Security consultant promotes standards to protect schools

Timm typically walks through school buildings to assess vulnerabilities, and recommends systems and products

As an independent school security consultant, Paul Timm of RETA Security conducts security assessments and provides technical assistance for numerous school districts throughout the United States and Canada. Timm typically walks through school buildings to assess vulnerabilities, and recommends systems and products, practices and policies, and other strategies to optimise school security. He has personally been in 500 school buildings.

Security standards for schools

For example, Timm just finished Phase One of a project with the state of Wyoming to document security standards for schools in the state. Timm worked under contract for the Wyoming School Facilities Department in this initiative to define and develop physical security standards for educational facilities across the state. This collaborative effort involved representatives from U.S. Homeland Security, Wyoming Department of Education, State of Wyoming Department of Fire Prevention and school districts throughout the state. The goal of this initiative was to immediately enhance current public school building security.

All schools report to the state level in state capital Cheyenne, and request money from the state, and Timm is helping to create standards that all public schools in Wyoming must adhere to. Emphasis is on finding best practices and on minimum requirements to reduce risks in schools. Basic requirements – fundamentals of a safe learning environment – include communication systems to enable teachers to request assistance and locks on all the classroom doors. “Once standards begin to surface, other states start saying we should have standards,” says Timm, who sees it as a “bottom-up approach” to federal standards. Tax money spent on security comes through state grants in some instances and, in others, from an overall allocation that various schools draw from.

Security consultation

Timm’s current clients also include the Cook County School District 130 (Illinois), the Lincoln Public Schools (Nebraska), and the Olathe Public Schools (Kansas). Timm has assisted numerous federal Emergency Response and Crisis Management (ERCM) grant winners and Readiness and Emergency Management for Schools (REMS) grant award recipients. In addition to assisting individual school districts, Timm is a nationally acclaimed conference speaker. He regularly conducts security presentations for organisations such as ASIS International, the Association of School Business Officials International, the American Association of School Administrators, and the Wisconsin School Safety Coordinators Association. He is the author of School Security: How to Build and Strengthen a School Safety Program, has appeared on numerous television and radio programs and has had school security articles published in numerous periodicals.

RETA Security started in 1984 as independent school security consultants, providing security assessments and training, and assisting schools with emergency planning. (The name is an acronym for Ron Eric Timm and Associates [RETA], named for Paul Timm’s father, who founded the company.) With three full-time employees and additional contractors, RETA Security works with many school districts and also with insurance companies that cover groups of schools.

Background

Timm served as a School Security Grant Program architect for the State of West Virginia, assisting the School Building Authority of West Virginia with implementation of the “School Access Safety Act.” He was instrumental in establishing the guidelines and procedures for this statewide program. Timm instructed administrators from all 55 counties in West Virginia in the need for and methods of effectively improving school access control. He also provides Regional Educational Service Agencies and individual school districts in West Virginia with technical assistance.

Upgrading school systems with latest technologies

Timm is helping the Olathe, Kansas, public schools with technical assistance related to security. With 40 or so schools in their district, the system wants to make sure the high schools are “in balance” in terms of security systems such as cameras, electronic access control and communications. “We are looking at their schools to make sure we help them move from A to B to C, with continuous improvement and coordinating the effort district-wide. Technical assistance also includes upgrading from DVRs to NVRs, and consolidating on fewer product manufacturers. We’re leading them through that process and helping their architect.” All schools will soon have a secured vestibule at the front of the building to manage visitors.

Timm is often amazed at the shortcomings of how technology is employed in our schools. “I still go into schools that have VCRs or they aren’t recording at all,” he says. “I see it over and over again.”

Timm sees social media as a huge problem related to school security, and a problem that many adults don’t understand. “Cyberbullying is epidemic, and student’s identities are tied to how many people like their posts. We can’t intervene because we don’t know what’s happening. If we can bridge the gap and be in that world, we can intervene much easier,” Timm says. One strategy to break through into the little-known world is for a school resource officer to build a social media profile as a 15-year-old student; as students “friend” the fake student, information that can help security becomes accessible. Schools are also using Twitter handles and other tools to communicate faster.

Timm warns schools against investing in popular “after-market” products that claim to provide additional security. One such product encases the door closer to quickly secure a door from the inside during a crisis. Another is a rectangular-shaped steel plate that secures a door with the help of two steel pegs. A third is an injection-molded plastic device positioned at the bottom of a door.  “These products violate fire and ADA codes. Some of them keep us from egressing a room,” says Timm. “All of them void warranties of door manufacturers.”

“Schools are waking up to the fact that they should involve students in the security planning dialogue,” says Timm. “Students are ahead of us in technology; they know more than we do. You should include them in the whole safety planning dialogue, from middle school age and up.”