Beatrice school resource officers use national model, to protect students, staff and public

BEATRICE - It’s pretty clear two school resource officers in the Beatrice Public School system take their jobs very seriously….because student and staff safety can be on the line at any moment in today’s world.

Officers Zac Lauenstein and Natasha Nesbitt use a training model created in the memory of a 16-year-old Colorado student killed in a school shooting in 2006, to ensure going to school is as safe as it can be. It was started through a foundation created by the girl’s father…and is now used throughout the U.S by schools and police.

Lauenstein, a Resource Officer at Beatrice High School and Nesbitt, a Resource Officer at the Middle School, talked about the steps of school safety to a small group of community members, Wednesday night. Lauenstein says there are response options.

"We can't give you a specific response to everything that could go wrong. That's an infinity of things in today's society. The responses that we have are hold...secure...lock down....evacuate....or shelter."

A danger outside a school building, Lauenstein says, means the school doesn’t want that entering the school setting…with the response being to secure the building.  When a threat makes it’s way into a school building, Nesbitt says there’s a specific procedure followed creating a lockdown….putting students in a locked room to keep the threat away from them.

"Our students and staff are all instructed to get behind a closed, locked door, turn off the lights and remain out of view of any windows that are in the hallway or on the outside of the building. Seventy percent of these incidents last less than five minutes while 90-percent are over in less than ten minutes. A study shows that zero deaths have occurred behind a locked classroom door."

Notices of the procedures involving hold, secure, lockdown, evacuate and shelter are posted throughout school buildings in the Beatrice district. Students are trained on steps such as turning off cell phones during the first minutes of a lockdown, but later being able to text parents to tell them they are alright. Said Lauenstein..."The reason we ask for the first five minutes to stay off your phone, is to keep the air ways clear for first responders, so we can get information that's needed to the people we need right away."

Students and staff are also instructed not to open a door for anyone…even if that person may identify themselves as a police officer.

A major step during an evacuation is keeping students and staff together and accounting accurately for everyone’s presence. That can include reuniting students with their parents at an off-site location.  Lauenstein says serious incidents in the school setting are rare, but the effects are huge. He says in his words, “that’s why we train so hard.”