SISD Safety and Security Committee updates board on school safety measures for upcoming year

The Socorro I.S.D. Safety and Security Committee briefed the district’s board on its implementation of Governor Greg Abbott’s School and Firearm Safety Action Plan.

The governor’s plan came in the wake of a deadly school shooting in Santa Fe, Texas in May.

The plan contains 40 recommendations and includes proposals that call for increasing law enforcement presence at schools, strengthening existing campus security programs, enhancing firearm safety, and providing mental health evaluations.

The district’s Emergency Operations Plan manager, Israel Castro, said the district was already doing a lot of the things the governor recommended.

“We’re enhancing our procedures with regard to his plan that he already has in place. The big piece is going through that Standard Response Protocol training, that’s recommended through Texas School Safety,” Castro said.

The Standard Response Protocol (SRP) training is provided by the “I Love U Guys” Foundation, a group that focuses on school safety. The SRP outlines what exactly students and teachers should do, depending on what threatening situation arises.

“We don’t know when and if it’s going to occur, but I can tell you we are doing everything we possibly can to reach out, and educate everyone,” SISD Chief of Police Jose Castorena said.

The district will host SRP training sessions for the public on 10 different Saturdays during the upcoming semester.

The district will also conduct the following emergency drills at each campus this school year:

Lockout (1 per semester) Lockdown (4 drills, 1 every nine weeks) Evacuation (monthly) Shelter (1 per semester) Hold (1)