks, iPads and Hot Spots; Programs to train parents how to use technology; and a myriad of devices having to do with sanitizing from germ-zapping robots, hands-Free 3D printed door openers that can be operated with a stylus, and antimicrobial coating for door handles, chairs, desks, lunch tables, light switches - pretty much everything. CUSTOMER PERCEIVED VALUE LED TO $100,000 GERM-ZAPPING ROBOTS in 2016. In an article I wrote in August for Crisis Response Journal, I noted that On September 18, 2014, President Obama issued an executive order combating antibiotic-resistant bacteria - or MRSA. The pesky was showing up in school locker rooms, gyms, fitness centers, etc. -- think of flesh-eating infection. That’s not exactly it - but close enough. A few wealthy districts are spending tens of thousands of dollars on special machines that kill MRSA on desks, door handles and fitness room equipment. A $100,000 germ-zapping robot named ‘Gronk’ is helping to kill MRSA at a Massachusetts High School (Perrodin, 2019). 350 of these robots were sold to hospitals, medical facilities and schools across the country. FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE & BLOG: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host & guests. The show adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse & debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety. This is episode 126 of The Safety Doc Podcast and was recorded and published on March 31, 2020.
- Article referenced in this post: Bullets or bacterium - in pursuit of the forgotten school intruder - http://www.crisis-response.com/comment/blogpost.php?post=472
- Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Book: School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
Wednesday Mar 18, 2020
How Thinking About a Bagel Can Get You Through the Worst Day of Your Life
Wednesday Mar 18, 2020
Wednesday Mar 18, 2020
Doc talks about what it means to enter chaos from the perspective of someone that researches crises. THINK OF A BAGEL. It's tasty as hell and also a metaphor for our lives and routines. Humans expect things to be similar and go bananas when they are moved out of the bagel - and the further you get outside the bagel, the more chaos. CHAOS IS A NATURAL STATE. But, chaos is part of nature and the sooner we recognize it and embrace, the sooner we inventory our options and make intelligent decisions to get us to the outcome basin. In other words, there are infinite ways to get from point A to point B - yet we've become comfortable in thinking everything must be convergent, or linear, that there is a "best way" to do every specific thing. That's BS. If we would have kept on thinking that way, we would have devolved as a species and innovation would have been stifled. And, we were kind of that point of barnacle regulations and unchecked spending. EPIC HUMAN EVOLUTION. Some company made the last ice box. Restaurants, for example, are scaling up take up and drive-thru. They are changing business models and it's working. Doesn't mean that is won't be bumpy and that we won't have losses - we will - but we will also rapidly evolve - perhaps an unparalleled 24-36 month evolution as humans in how we work, educate, build, design, entertain, etc. than we would have experienced on the trajectory without the Coronavirus. In fact, these, and other, core aspects of societies might leap 10-20 years further down the road due to how we've had to "solve the problems" presented by the coronavirus disruption. There is a very real probability we will look back upon 2020 as a time of great human innovation and not a time of human collapse. SCHOOLS WILL CHANGE in 5 GREAT WAYS Also, watch this livestream for tips on navigating life during chaos, making better decisions, and also 5 ways that schools will be better after the coronavirus event. This is episode 122 of the Safety Doc Podcast. FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE & BLOG: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host & guests. The show adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse & debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety. LOOKING FOR DR. TIMOTHY LUDWIG, PHD? Dr. Perrodin’s “Safety Doc Podcast” negotiates school and community safety. To be informed about industrial safety, please contact Appalachian State University Professor Dr. Timothy Ludwig, PhD, at www.safety-doc.com. This is episode 122.
- Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Book: School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
Monday Mar 09, 2020
Insider Truth of How Schools Will Respond to Coronavirus
Monday Mar 09, 2020
Monday Mar 09, 2020
Schools aren’t prepared to handle long-term closures due to the coronavirus. Don’t be fooled by germ-zapping robots or custodians fogging hallways with disinfectant. If a pandemic hits, the schools will close - and probably for the rest of 2019-2020 school year! I worked in school for 20 years with most of those being a school administrator involved in school crisis preparedness. In this episode, I’ll step you through what’s happening behind the scenes in America’s schools. HOW MANY SCHOOLS IN AMERICA? 55 million students are educated in 140,000 public and private school buildings each day. That’s more than one million classrooms. As we think of schools, we need to account for community preschool sites, portable classrooms and online instruction. PANDEMIC PLANS ARE AFTERTHOUGHTS. Most schools have antiquated pandemic response protocols in a file - likely something downloaded from a website. Unlike fire drills and intruder exercises, schools are not required to conduct “pandemic” practice activities, such as tabletops or simulations. With school safety singularly focused on intruder drills, schools haven’t been preparing for pandemics. Hype about schools effortlessly being able to teach kids online is greatly sensationalized and won’t work for more than a week or two. Schools simply aren’t designed to offer instruction in an exclusive online format. FEMA CAN TAKE OVER YOUR SCHOOL. Yep, that’s true - and it’s likely in the fine print of your county’s emergency management plan and only after the governor has declared a disaster - but it can happen. Dr. Perrodin explains what would rapidly unfold if FEMA took over school as medical or supply sites due to a coronavirus outbreak. In 2008, Dr. Perrodin worked in a school district that had two of its schools quickly taken under the complete authority of FEMA following a natural disaster. THE 5 THINGS THAT WOULD CAUSE SCHOOLS TO CLOSE. (1) COVID positive test for school staff or student that had been attending school - yep, one person and you can expect the district to shutter; (2) Local decision due to pressure by parents or teachers; (3) More than 30% of students are absent; (4) Disruption of supply chain including food, soap, paper towels, or cleaning supplies; (5) Government decree to close schools (likely beginning at a county level). It is very unlikely that the federal government would close all schools. WHY THE 2014 MRSA SCARE COST US DEARLY RIGHT NOW. On September 18, 2014, President Obama issued an executive order combating antibiotic-resistant bacteria. This order included a multi-agency plan due in 2020 to respond to this threat to domestic security – a plan that would mandate standards for electronic health record-based reporting for MRSA (Obama, 2014). As of July 2019, a uniform MRSA database had not yet been established in the United States and other countries. Had the plan been carried out, we would have had an established model to replicate for a coronavirus database. It also underscores how we pretty much just wait (and hope) for things to run their course and return to some type of similarity. MARKETING FEAR. In 2016, a $100,000 germ-zapping robot named ‘Gronk’ helped to kill MRSA at a Massachusetts High School. Hundreds were sold as school boards couldn’t vote fast enough to burn cash on items that probably worked, but weren’t necessary. (Ever heard of bleach and a rag?) Today, schools are buying Ghostbusters-like backpacks that fog hallways with disinfectant clouds. US WARNS 7 COMPANIES OVER FRAUDULENT CORONAVIRUS CLAIMS. On March 9, 2020, Federal regulators warned seven companies to stop selling soaps, sprays and other concoctions with false claims that they can treat the new coronavirus — or keep people from catching it. There are no approved treatments for the virus, and none are likely to be ready for months or years. FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE & BLOG: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host & guests. The show adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse & debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety. LOOKING FOR DR. TIMOTHY LUDWIG, PHD? Dr. Perrodin’s “Safety Doc Podcast” negotiates school and community safety. To be informed about industrial safety, please contact Appalachian State University Professor Dr. Timothy Ludwig, PhD, at www.safety-doc.com. This is episode 120.
- Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Book: School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Read Dr. Perrodin’s Crisis Response Journal article at https://tinyurl.com/CRJ-Perrodin
Friday Feb 28, 2020
Strength Trainer Drew Baye | Is Student Fitness Sapping School Safety?
