Did you Receive Notification of Lockdown Drills?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a kid in preschool. How do they alert the school of an active shooter?

Was your question how would a school let the school know to start a real lockdown? When we do drills at my FCPS elementary school, they announce over the PA. "Lockdown". They also tell the students after the drill that in a real emergency situation, they are to never listen to any PA announcements, even if it is the principal speaking. They are only to exit the room after police or an administrator releases them. I had a 5th grade class in my room during the last lockdown. They were smart enough to figure out that the reason the principal said that was that a shooter could force an administrator to make an announcement. They said, "well couldn't the bad person just take the keys and come get us". Sigh...

I think for a real emergency, there is no way to know how the school would be notified. I think the PP's who say they will hear gunshots, and will lockdown themselves are correct. I sure as hell hope I never have to find out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I tell my kids what the lockdown drill is for, and I tell them to loudly say "Republicans don't care if we get shot in school!" So you might have to explain that one when your kids get home. Since the adults won't help them, I am teaching my kids to advocate for their generation themselves.

Yeah, smart move. So you are pretty much ensuring that your own child will PANIC during an emergency. Awesome parenting

HA, they're not panicking. Funny that it makes you uncomfortable though.

Actually democrats don’t either. Why didn’t democrats pass gun legislation when they had the house, the senate, and the presidency?

Because the Republicans in the Senate filibustered.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our FCPS elementary school had its first lockdown drill of the year last week. My first-grader came home freaked out, talking on about "people with guns" and asking if they came to schools in Virginia. Since I had no idea the drill was that day, I wasn't well prepared to address her questions.

Later on, I did contact the teacher who was able to explain to me the language they used to discuss it with the children, which I borrowed in further discussions with my child. But I'm sort of annoyed the school didn't at least tell us they were doing this and share some tips about talking about it with small children. My friends (including teachers) in other states have told me their schools always notify parents ahead of time, because it's scary for young kids. FCPS constantly is sending home "warnings" about the family life lessons our kids will get each year, which I couldn't care less about, but then they just leave us in the dark about discussions over gun violence. Am I totally off-base here? Did any of you receive news prior to the first lockdown drill?

First, I’m very sorry to hear your child came home freaked out. We sure live in a scary world. Question, did you not have any idea your school would participate in a lockdown drill this fall? And, I’d be shocked if the teacher had a discussion of gun violence with first graders. I wonder if a student brought it up and the teacher had to clarify the talk? Hopefully your child will feel more prepared for the next one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I tell my kids what the lockdown drill is for, and I tell them to loudly say "Republicans don't care if we get shot in school!" So you might have to explain that one when your kids get home. Since the adults won't help them, I am teaching my kids to advocate for their generation themselves.

Not helpful and I hope you are joking. In my 20 years of teaching I’ve been in real lockdowns in schools several times and none have involved shootings. They have most often been rare cases of kids or staff having medical emergencies quickly needing to clear calls to get EMT in and out or police activity in the area not involving the school. They are usually over in minutes, not scary and simply treated like a drill because the process is the same. Clear the hall, stay in your room. Lockdown drills and lockdowns are used for a lot more than shootings. You may be confused with active shooting drills which we are starting to have st the high school level but not at the elementary.

[Anonymous]

Not PP. I thought lock down drills were held in the event of an active shooter, but you mentioned high schools having separate active shooter and lock down drills. What is the difference?

[Anonymous]

The terminology still hasn't caught up with all the scenarios.

Lock-in: No one enters or leaves the building but there is (or may not be) movement inside the building. Used when there is something happening in the community and they want to limit activity around the school.

Lock-down: Everyone moves into a secure room and no movement within the building. Used when there is a medical emergency or some other situation where they don't want people/kids in the hallways.

Active shooter (formerly known as lock down): Self explanatory. ALICE rules apply.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The terminology still hasn't caught up with all the scenarios.

Lock-in: No one enters or leaves the building but there is (or may not be) movement inside the building. Used when there is something happening in the community and they want to limit activity around the school.

Lock-down: Everyone moves into a secure room and no movement within the building. Used when there is a medical emergency or some other situation where they don't want people/kids in the hallways.

Active shooter (formerly known as lock down): Self explanatory. ALICE rules apply.

