With the recent attacks targeting different groups, the Messenger investigates school resources on student safety

Graphic by Melissa Liu, Managing Print & Design Editor

Grace Peng, Managing Online Editor & Sanjana Gopu, Staff Writer

The bustling suburbs of Johns Creek are ranked second in the nation for the safest city to raise a family, according to a 2020 list compiled by Safewise, one of the premiere residential security platforms. But the city’s record-low crime rates do not liberate it completely from the occasional danger that can still plague the community. With the attacks on women like Sarah Everard and people of color, residents still remain vigilant about their safety.

Chloe Grimes, a language arts teacher at Northview, began her career here only two years ago, and feels fortunate to say that she has never felt unsafe. But coming right out of college from a city that less so has introduced her into the kinds of safety precautions that are necessary.

“College is obviously pretty different. You're alone a lot. And it's dark, and you're taking classes at weird hours and your car's not parked by your house or by your dorm or wherever it might be.” Grimes said. “I was always very cognizant of where I was parking on. I avoided walking alone. I always had pepper spray on my lanyard that had my keys and ID and everything on it.”

Transitioning into adulthood and teacherhood has not changed Grimes’ perspective on personal safety, and her closeness in age to Northview students means that the awareness of hearing of dangerous incidents from both her parents and the media is often a shared sentiment.  However, when reversed, the transition from the safe haven of Northview to more crime-ridden cities can be quite different.

“I definitely think it would be different, very few and Johns Creek definitely has the privilege of physical safety at the highest place. We don't have much of a drug problem or crime problem so definitely puts us in a bubble.” Yasmin Shalim, a Northview senior, said. “Growing up here can give us a sense of ignorance but it's important for us to recognize that the whole world isn't like here.”

Shalim, who will be attending the University of Chicago in the fall, understands that the environment of Chicago is starkly different from Georgia. For example, while Johns Creek’s violent crime rate is 0.49 per 1,000 people – well below the national average, Chicago’s rate is one of the highest in the country, with approximately 40 per 1,000 people. Shalim, who has often walked home from school, has already started preparing.

“One thing that I've been looking into is tasers and pepper spray and all - what's most efficient. But whatever happens, I don’t want to limit my security options,” Shalim said. “Just doing research and finding out like which tools are best in different scenarios, and also looking at how to [easily] share my location, And that’s just so that people know where I am, in the case that anything happens, I really hope that I can have people can help me out.”

Shalim’s four years here have prepared her; late after-school meetings and solo trips home means that she has learned to not listen to music and carry scissors when necessary. Although she has been fortunate to not to face anything herself, the news of a possible trafficker in October of 2019 have increased the paranoia in making the journey. For a student who has faced an incident, however, the experiences afterwards can be painfully difficult to forget.

“I would get panic attacks often and I felt at my lowest, but I learned how to cope with my panic attacks by small things like tapping the middle of my palm to calm me down, to take deep breaths, and close my eyes and count to ten.” Mia*, a Northview sophomore, said. “These were all methods just to calm my anxiety and panic attacks that have helped me so much in life, especially when I was in public places.”

Mia, a survivor of sexual assault, recalls that while the physical damages of her attack were agonizing enough, the worst point of her life was in the months immediately. The healing process is an excruciating emotionally and mentally taxing effort, as the taboo surrounding the subject creates a difficult conversation to have.

“I really wish I had someone at the time that told me it was okay to cry because I felt very weak before when I cried.” Mia said. “It took me a while to completely understand what had happened to me, because I would randomly get flashbacks and when I did it just bothered me so much because I never truly admit to myself what happened.”

Nowadays, Mia has learned to move forward, and surrounds herself with the people who make her feel comfortable and safe. The Northview environment, she believes, is a relatively safe place, and she advocates for a course on the awareness of assault victims. However, she understands that the school has been making an effort, offering resources to those who suffer.

The school’s counseling department and administration play key part in ensuring student safety. This includes a series of school drills that are practiced on a monthly basis that ingrain the protocols required to guaranteeing student and staff safety. An example is the imposter drills, which can be divided into a soft lockdown and hard lockdown.

“The soft lockdown is when there's a threat that may be outside of the building. So, we use the building itself, as our kind of shield, you know, we, the, the staff would be out in the halls, we would restrict the students to being within their classrooms,” Brian Downey, principal of Northview, said. “We would make sure that all the exterior doors are locked, and we would have eyes on our campus.”

