Heightened Security at PG High Schools
Photo 250News
Prince George, B.C. – Another tense day in School District 57.
The District has confirmed all high schools in the city are under a code yellow alert which means that students must stay in their classrooms with closed doors.
It also means outside doors are locked while staff monitors exits with only supervised entrance and exit of students and parents as is necessary.
Initially the schools were under a code red alert which means doors are closed, schools are locked down and students are to sit under their desks in silence. The code red was moved to a code yellow at 9:10 a.m. this morning.
The school district hasn’t revealed the reason for the cautionary measures but did post the following statement on its website:
“In continuing dialogue with RCMP, Senior Administration was advised to hold and secure all Secondary Schools located in Prince George,” said superintendent Marilyn Marquis-Forster. “Information leading to this decision was coming to officials as most staff and students were either on their way to school or having just arrived.”
No word yet from the RCMP on what prompted the code yellow response but it does follow a threat involving a social media page Wednesday night which featured a graphic of clowns bearing firearms.
The posts on that site suggested schools in Prince George may be targeted.
It led to the arrest of two males, aged 16 and 17. One of the teens has since been released without charge while the 16 year was held in custody overnight and is due to make an appearance in Provincial Court today.
The RCMP is expected to provide an update shortly.
Comments
I have to wonder how effective the measures mentioned would be in the event of a Columbine-style attack, which is presumably what is feared. Wouldn’t it be more effective to station armed guards in the schools who could quickly confront shooters?
Considering that Columbine had an armed police liaison officer during the shooting and that did not stop the shooters? There isn’t a lot of evidence that armed security make schools safer.
The RCMP have a comprehensive SAFE Schools Plan that includes plans for individual schools and what to do in the case of an active situation. The safest thing for anyone to do in an active shooter situation is to lock the doors and shelter in place. The schools and staff practice this.
These lock downs are happening as an overly cautious step to what is likely not a credible threat. Likely, some kid in the school saw what a disruption it caused on Thursday and were hoping for an extra long weekend if they did a copy-cat threat today.
One officer not expecting anything to happen may not be able to do much. Several alert officers could be quite a different story.
I would suspect that if the RCMP protocol is anything like how they reacted yesterday, there were multiple cars and officers at each secondary school today.
That being said I would bet that there is definitely an armed presence at each of those schools.
This need to be dealt with right. Keep the little *** heads in jail for longer and fine them or they family (set and example) Not sure why there is a code red in most schools today.
Hopefully someone or group will sue the school district administration for overreacting and playing into these clowns game.
This has been two days of code silly !!
Looks like our kids are not happy with a three (3) day long weekend, and are making a successful attempt for a four (4) day long weekend… well played kids, well played!
Comments for this article are closed.