Farmington Schools Take On Safety Measures

FARMINGTON — Farmington School District staff continue to work through the school’s new strategic action plan to update board members and the public on recommendations and changes that are being made.

The district’s plan was formulated through a comprehensive study with John Brown University’s Soderquist Center and adopted by Farmington School Board last summer.

The plan includes a new mission, vision and values for the district and has action plans for four strategies: communication, a safe, cohesive and aligned learning experience, meeting the academic needs of students and implementing comprehensive literacy for grades K-6 and aligning literacy for grades K-12.

Terri Strope, assistant superintendent of schools, gave a presentation to School Board members last week on what the district is doing to create a safe, cohesive and aligned learning experience.

“The safety of our children is all important.” Terri Strope Assistant Superintendent of Schools

“We want to think about security of the whole child moving from one building to another,” Strope said. “The safety of our children is all important.”

Safety was identified as a weakness for the district during parent surveys but at the same time, it scored a 4.5 on a scale of 1-5, with 1 being the weakness and 5 the greatest.

“It’s always on our minds but we don’t feel like our children are at any risk at our schools,” Strope said. “But we always want them to be safe.”

Some changes made for the 2016-17 year include placing barriers so that traffic cannot go behind Ledbetter Intermediate during school hours. Children cross this road when going to the P.E. gym.

Another problem, Strope said, is that cars go into the exits at the elementary schools during pickup times at the end of the day. Barriers are now placed at the schools to stop this.

The committee has discussed having a more secure entrance at Ledbetter but decided to put that on hold because the school will be remodeled in the near future. Now, visitors can walk right into the school front hallway.

Superintendent Bryan Law noted that safety at the high school will improve when students move into the new building for the 2017-18 school year.

“At the new high school, all the kids will be under one roof,” Law said.

Now, students cross Double Springs Road to go to band, football and agriculture classes. Students use multiple doors to go in and out of the different buildings on campus.

“It’s virtually impossible to lock doors,” Law said.

At the new school, students and visitors will only have one way into the building.

“That will make it much better to monitor who is coming in and out of the campus,” Law added.

Other safety measures taken by the district include training for intruder or active shooters on campus. Farmington uses a national training called A.L.I.C.E., which stands for Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, Evacuate.

Having a cohesive and aligned learning experience falls under security, Strope said, because the district wants students to feel secure and confident as they move from building to building.

For 2016-17, teachers are focusing on an aligned learning experience in literacy. Next year, the focus will be on math.

Eighth- grade and high school literacy teachers have been meeting to make plans to help the transition from the middle school to high school. Teachers are eliminating repeats, such as reading one book in eighth grade and then being assigned the same book in high school.

Teachers are identifying essential skills for eighth grade and high school literacy and sharing these skills with teachers in lower grades so students will be ready for middle school.

In addition, fifth- grade and sixth-grade teachers are meeting to help with the literacy transition from Ledbetter to Lynch Middle School and third- and fourth-grade teachers are meeting to help with the transition in literacy from elementary school to the intermediate school.