School uses Emergency Alerting System during inmate escape

Following a DDD News text alert regarding an escaped criminal on Monday, June 15, 2009, officials in the Kennett School District put their Emergency Alerting System (EAS) in place as a precaution to protect the students who were attending the district's summer school program.

According to South Elementary Assistant Principal Roland Johnson, all campuses in the district immediately initialized their EAS procedure, securing the perimeter of the campuses.

Johnson said at South, all outside doors and classroom doors were locked and no one was allowed to enter or exit the building or the classrooms during the incident. He said the procedure is the same at each campus.

"We have roving teachers and teachers' aides who will go with students who have emergencies, like going to the restroom or something like that, while the teacher remains in the classroom," Johnson said.

Johnson said during the procedure, all administrators and directors were in direct contact with each other using the district's communication system.

Johnson noted that during the procedure, each classroom teacher checked the role to make sure all students are accounted for.

Johnson said the district's EAS procedure remained in effect for the remainder of the school day.

Although the district has been actively preparing for emergencies such as this, Johnson said this is the first time the district has had an incident of this nature occur this year.

"We've been in training," Johnson said. "The whole school district has been in training for emergency preparedness. With all the storms, we've had a lot of practice."

Johnson said that during the procedure, the students behaved very well and seemed to understand the importance of the event. He noted that the students were not fully aware of why the EAS was implemented.

"Our code is not 'intruder,' or anything like that to alarm [the students]," Johnson said, adding that he believes the EAS procedure was executed to the best of the district's ability.