As Louisiana schools seek to prevent shootings, some make do with limited resources

The fatal school shooting in Georgia this week was a tragic reminder of the ever-present threat of violence that hangs over American schools. Not that anyone needs reminding.

In Louisiana, many schools have been reviewing safety plans and running lockdown drills since the new school year began. In Caddo Parish last week, schools were practicing how to respond to an active shooter when a student sitting by the door in Ashley Samuel’s fifth-grade classroom observed flatly that he would likely be the first person shot.

“I was like, ‘No, we’re going to make sure that you’re safe,’” Samuel said. But the boy’s casual remark was jarring: “That was just a normal conversation for him.”

While deadly school shootings have become more common, they remain statistically rare. Yet even the remote possibility that gunfire could erupt inside any school looms large in the minds of many parents and educators — especially after tragedies like the one this week.

On Wednesday, a 14-year-old student opened fire at his high school in Winder, Ga., killing two students and two teachers and injuring nine others. Early reports suggest that safety measures at Apalachee High School, including an emergency-alert system and quick-acting school resource officers, helped prevent further carnage.

In Louisiana, where the Republican-controlled legislature has expanded gun rights and rejected restrictions, lawmakers and state officials have focused on enhancing school security. Last year, the Legislature passed a law requiring schools to conduct active-shooter drills within 30 days of classes starting and to adopt “panic button”-type alert systems. Also last year, the state Department of Education awarded more than $20 million in federal aid to help schools upgrade their security systems.

Yet the level of preparedness varies by school and district, according to a recent audit and interviews with district leaders. Funding is a major challenge for some school systems, especially in rural areas where limited tax revenue forces schools to rely on competitive grants for security upgrades.

One consequence of the funding challenges: About a third of schools lack a full-time school resource officer, according to a Nov. 2022 survey cited in the Louisiana Legislative Auditor’s report.

But even the best safety measures cannot fully eliminate the risk of violence. Jarod Martin, superintendent of Lafourche Parish schools, said his district has invested heavily in weapons-detection systems, fencing and school resource officers.

Still, “it never provides foolproof protection,” he said. “The best you can do is be a difficult target.”

Schools search for ways to fund security

Officials in St. Helena Parish know better than most why schools need protection.

Last September, one student was killed and two others were injured after a 14-year-old shot them in a high school parking lot after classes ended. Weeks later, the district proposed a tax increase that would generate about $1.7 million, helping to pay for security upgrades and guards. Voters rejected it.

So instead, the district used a $518,000 grant from the state education department to pay for new security equipment, including two metal detectors and some cameras. Another $50,000 grant helped pay for a school resource officer, but the district will have to reapply for the grant annually, said St. Helena schools Superintendent Kelli Joseph.

“We’re here doing what we can with the limited resources that we have,” she said, “to make sure that all of our kids are safe every day.”

Each district must find its own way to pay for school security, superintendents said. Possible funding sources include local taxes, state and federal grants or the district’s operating budget, though that money is limited.

Lafourche Parish is one of the fortunate school districts where voters approved a local tax to pay for school safety measures. The district has installed fences around every school and recently purchased weapons-detection systems for its middle and high schools, Superintendent Martin said. The tax also helps pay for sheriff’s deputies to work as school resource officers, which costs the district more than $1 million per year, Martin said.

“The costs of this quickly get very high,” he said.

Unlike other nearby states, including Florida and Texas, Louisiana does not require every public school to have a school resource officer, or SRO, according to the Feb. 2024 report by the Louisiana Legislative Auditor.

In the 2022 survey by the state education department, about 33% of 1,257 responding public schools said they did not have at least one SRO, according to the report. One reason for the lack of coverage: Schools “that struggle with funding may have no means to fund SRO positions,” the report said.

The auditor also found that many schools lacked emergency plans that met legal requirements. In a review of 49 plans, the auditor found that about half did not address active-shooter scenarios, as required by state law.

In response to the report, the Louisiana Department of Education listed recent steps it’s taken to enhance school security. Those include hosting an annual “School Safety Summit,” awarding $518,000 grants for security upgrades, and encouraging schools to use a free app for students to anonymously report threats.

People play a critical role in school safety

Even in schools with high-tech security systems, many safety measures rely on people.

The East Baton Rouge school district employs metal detectors, cameras and even police dogs to identify threats. Yet it’s the school employees, from office clerks to classroom teachers, who are key to spotting and reporting danger, said Capt. Rodney Walker, who oversees district security.

“To me that’s the biggest defense,” he said, “just having people paying attention to small signs to maybe prevent incidents from happening.”

Research has shown that most school attackers give some advance indication about their plans, whether verbally, in writing or online. However, their peers often don’t report the warning signs.

Louisiana has tried to promote reporting by partnering with Crimestoppers of Greater New Orleans, which offers an anonymous reporting hotline and mobile app called Safe Schools Louisiana. Crimestoppers says thousands of tips have been reported through the system, helping to save lives.

About 650 schools have signed up to use the free app and another 75 are preparing to use it, according to Crimestoppers. But that means about 25% of eligible middle and high schools still have not signed up.

Some educators and anti-violence advocates argue that one of the best ways to keep students safe is by promoting mental health. Through counseling and other services, schools can give students the support they need to avoid violence or identify threats.

That is an approach favored by Cathy Toliver, whose three-year-old grandson, Devin Page, Jr., was fatally shot by a stray bullet while sleeping in his crib.

Toliver has become an outspoken activist in the fight against gun violence in Baton Rouge, where her grandson was killed in 2022. In her view, mental health services and support from caring adults are among the best ways to prevent young people from committing violence, both in and out of school.

“I don’t care how many security officers or resource officers they have at the school,” she said. “Until you get one-on-one with an individual and find out what they’re thinking, find out what’s going on, you are going to have these situations happen.”