About Us
Words from the Head of School
A Culture of School Safety
Dear Brandeis community,
The past few weeks have been big ones for speaking out on behalf of the safety of our kids, from the national walkout that our students participated in (along with neighboring students from St. Thomas More School and KZV Armenian School), to the statements on gun violence from California heads of schools and Prizmah Jewish day school heads. I particularly resonated with the opening of the Prizmah letter:
We come from a prophetic tradition that teaches a moral responsibility to pursue justice. We are called to speak, and to speak publicly, when our children are being put at emotional and physical risk. As leaders in our communities, as Jews of conscience, and most of all, as those who have taken on the sacred task of educating and protecting our children, we feel compelled to join our nation’s youth to demand action that will increase safety in all of our schools.
To all of that I say amen. But of course, at the local and immediate level, we also know that school safety is about a great deal more than can be contained in calls to action and national movements. And so, we also recently held a meeting for parents to share about the team (in addition to Joe Vigil and me, we also heard from School Resource Officer Lok of the SFPD, and from Mike Grabski, our partner at Talos Secure Group), the work we have done lately to improve our security posture and protocols, and to talk about how we can all work together to make our school safer. I wanted to share a few highlights from that meeting here.
- Safety begins with people, and we are lucky to have some amazing security professionals working with us to ensure the security of our campus. Since 2015, we have restructured our approach to security to create a management role to oversee security (in Joe Vigil, our facilities manager), and increased our staffing so that we have two guards on site during school hours.
- Protocols and procedures are at the core of keeping the school safe. In partnering with Talos Secure Group, we have revised the rounds and protocols that our guards keep, in order to maximize their visibility and impact on securing the campus. Joe has also led our efforts to revise, train our staff on, and implement a new approach to emergency drills, including a new annual schedule of lockdown and earthquake drills, to ensure that our students, faculty, and staff are practiced and prepared. The recent test of our emergency communication system is an example of some of the new protocols we have put in place.
- Oversight is key, which is why we created a risk management committee of the board as a standing committee, to help us ensure that both physical and cybersecurity at Brandeis are informed by best practices in the field. With the committee’s support, last year we partnered with Global Operations, our fifth security auditor since 2005, to come and review our physical and operational security measures, and we have been using their recommendations to guide us as we continue to tighten up our communication with other agencies on site and strengthen our overall approach.
While we have been highly commended by our accrediting body for all the work we have done on security, and while we are seen by our peers as a leader in creating a positive culture of school safety, we continue to work at all of the above, to stay attentive to shifts in the field and evolving best practices.
At last week’s meeting, we also discussed how everyone in the school community can partner to make our campus as safe as it can be. I shared five simple steps we all can take:
- Safety first. We all lead busy lives, and we often let our busy-ness overtake our good sense. One of the single greatest dangers to our students arises from the cars in our parking lots and the rushed or distracted driving that each of us occasionally reverts to. Please keep the safety of our students at the top of your mind as you drive, cross in the crosswalk, or do anything in our parking lots.
- Welcome the stranger. This Jewish ethos can also help us keep the school safe. Whenever you see someone who is unfamiliar to you (and especially if they are not wearing a visitor badge), introduce yourself! Ask if you can help them get where they’re going. This simple practice will lead to a greater awareness by all of us about who should or should not be on campus.
- Close the door behind you. Our gates and doors close themselves, but please wait the extra three seconds to see that they have fully closed and latched before you head on your way.
- Trust and partnership. There are times when our protocols call for us to close down the campus entry or search cars that are coming onto campus. Please trust that our security officers are doing this for a good reason, and work with them as they do so!
- When in doubt, share. If you have an interaction with someone visiting the campus that seems off, or if you see something worrisome in a parking lot or down the street, don’t hesitate to find someone and tell them. The more we know, the better.
At last week’s meeting, we also heard some good ideas about ways we can improve security or the communication and partnership between parents and the school, suggestions that I am grateful for. We will continue to keep the community in the loop as we move forward, with regular updates on security at our annual town halls and via Hashavua. Thank you all for your partnership!
Wishing you all safe weekends, my friends.
Warmly,
Dan