Friday Feb 28, 2020
Friday Feb 28, 2020
Drew Baye has been teaching and writing about exercise for over twenty years, during which time he has personally instructed hundreds of clients, including elderly people and people with physical disabilities, one-on-one through tens of thousands of workouts. He maintains the number one blog on high intensity strength training baye.com and has been featured in several books about exercise including The New Bodybuilding for Old-School Results by Ellington Darden, PhD, Heart Strong by Ken Hutchins, and The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferris. CALIFORNIA SUSPENDING PHYSICAL EDUCATION. Antonia Noori Farzan of the Washington Post (February 7, 2020) wrote about pending state legislation in California that would drastically impact physical fitness instruction, assessment and guidance for students. “For generations of students, running a timed mile around the track as part of a mandatory fitness assessment has been a painful rite of passage. To some, it can be downright embarrassing and humiliating. But that could soon be changing in California, where officials have raised concerns that annual physical performance tests can lead to body-shaming and bullying, and that they discriminate against students who have disabilities or identify as non-binary." PRESIDENTIAL PHYSICAL FITNESS. In the 1950s, President Dwight D. Eisenhower was horrified to learn that European schoolchildren were acing a fitness test designed by competitive rock climbers, while the majority of American kids failed. The fear that the United States was falling behind on the world stage led to the introduction of the Presidential Fitness Test, which rewarded the students who could do the most pull-ups and run the fastest miles. In 2012, the Presidential Fitness Test was quietly replaced by a program that focused on students’ overall health rather than arbitrary fitness goals. FITNESS. Drew defines fitness as, “Your ability to perform various physical tasks without fatigue and without injury.” He notes that strength training benefits muscles and also the heart – explaining the misconception that the heart is solely responsible for circulating blood throughout the body as many muscles are involved. EXERCISE. Per Drew, most people are unable to accurately define exercise. He defines it as, “A process by which the body performs work of a demanding nature in accordance with muscle and joint function for the purpose of creating tension and fatigue in the targeted muscles to stimulate improvement in muscular strength and size and through the stress in the muscles to place a demand on and to stimulate improvements in all those supporting systems.” NUTRITION. Ultimately, nutrition is a significant component of student fitness. Drew debunks the popular argument that kids of previous generations had similar diets as kids today – and they were more active decades ago. In fact, he notes that the higher level of activity kids had in the 1950s and 1960s decreased opportunities for them to consume extra calories – as they were out doing things and not sitting in front of a screen. STUDENT FITNESS IMPACT ON SAFETY. Drew identified 4 benefits of physical fitness specific to student safety (1) Students able to quickly get themselves to a safe location during a crisis: (2) Students being able to better recover from a physical injury; (3) If you’re stronger, you are better able to aid other people (which is also part of the FEMA Teen CERT program); and (4) Students maintain sharpened thinking skills and decision-making during a crisis due to the connections between physical fitness and improved cognitive functioning. IS ELIMINATING PHYSICAL FITNESS DISCRIMINATING AGAINST STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES? Dr. Perrodin asserts that California’s draconian measures to limit physical education are based on inaccurate perceptions that students with disabilities don’t enjoy, or don’t benefit, from physical education – an assumption he argues discriminates against students with disabilities and violates the Americans with Disabilities Act (Chapter 7, Addendum 2). FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE & BLOG: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host & guests. The show adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse & debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety. LOOKING FOR DR. TIMOTHY LUDWIG, PHD? Dr. Perrodin’s “Safety Doc Podcast” negotiates school and community safety. To be informed about industrial safety, please contact Appalachian State University Professor Dr. Timothy Ludwig, PhD, at www.safety-doc.com. This is episode 119.
- Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Book: School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Learn more about this show’s guest at www.baye.com
Wednesday Jan 22, 2020
Morgan Ballis Interview | Preparing for an Active Assailant on Campus
Wednesday Jan 22, 2020
Wednesday Jan 22, 2020
As a school crisis develops, more time means more options. This episode’s guest works to put seconds back on the clock by teaching people steps to improve their chances for survival during a chaotic situation. ABOUT MORGAN BALLIS. Morgan Ballis is the Director of Strategic Planning & Training with Campus Safety Alliance which is a network of emergency management professionals, law enforcement trainers, and educational leaders providing evidence-based safety solutions for PreK-12 facilities and faith-based organizations. He is a firearms instructor, United States Marine Corps veteran, and is currently completing a doctoral degree in Emergency Management. ACTIVE SHOOTER DATA is CONFUSING. The number of school shootings over the past 20 years depends upon the source of the data. Morgan advocates for using data curated by the FBI which includes: number of attacks, locations of attacks, relationship of the shooter, timelines, and casualties. WHAT’S THE ORIGIN OF THE TERM LOCKDOWN? Lockdowns have become commonplace in today’s schools. Morgan shares that the origin of lockdown drills is rooted to 1970s Southern California when the threat was that someone driving by would shoot at a school. Imagine getting beneath window-level and pulling thick curtains on exterior windows. He noted that early lockdown drills where informally known as “Drive-By Drills” as the threat was external to the school. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN LOCKDOWNS IN THE 1970s and TODAY. Unlike the drive-by threats of the 1970s, contemporary active assailant threats are manifesting within the school. Morgan shares data that these incidents are shorter in duration (3-5 minutes) and more often completing before the arrival of law enforcement – especially in rural areas. These changes in the profile of an active assailant event are rationale for Morgan’s support of an options-based response. SITE-SPECIFIC TRAINING. The school is the unit of measure. Morgan stresses the importance of addressing each school setting within a school district and going beyond quantitative data to interview students, staff, and stakeholders. He revealed that some prominent school safety firms deploy architectural engineers who assess the school environment from a design, hardware and software approach. This creates a conflicted interest as the company conducting the safety assessment will subsequently market solutions that it will sell and install, such as cameras – despite other priorities of defining safety terminology, equipping staff with reliable 2-way radios and teaching standard communication protocols. A TEAM OF EXPERTS. Morgan embraces building a team of content experts to work with him – a group that is matched to the needs of the location. This is known as small group theory and is similar to how the CDC operates when faced with a potential pandemic. IF MORGAN HAD JUST ONE HOUR IN A SCHOOL. Schools seldom have more than ten days of contracted non-student time during a school year. This time is quickly carved into bits for developing curriculum, mandated training on blood borne pathogens, grading, setting up classrooms, ... School safety has secured its place at the table of professional development, but there’s never enough time, right? Morgan advises schools to identify how much time they will allocate to staff training for school safety. The first priority is defining terminology and establishing inter-rater reliability. The second priority is a reliable communication system with 2-way radios for all staff. Morgan’s emphasis on communications aligns to this 2013 interview with communications expert Fred Varian: https://tinyurl.com/Varian-Interview-ComSec LEARNING OBJECTIVES. Threaded throughout this interview was the need to cultivate learning objectives for school safety activities. Are we testing the school’s 2-way radios? Are we measuring the mass communication system that alerts parents? How might a few learning objectives completely change the tone of a school district and outside agencies conducting oft-controversial intruder exercises? And, what do most schools overlook? FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE & BLOG: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host & guests. The show adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse & debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety. LOOKING FOR DR. TIMOTHY LUDWIG, PHD? Dr. Perrodin’s “Safety Doc Podcast” negotiates school and community safety. To be informed about industrial safety, please contact Appalachian State University Professor Dr. Timothy Ludwig, PhD, at www.safety-doc.com. This is episode 117.
- Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Book: School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Learn more about this show’s guest at www.campus-safety.us
Tuesday Jan 07, 2020
True Threats - What Every Parent Must Know
Tuesday Jan 07, 2020
Tuesday Jan 07, 2020
