Superintendent Addresses Safety Training, Traffic Issues at Committee Meeting

By Adam Swift

It was safety first for the School Committee at its Monday night meeting.

Winthrop Superintendent of Schools Lisa Howard updated the committee on ALICE active shooter training for school staff, and made a plea for parents and caregivers to follow the traffic rules when it comes to dropping off their students at school.

“Every teacher and administrator and ESP (education support professionals) and even our cafeteria workers have all been ALICE certified by taking the online ALICE certification test which teaches us how to react to any type of incident in our schools that is intrusive,” said Howard.

ALICE is a professional active shooter training program. The acronym stands for the steps to be taken during an active shooter or other emergency situation – alert, lockdown, inform, counter, and evacuate.

With the help of Winthrop Police Chief Terence Delehanty and certified ALICE trainers on his staff, Howard said staff will undergo further training in the schools over the next month or two.

“The idea behind it is that there are people who are certified as teachers in the classrooms, and if there was to be any type of intrusion or anything going on in the building in which we need to lock our building down, that the students are expected to react to the teacher’s direction,” said Howard.

The police trainers will meet with school staff to review ALICE training, do a question and answer session with staff, and then set up scenarios in the school while there are no students in the building.

After the scenarios are completed, the chief and police trainers will give an assessment of what they saw as well as an idea of any additional support or training the school staff needs.

While the school staff has gone through the ALICE certification training for four years, due to the Covid pandemic, this will be the first time in two years they will take part in active, onsite training scenarios.

During the meeting, Howard also offered a reminder to stay safe in and near school parking lots and drop-off areas.

“Please be mindful of the rules of each individual school as you are dropping your children off,” she said. “I know everyone wants to get there on time and be the first in line, but we are continuing to have difficulties, and not just at the Gorman Fort Banks School, but at all of our schools,” said Howard. “Folks are moving quickly on the roads, and not everybody as children in the schools, so not everyone is aware of the parents dropping students off on the street level.”

Howard also requested that parents make sure their children exit the cars on the sidewalk side of the cars, and not toward the street.

While Howard said there are traffic issues at all the schools, she said they are still especially acute at the Gorman Fort Banks.

“The traffic challenges at the Gorman Fort Banks are continuous, since probably the day the school was built, but it is inhibiting people from accessing the loop,” said Howard. “Folks are not necessarily following the rules; they are doing some live parking in spaces that say no parking, which means you can’t park there.”

Howard said cars end up blocking traffic in both directions, which is a huge public safety issue, especially if emergency vehicles need to get to the area.

“No matter how briefly you park your car in the wrong spot, especially the ones that say N-O no parking, it compromises the safety of all our kids and emergency access to all our schools,” Howard said.

Howard said the schools will work with the police department to identify people who are habitual traffic offenders at the school.

In other business, the School Committee approved a new contract with the district’s custodians that will run through 2025.

The senior custodians will see a two dollar per hour raise in the first year, while the junior custodians will get a $1 bump in pay per hour. For the second and third years of the contract, all employees will get a 2 percent increase in pay for each year.

The contract also adds Juneteenth as a recognized holiday and slightly increases the clothing allowance and longevity pay for the custodians. There was also some adjustment to the hours of custodial overtime, according to Howard.