Editorial: Stop dawdling on school safety

School safety has become a concern across the United States. Yet this month, the Star-Advertiser reported that Hawaii’s Department of Education (DOE) has been slow to get up to speed on a statewide safety plan for Hawaii’s schools.

That is completely unacceptable, when young lives could be at stake.

On Jan. 10, state schools Superintendent Keith Hayashi told members of the state House Education Committee that threats of harm or violence directed to the islands’ public schools have risen markedly. There were 103 such threats to students and staff in 2019. The incidence fell to 47 during the pandemic in 2020, when remote learning was in effect — but by 2022, this number more than tripled, rising to 152 incidents.

Schools take these threats “seriously,” Hayashi assured legislators. Yet less than half of Hawaii’s 258 public school campuses have been formally evaluated for their vulnerabilities to targeted violence.

The DOE reports that it is expected to take another three years to finish the vulnerability assessments, which identify areas of weaknesses on school campuses — for example, quality of supervision as students come and go from campus, availability of security cameras and unsecured entry points.

DOE should recognize that the need for action is too urgent to be languid.

Already, the June 2022 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that there is a constitutional right to carry a concealed weapon outside one’s home, along with pro-gun rhetoric accompanying the ruling, have resulted in a marked rise in Hawaii gun ownership.

Statistics show that the more guns in a locale, the more likely it becomes that these weapons will come into the hands of a person who will attempt to use one for a life-threatening purpose. The Jan. 6 shooting of a Newport News, Va., teacher in her classroom by a 6-year-old whose family insists their gun was “secured” is a startling case in point.

In August, Lina Alathari, chief of the U.S. Secret Serv­ice’s National Threat Assessment Center, came to Hawaii to assist school officials and others with training to find and stop threats of violence. That’s a positive step. The DOE has additional protective measures underway, including trainings for more than 1,000 school employees so far in methods for assessing a student’s threat level, and preventing or intervening against a targeted attack.

Active-shooter response training is also available, though not mandatory, and has been provided so far by 80 schools. And all schools currently have emergency preparedness plans.

However, preventing threats is preferable to facing an emergency. This is why vulnerability assessments are needed.

Lack of information has consequences. As state House Education Chairman Justin Woodson noted, it’s not known whether the state’s 37 charter schools are adequately prepared, because charter schools operate independently, and they have not been required to report on or commit to specific, consistent preparations against targeted violence.

That brings up another concerning issue: It’s also unacceptable that the DOE withholds information communities need to assess school safety.

The Star-Advertiser has submitted multiple requests to the DOE for details from completed vulnerability assessments. Not only did the DOE withhold information, it actively discouraged efforts to learn more, first requiring a Uniform Information Practices Act request, then informing journalists that it would release redacted versions of the assessments for a fee of $7,142.50.

That is simply outrageous. Transparent communication with the public, school-by-school assessments and informed action plans all are necessary, and should be implemented as soon as possible — preferably by the end of 2023. Where students’ safety is concerned, there is no time for complacency.