Orange County Grand Jury • 2017-2018 • Agency Response
Response to: Garden Grove Unified School District

Board of Education Garden Grove Unified School District Grove Bob Harden President Gard Lan Quoc Nguyen*

Published: October 11, 2018 3 pages
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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 F.1: The Garden Grove Unified School District agrees with this finding. School safety and security are a priority in Garden Grove Unified 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. Response to R.1: The recommendation has not yet been fully implemented. The Garden Grove Unified School District currently utilizes school bond funds to install single point of entry and other security measures.
F2
The implementation of security measures for schools, in many cases is limited by funding. Response to F.2: The Garden Grove Unified 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 security 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. Response to R.2: The recommendation has been implemented. The Garden Grove Unified School District is in the process of completing single point of entry construction at all sites. A presentation of this plan was provided to our Board of Education.
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 F.3: The Garden Grove Unified School District agrees with this finding. Community members express concern regarding potential school violence and desire enhanced security measures at their children's schools.
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 award ceremonies or stage or musical productions. Response to R.3: The recommendation has been implemented. The Garden Grove Unified School District currently uti- lizes a manual sign-in system at all its schools to log in all visitors and volunteers entering and exiting the campus. October 11, 2018
F4
While every Orange County school district reported the use of visitor sign-in process, there is lack of procedural consistency among school campuses. Response to F.4: The Garden Grove unified School District agrees with this finding. Due to a lack of state or federal guidelines regarding procedures for visitor sign-in, each district must create their own procedures. Garden Grove Unified School District uses the same procedures across the district for our visitor sign in process. October 11, 2018
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 badge is issued. Response to R.4: The recommendation has not been implemented, but will be implemented in the future, with a timeframe for implementation.
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 F.5: The Garden Grove Unified School District disagrees with this finding. Our school district does require all employees and visitors to wear an ID badge at all times.
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. Response to R.5: The recommendation has been implemented. The Garden Grove Unified School District requires all employees to wear their district photo ID badge at all times while on district property.
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 F. 6: The Garden Grove Unified School District agrees with this finding as it pertains to its schools.
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. Response to R.6: The recommendation has not been implemented, but will be implemented in the future, with a timeframe for implementation.
F7
Campus personnel and volunteers, while on duty outside the classroom, have an inconsistent usage or availability of communication devises for emergency situations. Response to F.7: The Garden Grove Unified School District agrees with this finding. The Garden Grove Unified School District provides two-way radios for custodial and supervisory staff to communicate with the office while on duty outside of buildings.
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 devices with them at all times, enabling instant two-way communication with the office. Response to R.7: The recommendation has been implemented. The Garden Grove Unified School District provides two- way radios for custodial and supervisory staff to communicate with the office while on duty outside of buildings.
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 F.8.: The Garden Grove Unified School District agrees with this finding as it pertains to its schools.
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. Response to R.8: The recommendation has been implemented. Garden Grove Unified School District has considered requiring that all campus incidents of unauthorized access be recorded, tracked and reported to the district office on a quarterly basis. In addition, GGUSD does record and track such incidents through its 911 and police department(s) and lockdown communications protocols. Such incidents are not shared with the Orange County Department of Education because as of this time OCDE has not established any particular reporting procedure.
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 F.9: The Garden Grove Unified School District agrees with this finding as it pertains to our schools.
Related Recommendations (1)
R9
School districts should evaluate each school to perform a school security assessment to evalu- ate their current school safety plan. Response to R.9: The recommendation has not yet been implemented, but will at such a time that the district can evaluate with schools how this will be accomplished. Sincerely, Rick Nakano Assistant Superintendent, Business Services

* 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.