After a maintenance team triggered the Camas School District’s (CSD) lockdown alarm at Camas High School (CHS) two weeks ago, staff and student concerns have prompted a re-evaluation and update of the school’s lockdown procedures.
On Friday, Feb. 23, a maintenance team working for Paragon, the company that provides the CHS emergency lockdown system CrisisGo, accidentally triggered a lockdown alarm during scheduled annual maintenance which coincided with CHS’s first period.
“For whatever reason, [scheduled maintenance of the CrisisGo system] caused the lockdown, and we didn’t know that for a good 10, 15 minutes…we were really trying to make sure that it wasn’t anything else,” CHS Safety Director Owen Sanford said.
CrisisGo, which allows some staff to trigger an alarm to other staff members and police, could not provide the exact location of an alarm, generating confusion amongst staff.
“Normally, when someone calls 911 from a phone, we’re notified where exactly that phone call came from, or if someone triggers the lockdown in other ways, we’re able to find out how that was done,” Sanford said. “That wasn’t the case this time, so they’ve fixed that as well.”
Because of its vague nature, the staff and student reactions ranged from confused to panicked during the lockdown.
“It was understandably very concerning for a lot of students and staff, and people have varying responses to something like this,” Sanford said.
Some students and staff treated the lockdown like a drill or ignored it entirely.
“We just sat in the dark for a while…I thought it was just a drill,” CHS freshman Kyler Reeves said.
“I thought it was just a little weird, ’cause it was out of nowhere… I was a little confused,” CHS sophomore Aeden Garling.
“To be honest, our teacher didn’t really treat it very seriously… we just continued on our project,” CHS senior Olivia Martinez said.
Others believed the lockdown was more serious.
“We thought it was pretty real for a second…a door opened, people were screaming, a girl was screaming in a bathroom saying ‘help me’ and we thought someone was in trouble,” CHS Senior Kenyen Thompson said.
“When the door opened, it was just someone that was in a bathroom… but that girl [who was screaming earlier] probably thought she was gonna get shot… it was a pretty scary experience,” Thompson said.
Many felt that the school’s reaction to the lockdown wasn’t enough. Lockdown procedures were unclear or not followed by many teachers and staff, and some students have asked for a safer policy.
“I think [the CHS lockdown policy] does need to change for all the teachers… our teacher just started playing the piano, he didn’t take it seriously… if it had been a serious thing, I probably could have died or something,” Martinez said.
“We need to take more action in a lockdown, because if a [school threat] is a student they’re already gonna know what we’re gonna do…[we need] better places to hide or more ways to fight back,” said Thompson.
“I think [the school district] should upgrade their technology so we’re not getting these maintenance issues,” CHS sophomore Tyler May said.
In response, CHS is working to update its safety policy and lockdown procedures. CHS Principal Kelly O’Rourke released a follow-up on March 7 (over a week after the lockdown incident), detailing updated procedures to be taken by the school, including staff priorities during a crisis, increased communication between staff and students, updated plans for the safety of students caught outside of class during a lockdown, further installation of blackout curtains and window fog and changes to maintenance schedules.
“We’ve taken away some lessons from this… if there’s any of this maintenance that needs to be done again, it certainly won’t be done during school hours,” Sanford said.
