Orange County Grand Jury
• 2017-2018
• Agency Response
Response to:
Ocean View School District
Safer Schools - What Can We Do?*
⚠️ Translation Notice: This content has been automatically translated. The original English text is the official version. Translation may contain errors.
⚠️ Este contenido ha sido traducido automáticamente. El texto original en inglés es la versión oficial. La traducción puede contener errores.
Findings and Recommendations 9 findings
F1
School safety and security are priorities in every school district in the Orange County public school system. Response to Finding 1: The Ocean View School District agrees with this finding. School safety and security are a priority in Ocean View School District.
Related Recommendations (1)
R1
School districts should explore all possible funding resources that may be available in order to implement desired security measures. (F.2.)
F2
The implementation of security measures for schools, in many cases, is limited by funding. Response to Finding 2: The Ocean View School District agrees with this finding. The extent to which our schools can implement the type and extent of security measures is often dependent on funding.
Related Recommendations (1)
R2
School districts should re-evaluate the lack of secure fencing on all school campuses and present a report to their respective boards by December 31, 2018, outlining their plans to make campuses more secure. (F.2, F.3)
F3
Many Orange County school campuses were constructed to reflect an "open and inviting" atmosphere but are now faced with physical and philosophical security issues that challenge this thinking. Response to Finding 3: The Ocean View School District agrees with this finding. Of the seventeen (17) schools within our district, all are considered to reflect an "open and inviting" atmosphere. 2017-2018 Orange County Grand Jury Report Safer Schools - What Can We Do? Response of Ocean View School District July 20, 2018
Related Recommendations (1)
R3
School districts should implement procedures to ensure that all campuses maintain a complete, daily log (electronic or manual) of every visitor and volunteer entering and exiting the campus, excluding program events such as awards ceremonies or stage or musical productions. (F.4.)
F4
While every Orange County school district reported the use of a campus visitor sign-in process, there is a lack of procedural consistency among school campuses. Response to Finding 4: The Ocean View School District agrees with this finding as it pertains to its schools. Due to a lack of state or federal guidelines regarding procedures for visitor sign-in, each District must create their own procedures. While Ocean View School District uses the same procedures across the District for visitor and volunteer sign-in, the District is implementing a districtwide visitor management system in 2018- 2019.
Related Recommendations (1)
R4
School districts should implement procedures to ensure that photo identification is required of all campus visitors and volunteers before a visitor's badge is issued. (F.4, F.5.
F5
Many districts or school campuses do not require all teachers, staff, and volunteers to wear ID badges while on campus, making identification of authorized personnel difficult for substitute teachers, student teachers, visitors, volunteers, and first responders. Response to Finding.5: The Ocean View School District does not agree with this finding as it pertains to its schools. Staff are issued and wear ID badges, volunteers and visitors check in and wear identification badges while on campus.
Related Recommendations (1)
R5
School districts should implement procedures to ensure that all faculty and staff are required to wear visible photo ID badges while on campus. (F.5.)
F6
Currently, student ID badges, which could easily distinguish students from non-students of similar age, are not required to be worn by Orange County middle and high school students. Response to Finding 6: The Ocean View School District agrees with this finding. The Ocean View School District is an elementary school district (K-8), and does not have high school students. The Ocean View School District's middle school students (grades 6-8) have student ID cards.
Related Recommendations (1)
R6
All school districts with middle or high school campuses should consider using student ID cards in a format to be worn as student ID badges while on campus. (F.6.)
F7
Campus personnel and volunteers, while on duty outside the classroom, have an inconsistent usage or availability of communication devices for emergency situations. Response to Finding 7: The Ocean School District agrees with this finding. As it pertains to our schools, the Ocean View School District schools provide two-way radios for custodial and supervisory staff to communicate with the office and health office while on duty outside of buildings. Volunteers are not issued radios. This school year the District installed a new telephone system which includes two-way paging.
Related Recommendations (1)
R7
School districts should evaluate available communication devices and ensure that custodial and supervisory personnel, as well as safety resource officers, playground supervisors and coaches, have two-way radios or equivalent communication devices with them at all times, enabling instant two-way communication with the office. (F.7.)
F8
There is no documentation or reporting protocol within the districts of individual security incidents, making it difficult to track, analyze, and summarize such incidents. Response to Finding 8: The Ocean View School District agrees with this finding. In the Ocean View School District, schools report to District Administration any incidents involving security. There are established protocols to report security incidents. 2017-2018 Orange County Grand Jury Report Safer Schools - What Can We Do? Response of Ocean View School District July 20, 2018
Related Recommendations (1)
R8
School districts should consider requiring that all campus incidents of unauthorized access be recorded, tracked, and reported to the district office on a quarterly basis. All districts should share these reports with the Orange County Department of Education. (F.8.)
F9
While every Orange County school develops a school safety plan, few schools have used an individual school security assessment to identify deficiencies or to develop the required plan. Response to Finding 9: The Ocean View School District agrees with this finding. Schools review and update their school safety plan on an annual basis.
Related Recommendations (1)
R9
School districts should evaluate requiring each school to perform a school security assessment to evaluate their current school safety plan. (F.9)
* This report's PDF did not contain easily extractable text and required Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for analysis. There may be minor errors in the extracted findings and recommendations due to OCR limitations with scanned documents.