[CCHS] lockdown drill

[Art Dulong]

Hello to all,

	I am sending this to inform you that this morning we had our lockdown
drill at approximately 9:15AM. During the lockdown teachers and students
are in a classroom or other designated area, lights off, and out of sight
from the corridor (to the best degree that that is possible). Since this
was a drill each administrator accompanied a police officer or team
through a section of the building to verify that protocols were followed.
The students and teachers took the drill remarkably seriously, in terms of
them following protocol. There was lots of good humor, but people were in
place and following instructions. The police were extremely impressed that
things went so well on a first practice of this particular protocol. The
entire exercise took about 17 minutes. 

	If you get a chance please explain to your child that there are many
different emergency scenarios. Some require movement of students out of
certain classroom areas and into others. Some of them require evacuation
of the entire building to a locale nearby. One calls for evacuation of the
entire building to a site completely removed from campus. If we were to go
into a real lockdown or a real shelter in place it would be because that
is the safest place to be at that time.  I send this along because I am
already hearing that some kids say "if it was real I'd just run outside".
If it were real, that would be the most dangerous thing one could do.
Please pass that along when you get a chance. The purpose of the various
scenarios is to try to place students and staff in the safest possible
place for the given situation. hopefully we will never have a real
situation. However, just a couple weeks ago Bedford had a real lockdown
for a legitimate reason. Students being in the building and accounted for
was the safest place they could have been at that time. 


Arthur Dulong
Principal, CCHS
(978) 341-2490 x7110