Florida wants all school doors, gates locked. It could get costly.
The days of unlocked doors, gates and other access points at Florida’s schools are coming to an end.
New state law, which takes effect July 1, says schools must keep all classroom, building and campus entrances and exits closed and locked when students are present, “regardless of whether it is during normal school hours” — unless it’s time for changing classes or a staff member is monitoring the spot.
School district officials said they applaud the effort. But putting the mandate into effect could be problematic, they added. Some worry that the cost of securing doors while still allowing for students and staff to move freely could run into millions of dollars.
“The intent was good,” Pasco County schools superintendent Kurt Browning said of the law, which Gov. Ron DeSantis signed in May. “It is the actual implementation of that bill that is causing the Pasco district, and districts across the state, a great deal of pause.”
“We are trying to figure out how to comply with it,” Browning said, noting the short turnaround time makes it more difficult to create a workable plan.
The concerns center on issues such as how to deal with students who need to leave class and go to a counselor’s office in a different building. Or how to handle students who are on campus for after-school extracurricular activities that don’t involve a teacher or coach. Or what do to when parents and the public are attending a performance in one part of the school while students are preparing in a different area.
“I don’t think there’s a school district in the entire state that is going to be able to lock every door and every gate, or have it staffed,” said John Newman, chief of security for Hillsborough County schools.
Further complicating matters is the fact that not all schools have the same characteristics. Some are single buildings with a lone visitor entrance, while others have several buildings spread over many acres. Some have doors that face outside, while others have doors facing corridors that must be accessed by a separate entrance.
Each campus can require a different approach.
Newman said he and his peers in other districts are collaborating daily to work on solutions, while awaiting further direction from the state. The Board of Education adopted a rule governing the requirements on Wednesday, but it offered little beyond the wording of the law that has baffled district leaders.
Many are looking long-term toward ideas such as giving everyone on campus individualized key cards, or using programmable hall passes. But that’s a costly move that could not be implemented over the summer.
In the meantime, Newman said he’s looking at a more immediate answer that doesn’t lead to locking every door. He’s focused on language in the law allowing for doors to remain open if “other safety measures” are in place.
He offered an example of a school where visitors must pass through a secure entrance to get into the administration office, and have their ID checked before they pass through another locked door to get into any area where students are present. He said other doors leading to that “exclusionary zone” might not have to be locked, because of the controlled access from the outside.
Officials are determining which, if any, Hillsborough schools have adequate preexisting security systems that would allow for this approach.
It’s important to make such distinctions when dealing with such an important issue, Browning said.
“You have to assume a school has built-in layers of protection before (outsiders) get to the interior part of the school,” he said. “Our goal is keeping bad people out, people that are not authorized to be on our campuses.”
It’s not to impede the normal daily flow of school, he said.
Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri, who leads the state school safety commission, helped write the latest legislation. He said school officials should use common sense in tackling this topic.
“There is no perfect,” Gualtieri said. “We are looking for people to genuinely and sincerely do the best they can under the circumstances.”
That wasn’t happening before, even as the state took steps to increase campus security after the 2018 shooting massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High in Parkland. Schools added locked exterior gates with video doorbells for entry, clear bags at large school events, crisis drills, armed guards and more since that time.
State safety audits revealed “significant noncompliance,” Gualtieri said, with some educators and administrators defiantly refusing to adopt some of the recommended actions.
“We had to act on it,” he said.
Some of the responses to the new measures are overreactions, Gualtieri suggested. He said the requirements can be applied in a realistic, meaningful way.
For example: Requiring all doors to be locked later in the evening when custodians have the doors open for cleaning, but a teacher is tutoring a handful of students in one room, is perhaps too technical of a reading, Gualtieri said.
But school officials said they are concerned with the technicalities, given the state’s willingness to penalize districts for their interpretations of vague laws on other issues. That has them parsing out the meaning of terms such as “normal school hours.”
They also don’t want to face the consequences for teachers who leave their doors open to monitor nearby classes covered by substitutes, for instance; or to allow air flow when the air conditioner stops working. The law does not appear to offer any wiggle room.
Newman said he expected more answers as school safety officers meet with state officials over the summer to discuss next steps.
“We have to determine, where is that sweet spot” that keeps schools safe while “not letting school see like a detention center,” he said. “I think we’re going to have some growing pains this year.”