I recently read the book The Heart and the Fist – The Education of a Humanitarian, the Making of A Navy Seal.  The book was written by Eric Greitens who was a Rhodes Scholar who earned his PhD at Oxford and did extensive humanitarian work around the globe before becoming a U.S. Navy S.E.A.L.   I found the book to be well-written, interesting, and insightful.  We relentlessly research and study how people can better prepare for and respond to life and death crisis situations.  Greitens book was one of the books I read while researching our latest book Staying Alive – How to Act Fast and Survive Deadly Encounters due out from Barron’s this April.

I thought the author did an excellent job in examining how mental confidence is built during SEAL training.  He also does a great job in describing specific concepts the Navy uses to instill the unusually high level of confidence and competence in their trainees and graduate of SEAL training.  I recommend The Heart and the Fist for those who are serious students of school crisis planning As we have maintained for years, while it is impractical to try to train educators in the same manner as special forces operators, some of the same concepts they use can be conveyed to members of the general public in an appropriate fashion to help them improve their ability to think fast and survive challenging events.  Many school crisis planners we have worked with have successfully incorporated lessons learned in other disciplines such as the military, law enforcement, fire service, and emergency medical care.

Safe Havens International has been selected to perform a school security assessment for an independent Christian school in Nairobi, Kenya.  Safe Havens Executive Director Michael Dorn will travel to Kenya for a week in January to conduct the on-site portion of the assessment while Steve Satterly, Russell Bentley, and Phuong Nguyen will provide off-site research, analysis, and report preparation.  Safe Havens routinely performs school security assessments for independent schools across the nation and has been receiving an increasing number of requests to perform school security assessments not only in the U.S. but in other countries as well.  Safe Havens has also been selected to conduct a school security assessment in Nigeria and is being considered for a school security assessment project for an independent school in Thailand.

As is our practice on high-risk targets for terrorism, we will not be identifying the school by name prior to the site visit.  Two parents from the school were killed and two students who attend the school were wounded in the tragic terrorist attack at a Nairobi shopping mall.  Safe Havens feels deeply honored to be entrusted to perform this detailed and particularly high-stakes independent school security assessment.

I am travelling to Wethersfield, Connecticut today for two training sessions for 700 school officials and law enforcement officers.  I have had great interaction with many dedicated advocates for the children in many trips to Connecticut.  I will travel from Connecticut to another school district presentation in Jefferson, Tennessee.   I am excited and looking forward to working with presentations for both districts. 

Many schools have placed large numbers on each exterior door to help emergency responders navigate their facilities in the event of a school security incident.  Our clients have reported numerous other day-to-day benefits from this practice.  For example, numerous clients have told our school security experts that this makes it easier to direct visitors for special events and helps maintenance personnel understand which door needs repair when work orders come in.  This school security practice is relatively inexpensive and can provide years of benefit even if there is never a major school security incident.

Some of our clients add directional letters to make communications even more effective.  For example, 4W would indicate door number 4 facing west.  A few of our clients even place the numbers and letters on the inside of exterior doors at the bottom of the doors so they can be seen when crawling during a fire.  Our school security experts generally do not recommend numbering individual classrooms on the exterior of the school as this could help an aggressor locate a staff member or student they wish to attack or in the case of students abducted.

Our school security experts try to focus on the simple and inexpensive approaches to school security as well as appropriate school security investments that are more costly.