I’m the teacher who said I’ve been through lock downs and generally agree with this. Everywhere I’ve worked called them all lock downs and I’ve never heard it called a lock in but that makes sense. They have also used lock downs when there were fights and they don’t want kids switching classes and more people in the halls. We currently have lock down drills still and the separate active shooter drills. Again, these are only taking place in high school. Totally different and you provided a good explanation of the difference and we are are all getting exposed to the new ALICE training.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We got this on 9/4/19 (i.e., the day before the first drill):

Every school facility in Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS) has in place crisis management and emergency preparedness plans, designed with the help of the school system’s security planning staff, local law enforcement, and emergency management officials. The plans include procedures to respond to critical incidents, like fire and tornadoes, and we practice these drills regularly. Currently, we participate in a fire drill once a week within the first twenty instructional days of the new school year and once a month thereafter. We also participate in a tornado drill in March. Additionally, all Fairfax County Public Schools participate in a drill, called a lockdown drill.

While we have no reason to believe that any threat of violence will arise, it is always best to be prepared. It is important to train students and staff members so that we can effectively implement a lockdown in the event one becomes necessary. Training helps ensure a calmer, more effective lockdown.

To implement this training, [School] will conduct 2 lockdown drills in September. The drills will occur on Thursday, September 5 and Wednesday, September 18. A lockdown drill is generally short, typically lasting no longer than a fire drill.

OP here -- that was exactly what I would have liked to have received. It is helpful for me to know that other schools in the district did this, thanks.

I think the notification needs to happen afterwards.

I'm a special ed teacher. I teach in a school that announces fire drills and lock down drills to staff, and someone always leaks it to the kids, which means that my students know when they are coming.

The problem? While my kids all do great during drills that they know are coming, they panic when they're surprised by them (e.g. we had someone accidentally set off the fire alarm with a science experiment). Because in their mind drills are announced so they think anything unannounced must be real.

If there was ever a real lockdown, my best strategy would be to convince my kids it was a drill. Making drills announced takes this away, and I can guarantee that if we notified the hundreds of parents in our school, someone would tell their kid, and it would become an announced drill.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The terminology still hasn't caught up with all the scenarios.

Lock-in: No one enters or leaves the building but there is (or may not be) movement inside the building. Used when there is something happening in the community and they want to limit activity around the school.

Lock-down: Everyone moves into a secure room and no movement within the building. Used when there is a medical emergency or some other situation where they don't want people/kids in the hallways.

Active shooter (formerly known as lock down): Self explanatory. ALICE rules apply.

In Fairfax County, we don't use this term. We use "Secure the Building." And thankfully we do not use the term "Active Shooter" drills. It's a lockdown.

It's just sad that we're even having these. The idiots in the NRA won when no one did anything after 20 first graders were shot dead.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The terminology still hasn't caught up with all the scenarios.

Lock-in: No one enters or leaves the building but there is (or may not be) movement inside the building. Used when there is something happening in the community and they want to limit activity around the school.

Lock-down: Everyone moves into a secure room and no movement within the building. Used when there is a medical emergency or some other situation where they don't want people/kids in the hallways.

Active shooter (formerly known as lock down): Self explanatory. ALICE rules apply.

In Fairfax County, we don't use this term. We use "Secure the Building." And thankfully we do not use the term "Active Shooter" drills. It's a lockdown.

It's just sad that we're even having these. The idiots in the NRA won when no one did anything after 20 first graders were shot dead.

Yes, we also are adopting "Secure the Building" but we also call it Lock-in. We have not had an Active Shooter drill yet since some people are still going through ALICE and I think there are second/third thoughts about how/if to roll that out to the kids. If there is a real Active Shooter though the ALICE training is clear that you call it what it is and don't hide behind terminology. In those situations seconds can make a difference between life and death.

I agree that it is sad that we're even thinking about this. It is more than the NRA though. It is our whole culture where video games like Black Ops and Fortnite are part of acceptable games for kids. I have seen 8 or 9 year old kids playing both games at school on their devices. As soon as those became acceptable we as a society opened the barn doors to this calamity.

[Anonymous]

Our school doesn’t notify us in advance.
My new kindergartener, though, asked what they would do if they needed to “lockdown” and evacuate because of a fire at the same time. She wanted to know what do if the (bad) “person that wasn’t supposed to be in the building” (that’s how they explained the purpose of lockdown drills) set the school on fire.