The First Amendment protects so much of what is going on (although the public after a mass attack do not like to hear that). One thing is certain - the days are over of law enforcement issuing warnings to people making threats that might be made with the intent to intimidate others. TRUE THREATS AND STUDENTS - ACT OF TERRORISM. It is absolutely critical that schools overtly and bluntly make students aware that a threat to bring harm to their schools might result in arrest and prosecution as a Federal act of terrorism. Yes, the courts would need to consider the mental state and cognitive capacity of the student, but that’s likely done after the student has been taken into custody. TRUE THREATS PROSECUTIONS. “There has definitely been an increase in the visibility of true-threats prosecutions,” says Jennifer Kinsley, a law professor at Northern Kentucky University who litigates First Amendment cases. She explains that many of these arise from social media posts and from the domestic arena, where divorce parties make angry statements. These individuals may claim that their spoken words are protected by the First Amendment, that their offensive expressions were merely crude political opinions, jokes or rants not meant to be taken seriously—or misguided attempts to blow off steam. But in an age beset with mass shootings and fear of terrorism, government officials likely will contend that such utterings or mutterings fall into the category of true threats—a type of unprotected speech.” (Hudson, 2018, ABA Journal). FIRST AMENDMENT PROTECTION. The First Amendment to the United States Constitution is a part of the United States Bill of Rights that protects freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, freedom of the press, and right to petition. WHAT COUNTS AS SPEECH? Think far beyond the spoken word or written notes. Courts have identified speech as expression in: online posts; theater and dance, art, political yard signs, handing out flyers, and clothing. At least one federal appeals court has found that liking something on Facebook qualifies as speech! Some types of computer code may be considered speech, but the limits of that is still an open question. DEFINITION OF A TRUE THREAT. In legal parlance a true threat is a statement that is meant to frighten or intimidate one or more specified persons into believing that they will be seriously harmed by the speaker or by someone acting at the speaker’s behest. (Yelling “fire” in a theater is not protected public expression) True threats constitute a category of speech that is not protected by the First Amendment (O’ Neill, K. F., (2017) True Threats. MTSU.Edu). CONFUSION IN THE COURTS. The Supreme Court’s true-threat jurisprudence is less than clear. A review of lower court decisions indicates a hodgepodge of different results: (A) The Supreme Court of South Dakota recently upheld the conviction of a man for threatening a judicial officer by stating: “Well, that deserves 180 pounds of lead between the eyes,” and “Now I see why people shoot up courthouses.” State v. Draskovich (Nov. 21, 2017); (B) The Connecticut Supreme Court ruled that a man’s statement to his brother—“If you go into the attic, I will hurt you”—could be considered a true threat and denied the defendant’s motion to dismiss. State v. Pelella (Oct. 10, 2017); (C) An Illinois appeals court reversed the threat conviction of a man who left the following voicemail on a public defender’s phone: “There is not a day that goes by since I was sentenced at that courthouse that I have not dreamed about revenge and the utter hate I feel for the judge. There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t pray for the death and destruction upon the judge and upon every single person who sentenced me.” People v. Wood (Nov. 20, 2017). FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE & BLOG: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host & guests. The show adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse & debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety. LOOKING FOR DR. TIMOTHY LUDWIG, PHD? Dr. Perrodin’s “Safety Doc Podcast” negotiates school and community safety. To be informed about industrial safety, please contact Appalachian State University Professor Dr. Timothy Ludwig, PhD, at www.safety-doc.com. This is episode 115.
- Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Book: School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
Sunday Dec 15, 2019
Nick Schulaner | The Jagged Intersection of Marketing and School Safety
Sunday Dec 15, 2019
Sunday Dec 15, 2019
Nick Schulaner is a 21-year-old guitar-playing Digital Marketer and Mechanical Engineering Student. He has taught in 2 programs teaching people how to do digital marketing so they can either promote their own small business or get jobs marketing for other people. He also has his own YouTube channel where he interviews other successful marketers and business owners. Because he’s so young, Nick has been able to see firsthand the type of fortifications schools invest in, as well as how those fortifications are perceived by the students themselves (spoiler alert: it’s not a pretty picture). GOING ALL-IN FOR HIGH SCHOOL SAFETY. During the 2013-2014 school year, Nick, (then) a student at a high school of 2000 students in Washington State, observed sweeping safety overhauls at his campus, including the installation of bullet-resistive window films and metal detectors at “some” of the entrances. Let’s examine the concept of “all in.” In American usage, the phrase “all in” began as a colloquial expression meaning to be in a bad spot—exhausted, worn out, and spent. In the game of poker, it refers to the moment when a player—whether out of bravado, recklessness, or desperation—bets all of his or her chips on a single hand. In other words, Nick’s school leaders were implementing a flurry of expensive and difficult-to-maintain safety measures with the presumed hope that these steps would satisfy panicked parents and perhaps increase school security. TEACHER ADMITS FACULTY UNABLE TO PROTECT KIDS. Per Nick, “Yet, even after all those things were implemented, I distinctly remember one of my teachers telling my class something to the effect of ‘I really hope we don’t have a school shooting here because we (meaning the faculty) have pretty much no way to protect you kids if we do.’ If anything, you could argue that all the fortifications actively made things WORSE by lulling people into a false sense of security.” NO STUDENT INPUT. Nick didn’t recall any time when school leaders asked students about safety concerns on campus or sought their input on what practices or devices might increase school safety. His friend who served in student government discovered that the collective student voice wasn’t of interest to administrators and ignored on serious matters, such as school safety. Nick shared that fights were a much more common occurrence at this school, noting a time when two girls duked it in a hallway over a cupcake. Yes, a cupcake. And, don’t even ask what was happening in the woods next to the school! WHAT MADE NICK FEEL SAFER AT SCHOOL. Nick shared that the metal detectors made him feel that his school was safer…until a few weeks into the school year when, due to long lines and other obligations of the SRO, the fidelity of metal detector checkpoints waned and students were able to enter and exit buildings unchecked at the schools approximately dozen entrances. PBIS AT HIGH SCHOOL “BEAMER BUCKS” Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports is a formal program for teaching students positive and appropriate behaviors. A form of PBIS was in place at Nick’s high school and students received “Beamer Bucks” that could be redeemed for school apparel. He noted that the PBIS program was vague and the incentives would have been valuable if for things like pizza. Again, a “code of conduct” program implemented without student input. MARKETING SCHOOL SAFETY. Nick identified two reasons why people buy something. The first is to acquire pleasure and the second is to escape pain. In schools, the relentless pressure of parents to “do something” to improve school safety is the “pain” applied to the school board. Social proof, as Nick explains, is another powerful construct for selling safety. If you can show another school that has purchased a product, then the argument becomes, “That school made the investment to keep its schools safe…why aren’t you also choosing to keep kids safe?” FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE & BLOG: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host & guests. The show adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse & debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety. LOOKING FOR DR. TIMOTHY LUDWIG, PHD? Dr. Perrodin’s “Safety Doc Podcast” negotiates school and community safety. To be informed about industrial safety, please contact Appalachian State University Professor Dr. Timothy Ludwig, PhD, at www.safety-doc.com. This is episode 114.
- Learn more about guest Nick Schulaner at www.nickschulaner.com
- Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Book: School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
Thursday Nov 14, 2019
Insider Truth About Student Discipline Abeyance Agreements
Thursday Nov 14, 2019
Thursday Nov 14, 2019
STUDENT will give his best effort in all of his subjects every day. That subjective condition-statement was extracted from a school district's boilerplate one-page abeyance agreement. It's codified by the district's school board policy. With suspensions racing to extinction, this is in the new embodiment of student discipline and it’s not just a second chance to follow the rules. WHAT IS AN ABEYANCE AGREEMENT (AA). In public schools, an AA sets forth the conditions under which the school agrees to not impose discipline (detention/suspension/expulsion). AA is a practice wrangled from the legal system (not from education policy) where it’s often associated with a plea deal. AAs are also referred to as pre-expulsion agreements or a first offenders program. PURPOSE OF AN AA. School leaders champion AA’s as a tool of discretion that offers a second chance for students who have violated the code of student conduct. However, implicit functions of the AA include: (a) having a conclusive action to an investigation; (b) avoiding creation of a reportable data as AAs are not reported to local, state Department of Public Instruction, or federal agencies; (c) avoid convening the IEP team if the child has a disability (to discuss services and placement); and (d) shield the school board from an abrasive student expulsion. WHAT ARE THE PARTS OF AN AA? A Google search will surface countless AA templates - some as short as a page. AAs include, (a) period of time that the AA is in effect - often a semester; (b) attendance requirements; (c) requirement that the student follow the school rules; (d) statement that the student will give his/her “best effort” in school; and (e) signatures by student, parent and school administrator. Many include the following clause, “By executing this agreement the undersigned acknowledges that they voluntarily and without any undue influence agree to waive their right to appeal.” ...That last sentence. Yep, an AA is a slight-of-hand maneuver that separates students from their right of due process. IS AN AA REPORTED TO THE STATE OR FED? There is no requirement that an AA be reported to a school board, state department of instruction or federal department of education. In fact, most AAs are expunged from school databases after they expire unlike school suspensions and expulsions which must be reported to state and federal government. FIVE INCENTIVES TO ENTER INTO AN AA. Reasons that drive AAs: (1) keeps the district’s actions “off the books.” (2) has FERPA (privacy) shield; (3) if a student has a disability, or might have a disability that hasn’t been diagnosed, an IEP team would be convened to hold a manifestation determination and consider services and placement. AA might preclude convening the IEP; (4) simple and quick; (5) parents go along with them most of the time because an AA leverages the positionality (perceived power) of the school. The school often includes its lawyer to craft the AA or be present at the meeting with parents. THE PSYCHOLOGY OF PERSUASION: WHY PARENTS ALWAYS AGREE TO AN AA. A parent might be intimidated by the school (as it is a powerful government