Unreliable Data can Produce Poor Decisions

I recently finished an interesting revisionist military history book Deathride – Hitler VS Stalin: The Eastern Front, 1941-1945 by Loyola University professor John Mosier.  Squarely confronting the traditional view of this conflict, Dr. Mosier conducted extensive research of both Soviet and German documents to help him evaluate the chain of events that led up to the defeat of the German army in World War II.  In his book, Dr. Mosier asserts with some pretty good evidence that one major problem for the Soviet military during the war was the culture in the Soviet Union that drove officers and government officials to provide false reports because those who provided accurate reports which included bad news were usually punished. 

This created a situation where Stalin did not have any real idea of what the situation was on the ground.  For example, Dr. Mosier points out that the production numbers for Soviet tanks were dramatically over inflated because officials who were in charge of tank production dared not to admit that they had not met the unrealistic production quotas set forth for them.  

According to Dr. Mosier, though this was only was but one of many serious blunders that led to the deaths  of millions of Soviet troops and civilians, the disconnect between the reality in the field and the “numbers” made the tactical and strategic approaches ineffectual to a deadly extent. 

Though this is a far more grievous situation in a war, the same principal applies in other areas such as criminal justice, law enforcement, mental health and education.  If decision makers do not have accurate data to reflect what is happening in their schools and communities, progress or lack thereof cannot be accurately measured.  This in turn makes it less likely that effective strategies will be employed to address opportunities for improvement. 

One of the most common examples involves failures to accurately report, track and analyze data relating to school safety, crime and discipline.  If reporting approaches place pressure on school administrators, victims, school employees and public safety officials, then the number of reported incidents will drop while the actual incident rate can rise.  

Taking care that policies and practices do not interfere with easy reporting and accurate tabulation of data is needed to make schools safer and more effective learning environments.  

Bomb Threat Protocols for Schools Should Provide a Range of Options to Reduce Disruption as well as the Risk of Mass Casualty Loss of Life

A series of recent bomb threats at universities across the nation illustrates how disruptive bomb threats can be.  While it is tempting to think that it is safer to automatically evacuate a facility when a bomb threat is received, there are times where a bomb threat is used to trigger an evacuation so building occupants are more exposed.  In other words, an aggressor can call in a bomb threat so that evacuees will be brought to the location of an explosives device.  This is not a strictly hypothetical situation as a Georgia middle school student was arrested for planning exactly this type of attack many years ago and there have been incidents where this tactic has been successfully utilized elsewhere.

A number of years ago, we released a white paper on this topic that was written for the Indiana Department of Education School Safety Specialist’s Academy.  We are planning to update this paper later this year and  it will be announced automatically to people who have signed up for our free electronic periodical the Safety Net.

Big Walnut Schools in Ohio Work to Prevent Bullying

I have not had much time to blog due to my travel schedule. I had the honor of working with folks from the Big Walnut School District in Sunbury Ohio for a couple of days. Their town is beautiful, the weather was picture perfect and the central office administrators, building administrators, teachers, school bus drivers and other support staff who attended the presentations were awesome folks. The focus of the site visits and presentations was to help the district enhance their efforts to prevent bullying while improving school climate and culture. The interaction by participants in the sessions, as well as the one-on-one discussions at breaks, indicated a high degree of connectivity between staff and students in the district. Hopefully, the positive discussions we had will help build on this solid foundation even more. I have had the good fortune to keynote a number of statewide school safety conferences and to work with some outstanding districts in Ohio and thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to do so again this week.

A Helpful Book for School Crisis Planning – Sharpening the Warrior’s Edge – The Psychology and Science of Training

Bruce Siddle has performed considerable research in the field of human factors and is an expert on how the human mind and body function under life and death stress.  In Sharpening the Warrior’s Edge – The Psychology of Science and Training, Siddle does a great job of explaining how the heart rate affects our ability to think and act under crisis conditions.  This book  is a very helpful read for those who are interested in advanced concepts of school emergency preparedness.

Texas Schools Move Forward to Improve student Safety with Student Identification Tracking Devices in Spite of Protests of a Few

School officials frequently seek ways to improve school safety, security and crisis preparedness through improved technologies.  Two Texas school districts have implemented student identification cards that include radio frequency identification microchips which can be tracked by electronic readers located in various parts of the school building.  The Northside Independent School District and Springs School District have both adopted these types of systems which are designed to help them track students for improved security, safety,and  accountability for students during a crisis.  The systems are also designed to help school officials reduce truancy which can in turn help to reduce the dropout rate and improve test scores.

As with many efforts to enhance school safety through modern technology, there are people and organizations that are critical of these efforts.  The complaints in these instances have apparently centered around student privacy and concerns with hacking.  School officials have countered that the reading devices only work on campus and that personal information cannot be accessed by hacking the cards.  Similar criticisms have been an issue for other technologies  such as the use of school security cameras, metal detectors and security X-ray devices in the past.

In the Northside IDS, school officials say the project will cost a little more than a quarter of a million dollars a year but is expected to increase revenues to the district by about $2 million due to improved daily attendance.  If these estimates are correct, this appears to be an excellent way to improve student safety while increasing funding for the students.  With the added benefits of reducing the risk of victimization to truant students and enhancing graduation rates, this may be a very logical approach.   

Media reports we reviewed seem to indicate that most parents approve of the technology and Pascual Gonzalez who is a spokesman for the Northside Independent School District told reporters that only one parent has complained about the new approach.  Concerns have been expressed by civil liberties groups including the ACLU and privacy advocates predict that districts utilizing the new technologies will be hit with protests and litigation though this has apparently not taken place in the Spring ISD which implemented similar technology five years ago.   I presented for the Spring ISD many years ago and they are one of the most innovative districts I have worked with in their intelligent utilization of school security technology.      

Free School Safety Video Podcast – Lockdown Options

Safe Havens Video has posted another free school safety video podcast focused on school lockdowns.  This podcast discusses why school officials may wish to have two lockdown options, one for dire emergencies and another for more common situations that can escalate into dire emergencies if they are not contained.  The Ask Safe Havens Video series is designed to answer school safety questions that our analysts commonly recieve.