The Anchorage School District will soon begin random metal detector screenings at middle and high schools.
District Office of Emergency Management Senior Director Jared Woody said the goal is to deter students from bringing weapons to school. He said roughly 60 students were caught with weapons last school year, close to the same number as the prior year.
“Most of those were your standard, you know, 4-inch pocket knives that most adults in Alaska carry, but obviously not appropriate in a school setting,” Woody said. “We do find a small number of firearms every year.”
Woody said the district has five sets of detectors — each made up of a pair of gray, 6-foot tall towers. He said all five sets will be randomly rotated between schools. Some days they won’t be deployed at all, and sometimes they may be brought to the same school several days in a row. If needed, he said, they could be sent to a specific location.
“We will also do deployments if we have a specific threat that is found to any building in the district,” Woody said. “So in that case, we may deploy even to an elementary school, though we don't anticipate doing that.”
Woody said the aim is to screen students quickly enough so they won’t be late for class.
He added that the detectors aren’t calibrated to specifically detect vapes, but they may come up in the screening process.
“We have that ability to do so,” Woody said. “We did test that at South High School last school year, and the problem that we found was it is a much more intensive screen.”
If a student is caught with a vape, it will be confiscated and turned over to the school, which will handle any discipline measures, he said.
Anchorage students return from summer break next week, with some grades starting Aug. 14 and others the following day.