A hard lockdown, however, is when the threat is inside the building, and classrooms are needed as an extra layer of security. In this drill, the goal is to stay out of any attacker’s line of sight, so students and teachers will retreat to a corner of the room where they cannot be seen and lock the door. A third drill is the evacuation drill, in which the entire campus is moved from one location to another. Staff and faculty go through hours of extra training to solidify their knowledge of protocol.

“There is training for our staff that we go through at the beginning of the year that just puts [these] things on their radar screen.” Downey said. “Then the administrative staff, and the school police have extra layers of training to, you know, deal with those situations, everything from the proactive side of what to look for, you know what should raise your antenna, what should raise your red flag to the reactive side, okay you know you see something, then what, how do you respond, and what do we do, we have on the reactive side, we do have an extensive camera system on our campus, both inside and outside our building.”

While Downey understands that the age range of high schoolers – around 14-19 year-olds – is a time for many to explore their first tastes of individuality and freedom, he still encourages the staff to keep an eye on potential signs of danger. The counseling department has taken this initiative with the creation of Northview UNITED, a coalition dedicated to fighting the injustices of today and addressing the worries resulted by recent attacks targeting many groups at Northview. Another method the school focuses on alleviating not only the physical, but the mental and emotional stresses is through the efforts of social workers, such as Alicia McClung, who fills this role for both Chattahoochee and Northview High Schools.

“My job as a school social worker is to remove barriers to education so that can be whatever it is, whether, whether it's social, emotional, whether it's learning difficulties, whether it's having difficulty at home, interpersonal relationships, whether it's mediating with friends, whether it's trying to figure out what courses I should take it could be a gamut of things.”

McClung, who has been at Northview for eight years, has seen a multitude of incidents happen, from conflicts between students to imposters that seem to threaten the community. Her role in the process that starts from the moment a report comes out to communication with the parents is key in helping both families and the school.

“Typically, I may hear about an incident from an assistant principal, once they have investigated or during the investigation of a particular disciplinary action. That may have included aggression.” McClung said. “And after that assistant principal has interviewed the student and interviewed the witnesses, they typically get the parents involved, to determine what the consequences are, or either to share with the parent what the consequences are.”

Then, there will be a long conversation between the assistant principal, the student in parents, after which the assistant principal will judge if further support and some connections to community resources. McClung’s role is vital here, as the connector to talk further with the student or parent and refer them out for additional resources or support.

McClung’s role often takes over each case that is reported by either an assistant principal or the school resource officer, Brian Collins. Collins and his colleagues partner with McClung and the counseling department to address crisis and emergencies in classrooms. Communication through various methods is key in the exchange to making the case a success, either through the emergency buttons stationed in each classroom or the walkie talkies carried by Collins and several administrators.

 “Say there is a fight in the lunchroom, if there is a fight, that is a crime in progress, so I would go to that, but we’d still want our counselors to go to that, as well as our administrative staff.” Collins said. “If the fight is ongoing when we get there, we have to break up the fight, and if it’s just a one-on, another person attacking another, we obviously have to restrain that person, which would be my specialty.”

Collins, whose role also encapsulates the safety of several nearby elementary schools, relates that one of the key points of his role is connection with the Johns Creek Police Department (JCPD), with whom he has contact with individual officers in the scenario that some cases overlap.

“We do work together very well. There are often times that Officer Collins may need to rely on our resources during the course of his day, and other days we need assistance from him.” Sergeant Tyler Seymour, #069, said. “Our department maintains a great relationship with the school resource officers working inside of schools in Johns Creek.”

The school’s relationship to JCPD extends outside of the connection of individual officers, as the police department offers numerous programs and tips that encourage safety on campus. These not only include classes such as the Women & Teens Self Defense Class, Citizen’s Police Academy, and the Citizens Auxiliary Patrol, but also the creation of response units such as the Civilian Response to Active Shooter. These programs even extend to physical locations, such as the Exchange Zone, area in a local parking lot designated for exchanges that happen between parties without fear of theft/robbery and is often utilized by buyers and sellers from online purchases or custody exchanges.

The police department encourages students of all ages, races, and gender to look into these programs and follow the tips expressed here, and continues to provide sources of safety in cooperation with the school, encouraging a culture of conversation and security that is so much needed in current times.

“So we all have to speak up on behalf of each other, and when we fail to do that, that's when these [attacks] happen. So we, we try to teach our kids that message that, you know, it's bigger than just you or me, it's all of us.” Downey said.

*Mia is an alias chosen by the Messenger staff to protect the identity of an individual who has chosen to remain anonymous.