The Leader Talk Blog is a group blog written by school leaders for school leaders that provides insights about how to improve primary and secondary education. The recent post Uncovering the Path (Source: LeaderTalk.org, 7/13/2008) by Barbara Barreda, a Catholic school principal in Los Angeles, highlights how she and other school leaders are constantly transforming and changing as they learn from each other about how to provide a better education for their students.
An example of transformation is the new technology tools that are available for schools to enhance the learning process. This year Ms. Barreda’s school will implement several applications designed to help learners access information more easily, as well as collaborate more effectively in an attempt to learn more efficiently. Google provides several of the applications and with new ones coming out so frequently, it’s critical that school administrators stay updated, so their students can benefit from new innovation.
Now, what does this have to do with safety and security? Well, in addition to new learning technology, safety and security applications are also constantly evolving, so it’s important that school administrators stay on top of these changes, too. The same thought process that forward-thinking school administrators apply to how new technology improves learning should also be given to safety and security in schools. For example, with old video surveillance technology it is often difficult to share relevant video quickly with the right people (other school administrators, teachers, law enforcement), but newer network video surveillance is designed for collaboration, as it utilizes IT infrastructure to simplify video sharing with relevant parties. Moreover, with network video a single district can monitor all of its member schools across the same network, which provides a lower total cost of ownership of the entire system.
Do you evaluate your safety and security processes in a similar way to your evaluation of your educational tools to ensure you’re providing a safe learning environment?