Training Gives Teachers New Insights

The sound was unmistakable – and unsettling to a number of teachers from Evansville’s Holy Rosary School.

The report of a handgun – albeit one firing blanks – had never-before echoed through the halls of a school they were in. This was no normal professional-development seminar.

Evansville Police Department officers, including members of the EPD SWAT team, provided training Feb. 13 to teachers from four Catholic schools, including one with two campuses – Annunciation (Christ the King and Holy Spirit campuses), Holy Rosary, St. Benedict Cathedral and Good Shepherd.

Training occurred in classrooms at St. Benedict Parish. Officer Jeff Worthington, EPD Resources Officer for all of the schools that participated, talked to the teachers before, during and after a series of scenarios to help them understand that fires and tornados aren’t the only threats they need to think about – and prepare for.

“We giving you real-life situations,” Worthington said. “We can’t tell you what to do because every situation is different – every school has a different layout; every classroom has its own unique features. We are going to provide some examples of what could happen in an active-threat situation that forces a lockdown, and we’ll give you some options.”

Worthington made it clear that, in descending order of preference, those options fell into three general areas. “Run if you can,” he said. “Barricade (doors, entries, etc.) if you have to; fight if you must.”

Worthington led a group of EPD officers through scenarios involving the call of a general lockdown in an area of a school where teachers and students have time to react and execute a plan – that is, the threat they could face is not imminent; maybe it’s in another part of the building and could eventually reach them; and another involving an active attacker gaining entry to a classroom before first responders arrive on scene.

Teachers learned about organizing their classrooms to facilitate quick-escape and barricading scenarios, and they also learned how they and their students should react if police enter a room where an active attacker is present.

“We approached EPD and requested that they provide the training,” said Nancy Mills, principal of St. Theresa School. Mills and her staff have trained in a variety of scenarios, and she coordinated these Feb. 13 sessions for the other schools on the city’s east side.

“The one thing you shouldn’t do is ‘what if’ things to death,” Worthington said. “You need to understand that every scenario will be different. There is no series of A-B-C-D steps that you will follow every time.

“You need to be aware,” he added, “and you need to be able to do something if you hear gunshots in the school, or if a lockdown is called over the intercom.”