Practical High School Campus Security Tips: What Works From a Veteran High School Teacher
The half-steam latte in my hand was already cold last month when I spotted it: the side exit by the gym stood propped open with a cinder block, 10 minutes before the first bell. A parent walking her freshman in stopped beside me, nodded at the door, and asked the question I’ve gotten a dozen times in the past two years: “Is anyone even checking who comes in here?”
I’ve taught 10th grade English at this suburban high school for 12 years, and my own kid is a junior here, so I care about this issue as both a staff member and a parent. Most of the conversation around school security these days is either about multimillion dollar bond measures for new camera systems or heated political debates, but no one talks much about the small, daily changes that actually keep kids safe. I’ve picked up a lot of lessons from the small slips and close calls we’ve had here, and most of them don’t require a big budget to implement.
We had the same problem with propped doors for years. Teachers prop them open when carrying boxes of textbooks to their rooms, kids prop them open to slip out for a quick smoke between classes, sports teams prop them open when loading equipment after practice. We sent out emails, posted signs, even wrote people up for it, and nothing changed. Then our head custodian suggested a $12 fix: hydraulic door stops that only hold the door open when someone is holding it from the inside. If you push on the door from outside, the stop retracts and the door locks shut. We put them on every exterior door in the building. Now, no one can prop a door open for long without standing there holding it, and that cut propped open doors by 80% in the first semester. It’s a tiny, cheap change that made a huge difference.
The next big shift was getting everyone involved in security, not just the two part-time guards we have on staff. Two years ago, a former student who’d been expelled for gun possession showed up in our lunchroom. The new security guard didn’t recognize him, and he almost got all the way through the line before Linda, our head lunch lady who’s been here 22 years, spotted him and texted the office. After that, we stopped locking information about banned visitors in a locked office file. Now, we do a 10 minute check-in after school every quarter. The office shows clear current photos and first names of anyone who’s banned from campus, and we invite everyone: custodians, lunch staff, coaches, even student office aides, so they know what to look for. We also give everyone a simple, low-confrontation script to use: if you see someone you don’t recognize, or someone without a visitor sticker or student ID, just say “Hi, can I help you find what you’re looking for?” It’s friendly, not accusatory, and anyone who belongs there will just tell you where they’re going. Anyone who doesn’t will almost always leave right away. I’ve used it three times this year, and all three were just parents who forgot to check in at the front desk, but it’s a habit that keeps everyone accountable.
We also changed how we do lockdown drills, after realizing the old scheduled drills weren’t preparing anyone. We used to do ours on the second Tuesday of every semester at 9:30 am, so everyone knew it was coming. Kids would joke around, teachers would forget to block the door, and it turned into just another box to check. Two years ago, we switched to one unannounced drill every semester, and we just tell parents which month it will be in, so they don’t panic if they get an emergency alert. I also set up simple, assigned jobs in my classroom so no one panics when the alarm goes off: one student moves the 300-pound classics bookshelf in front of the door, one covers the window on the door with pre-cut black paper we keep in a cabinet, one stays by my phone to text the office our room number, how many students we have, and if anyone is missing (like a kid who was in the bathroom when the alarm went off). It takes 45 seconds, everyone knows their role, and there’s no chaos.
The last small change that made a big difference was setting up an anonymous tip form. For years, we told kids to come talk to a teacher or administrator if they heard a threat or saw something worrying, but a lot of kids don’t want to be labeled a snitch by their peers. So we built a free, anonymous Google Form that goes straight to the principal and our school resource officer 24 hours a day. It’s linked on the school homepage, printed on the back of every student ID, and mentioned once a month in the parent newsletter. Kids can report anything from a planned fight after school to a threatening post they saw on social media. Last year, a kid sent a tip that another student was planning to bring a knife to a dispute, and we intercepted it before anyone got hurt. It took 10 minutes to set up, and it costs nothing.
Going back to that propped gym door last month: after that morning, I brought it up at our staff meeting, and we added one more small thing. We have student ambassadors who earn community service credit for graduation, and now they stand at each exterior door for the first 10 minutes of school, just checking ID badges. If a kid forgets theirs, they walk them to the office to get a free temporary sticker, no punishment, just a check. Kids notice other people their age faster than a single security guard standing at the main entrance ever could, and it’s cut down on unbadged people slipping in by a lot.
We still mess up. Last month, the band department propped open the auditorium door for three hours while moving equipment for the spring concert, and no one noticed until the custodian did his evening walk. We still have kids who forget their IDs and slip past the ambassadors. Security isn’t about being perfect. It’s about having enough small, simple checks that one mistake doesn’t turn into something terrible. These changes aren’t fancy, they don’t cost a lot of money, and they don’t disrupt the school day too much. We’re still tweaking things, still learning, and that’s okay. That’s the work.
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