The Texas Education Agency’s New Safety Standards Following Uvalde Investigation

The Texas Education Agency released its proposed safety standards for Texas schools this week following an investigation of the Uvalde shooting. The standards are meant to ensure a minimum level of safety on Texas school campuses. School safety expert Adam Coughran of Safe Kids Inc. checks in with his thoughts on the recommendations.

Adam’s Thoughts:

So the Texas Education Agency just released brand new recommendations coming out of some of the findings of Uvalde. Now, these recommendations, by and large, are things that people have been recommending for a long time. Many safety experts, schools safety experts, law enforcement, recommend things like always keeping the doors locked or having a way to lock doors from the inside, covering windows, all these types of things to keep kids safe.

However, there might be some roadblocks here. Things like the panic alarm system, the crisis communication systems, while always recommended will cost money, there’s going to be funds related to these things if schools don’t already have these types of measures in place. So many of the measures are things that have been recommended for a long time but have been finally been legislated into law.

Whereas some of the other recommendations where it relates to equipment or maybe having to get blinds for windows, emergency crisis communication systems, those type of things may run into some roadblocks without otherwise provided funding or grants from the government.