News and Information

8 On Your Side: The Safest School In The Country
Cindy Morrison, KTUL, Tulsa, OK, May 01, 2007

Houston, TX - School shootings, sex offenders and bullies -- it's hard to know just how safe your kids are when you leave them at school. So, our 8 On Your Side team set out to find the safest school in America. It's a search that took investigator Cindy Morrison all the way to Houston and back.

Tulsa's Rosa Parks Elementary is a new-style school building where you actually have to be buzzed in. It's rare. But, for a school district in Houston, it's just the beginning. It has spent the last sixteen years figuring out secrets to safety. There is a lot we can learn.

Inside the classroom, the Spring Independent School District looks pretty typical. But, the security there is like none other. You can't walk down the halls without someone watching.

"We just had these monitors installed in December. These are analog cameras. Between the analog system and the digital system, we're monitoring close to 15-hundred cameras."

Those cameras are monitored live and constantly recorded at the school district's very own police department.

"People tend to act a little better when they're on camera," says Chief Alan Bragg, who has 45 officers. They make about two hundred arrests in their district a month.

"We did have a break-in at one of the high schools and we were able to play the video back, show it to the school administration and they knew right off who the kids were," Bragg says.

Chief Bragg also knows who's visiting his schools.

"It's a pretty nice feeling to know that system is in place to scan and screen people before they get to the kids," he says.

Anyone visiting a school must bring an ID.

"It's scanned through the system and that system not only prints an ID badge for them to wear while they're in the building with their photo on it, it also checks 49 states to see if they're registered sex offenders."

If it's someone not welcome?

"We have an immediate notification if we have a registered sex offender on our campus."

Doors are always locked. All staff members have card keys.

"I would hope all the kids wherever they are have the opportunity to feel as safe and secure in their schools as our kids do," says Principal Joan Harding, who has no doubt kids are safer at school than at home.

"I understand some schools can't afford the equipment," Harding says. "Because we still have some schools in our district that aren't doing exactly what we do. But in this day and age, it's one of the necessities."

But, all this didn't happen overnight.

"It's taken a lot of time and hard work and support from our school board, our community and parents. We have that support. We've had it from day one."

Over the last sixteen years, there have been bond issues and smart money decisions. For instance, instead of paying the Houston Police department 20-thousand dollars to use their drug dog, they bought their own for five thousand and used the rest of the money to buy cameras. And the screening software? The district says it's well worth the cost.

"About a dollar a day to keep our kids safe."

That's right. After the initial set-up, the scanning software costs about a dollar per day per school.

Only one district in the Tulsa area has anything like it. That's Jenks. So, 8 On Your Side talked to the company that makes the technology and worked a deal out so some o four districts can try it for free. We'll keep you up to date on that.

As for school sizes and budgets, Spring Independent School District has about twice the number of students as Union, Jenks or Broken Arrow. But, they all have about the same security budget. Take police officer salaries out of the equation and they spend about 400-thousand dollars a year.