Rider described a layered approach to the department’s safety and security efforts.
The approach
The security measures in practice this school year at FBISD schools were listed by Rider as follows:
- Security vestibules
- Window film
- Police officers on-site
- Classroom door locks
- Security cameras
- Security app for reporting suspicious activity
- Suspicious activity
- Suspicious package
- Human trafficking
- Child abuse
- Drugs
- Weapons
- Bullying
- Fighting
- Dating violence
- Threats
- Vandalism
- Investigators assigned to personal property crimes, child abuse and computer forensics
- A continually operating dispatch center answering calls, and monitoring alarms and security cameras
- Advanced law enforcement rapid response training, or active shooter training, which all Fort Bend ISD police officers complete annually
Rider described efforts beyond the department he said makes the district’s campuses safer. Regular meetings are held with the Fort Bend County sheriff’s department and constables as well as Missouri City and Sugar Land police to keep the department’s officers in touch with community law enforcement.
“We strive to work with all stakeholders collaboratively and build strong relationships. We want our students, staff and parents to feel safe in our schools, and we provide them with different options to report a crime or anything suspicious,” Rider said.
Quote of note
“There are some places where our kids might go—to the mall, to the movie theater, to a restaurant—where those places might have one or two of those security measures,” Rider said. “But our district puts a lot of intentional effort into making sure that we do as much as we can to protect our students. And I would say that our schools are probably the safest place for our kids to be in our community.”
