Most Texas public schools reviewed this fall passed random inspections meant to detect whether an intruder could gain access to campuses.
However, more than a quarter of them 鈥� or about 800 schools 鈥� still need to make improvements, according to from the Texas School Safety Center.
Gov. Greg Abbott in the wake of the deadly Uvalde mass shooting in May where a heavily armed gunman gained access to Robb Elementary School.
Meghan Mangrum, who works in the Education Lab at the Dallas Morning News, said about 3,000 campuses . The center鈥檚 goal is to audit 75% of the roughly 8,000 schools across the state.
While the audits are a surprise, Mangrum said the center gives a general heads up to avoid causing panic.
鈥淭hey didn鈥檛 want to create any fear. You know, you have a random person trying to get into a school. So they did give districts and maybe some local law enforcement, depending on the community, a heads up,鈥� she said. 鈥淏ut they did want them to also be unannounced, because when you know someone鈥檚 going to show up, you鈥檙e on your best behavior. That鈥檚 human nature. So they really wanted it to be realistic while kids were on campus.鈥�
Of the schools who didn鈥檛 pass the audit, there were about 75 schools where auditors were able to gain unauthorized access to campus in under two minutes, Mangrum said.
鈥淚t looks like typically they were able to get onto campus through a secondary door. So instead of going through the main office, they were going through maybe a side door or another building,鈥� she said. 鈥淭hey notified districts when that happened. And there鈥檚 sort of a process for how districts have to address that.鈥�
The center has not announced which districts or campuses need corrective action. This is part of a wider trend of districts being tight lipped when it comes to school safety information, Mangrum said.
鈥�Some districts have released, you know, 鈥榟ey, this is how many schools have been audited, this is how many passed, this is how many didn鈥檛.鈥� Others haven鈥檛. Up here in Dallas, we haven鈥檛 been able to get those numbers from Dallas ISD,鈥� she said. 鈥淪o we don鈥檛, in most cases, have a list or know what schools passed and what schools didn鈥檛.鈥�
Mangrum said it is still a bit too early to have a full sense of the reaction from lawmakers and parents in response to this report. However, she said she expects school safety to remain a priority going forward.
鈥淲e know that school security is going to remain top of mind for both parents and lawmakers for the foreseeable future,鈥� she said.
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