institution) or overwhelmed by school authorities with advanced degrees and initials after their names. In these instances, parents perceive the AA as a “gift” from the school and sign it to bring the matter to a close and clean their child’s record. Other times, parents believe they pressured the school into making a deal due to their status in the community or making it known that they could unleash a “complaint campaign” or bring advocates to meetings. Regardless of the parents’ perception of why they are being offered the AA, the school gets what it wants - the signed AA. SIX SHORTCOMINGS OF AAs. (1) no oversight, efficacy research or reporting requirement; (2) less incentive for exhaustive investigation; (3) low threshold to fulfill the AA / no learning objectives; (4) privacy law keeps them secret; (5) denies due process to students [with disabilities]; (6) destroys a student record that might reveal a skill deficit, pattern of behavior or even bring light upon a systemic practice of institutional bias. FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE & BLOG: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host & guests. The show adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse & debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety. LOOKING FOR DR. TIMOTHY LUDWIG, PHD? Dr. Perrodin’s “Safety Doc Podcast” negotiates school and community safety. To be informed about industrial safety, please contact Appalachian State University Professor Dr. Timothy Ludwig, PhD, at www.safety-doc.com. This is episode 112.
- Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Book: School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
Thursday Nov 07, 2019
Interview with Max Eden | Education Policy Expert and Coauthor of Why Meadow Died
Thursday Nov 07, 2019
Thursday Nov 07, 2019
In this episode of The Safety Doc Podcast, I talk with the co-author of Why Meadow Died: The People and Policies That Created The Parkland Shooter and Endanger America’s Students. He discusses student discipline reform, student disability policies, abeyance agreements, and pressures on institutions to ‘look as though they have no problems,’ and more in light of recent school shootings. ABOUT MAX EDEN. Max Eden is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Before joining MI, he was program manager of the education policy studies department at the American Enterprise Institute. Eden’s research interests include early education, school choice, and federal education policy. He was coeditor, with Frederick M. Hess, of The Every Student Succeeds Act: What It Means for Schools, Systems, and States (2017). Eden’s work has appeared in scholarly and popular outlets, such as the Journal of School Choice, Encyclopedia of Education Economics and Finance, Washington Post, U.S. News and World Report, National Review, Claremont Review of Books, and The Weekly Standard. He holds a B.A. in history from Yale University. WHO IS IN CHARGE OF STUDENT SAFETY? 43 states have laws for school safety plans, but there is minimal accountability. Schools submit logs to denote that drills were conducted and nobody at the state-level offers feedback. It’s the difference between completing a requirement and learning from an activity. DISCIPLINE POLICY. Mr. Eden has written extensively about the complexities of inconsistent applications of discipline policy. He discusses what gets reported and considerations of the perceived interplay of personal and institutional biases in discipline and consequences. Dr. Perrodin iterates the absence of inter-rater reliability between states and notes the examples of North Carolina having more than 100 possible reporting codes for school discipline infraction - including affray which is defined as an instance of fighting in a public place that disturbs the peace. Administrative discretion versus zero-tolerance policies were also scrutinized in this episode. Policies are applied differently for students identified with disabilities due to certain legal protections. BUYING ACCESS. David sought Max’s response to the article Superintendents Association Recommends School Security Companies — for a Fee. Safety Experts Call It ‘Buying Access’ and Decry Lack of Transparency (by Mark Keierleber of the74million.org; October 21, 2019). Are national and state school organizations selling out to vendors? In Keierleber’s article, he writes, “[The] company and others like it pay $18,000 a year for the right to call themselves “School Solutions” partners with AASA, The School Superintendents Association — an arrangement that has raised ethical questions among some security experts. THE SILENT SHAME OF ABEYANCE AGREEMENTS. Schools have a tool, often per the guidance of their attorney, to deliver a lesser form of discipline that isn’t reportable to any local, state or federal entity. What is an abeyance agreement and how is it undermining student safety? PRESSURES TO PORTRAY A GLOWING SCHOOL IMAGE. In the modern age of open enrollment and government shaming for reporting “authentic” discipline figures, schools are actively managing their public image. School-shopping parents, local realtors, businesses and powerful local interests want “good” schools and not “honest” schools. Dr. Perrodin shares his own account of this as a school administrator and how perception was valued over reality. FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE & BLOG: www.safetyphd.com The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host & guests. The show adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse & debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety. LOOKING FOR DR. TIMOTHY LUDWIG, PHD? Dr. Perrodin’s “Safety Doc Podcast” negotiates school and community safety. To be informed about industrial safety, please contact Appalachian State University Professor Dr. Timothy Ludwig, PhD, at www.safety-doc.com. This is episode 111.
- Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Book: School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
Wednesday Oct 16, 2019
Wednesday Oct 16, 2019
In 2013, A 7-year-old Maryland kid chewed his breakfast pastry into the shape of a gun at school and wound up with two days suspension. The pastry in question was not named, but it's gotta be a Pop-Tart, right? This dubious outcome, and others like it, are often the result of what is known as Zero-tolerance school safety policy. . WHAT ARE ZERO TOLERANCE POLICIES? Zero-tolerance policies were written into school handbooks in the 1990s, created originally to be a deterrent for bringing weapons into schools. Many students under strict zero-tolerance policies are punished without a second thought. School administrators are not afforded discretion to use professional judgment to match a consequence to a violation of the code of student conduct. This type of disciplinary procedure has been proven in research to have an overall negative effect on students, and a disproportionately negative effect on minorities. ABOUT RESEARCHER ANN MARIECOTMAN. Ann Marie Cotman is a doctoral student researching school policing at Texas State University. An educator since 1995 and a mother since 1998, Ann Marie fully respects and underscores that schools' first and most important obligation is to creating and maintaining a safe learning environment. As a researcher she is determined to make sure that safety driven policies truly support the safety of ALL students and are not unexamined practices that instead produce poor and inequitable outcomes. When not reading, writing, and researching, Ann Marie loves to play analog games with her three children and create art. She also gets to know the coolest kids in Austin Texas through her summer camp program and private tutoring! FOUR WAYS ZERO-TOLERANCE DISCIPLINE POLICIES UNDERMINE SCHOOL SAFETY: (1) prioritizes compliance over self-management/critical thinking; (2) undermines students' development of and confidence in their own decision making; (3) hides race (and gender, and other) inequities under the fig leaf of equal treatment; (4) discourages and interrupts the relationship building that is critical to creating a culture in which all community members want to come forward with concerns. ZERO-TOLERANCE PRETENDS TO REMOVE SUBJECTIVE DECISION MAKING THIS A PROBLEM FOR TWO REASONS: (1) Why would we want to remove the human element from addressing discipline problems? (2) We know both in design and application that it does NOT create an objective decision process. BETTER OPTIONS. Ann shifts the discussion to looking at the safety priorities of the school. Is it worth the time and investment to maintain polarizing Zero-tolerance policies at the detriment of cultivating relationships with students and families? And, for policies to be effective across the hundreds of thousands of school buildings in America, they need to be melded to each school setting. That involves affording the principal discretion to interpret and apply policies to best fit the setting. It’s not capitulating – it’s sensemaking. Ann also shared an example of a school that invited four students to serve on its safety committee and simple, potent positive changes that resulted from a group of educators and students working to solve the problem of chronic vaping by youth. FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE & BLOG: www.safetyphd.com The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host & guests. The show adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse & debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety. LOOKING FOR DR. TIMOTHY LUDWIG, PHD? Dr. Perrodin’s “Safety Doc Podcast” negotiates school and community safety. To be informed about industrial safety, please contact Appalachian State University Professor Dr. Timothy Ludwig, PhD, at www.safety-doc.com. This is episode 110.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Book: School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America.