Story by JENNA BAILEY
The Walton County School District (WCSD) is officially in the preparation and training stages of their take on the Coach Aaron Feis Guardian Program. The program is named for the late Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School [Parkland, Fla] Asst. Football Coach and security guard Aaron Feis, who was one of the 17 individuals who died in February 14, 2018 school massacre. The tragedy is often referred to as the “Parkland Shooting.” Unarmed, Feis saved multiple students by using his body to shield the children. Feis died while running towards the gunfire. Three adults and 14 students were killed.
The program would bring in armed, anonymous individuals specifically trained for the event of an active shooter on campus. Though employed by the WCSD, these staff members are not teachers. The District is not in approval, currently, of teachers carrying guns on WCSD campuses.
WCSD Superintendent Russell Hughes and School Safety Specialist Charlie Morse spoke with the Herald-Breeze on the details and current status of the program. Following the initiation of the program, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis put some things into place for school districts to take advantage of including a couple with sheriff departments.
“Of course, they wanted SRDs [Student Resource Deputies]. Our school board had already done that,” stated Hughes. “We’ve had SRDs at all schools for at least five years….We are already in place and I am so grateful to our board, our community, for having enforced that before I even became superintendent.” Another approach was the mental health aspect of the issue. “What the district has done is they’ve used money that the State has sent them to obtain mental health counselors,” said Hughes.
Hughes continued. “The first thing I did is I hired Charlie Morse who is our Safety Specialist to make sure all of our schools are safe…I’ve explored for the last year the Guardian program. Talking about more guns in schools — I am not, will not, have not been a proponent of teachers carrying guns. I am not going that far, I have no intention of that far…I am creating a program where we will have adults who their primary responsibility is to keep children safe. To include, have a gun.”
The district has received 19 applicants and made their selection out of the 19. The total number of applicants selected is confidential. “Safety and security is held very close tight for us,” stated Morse. “I can promise the public we are doing our due diligence to keep all of our kids safe everyday. We may not always share that information with you, but we are doing our due diligence. Nationally, we’re looking at national best practices and state best practices to implement every day in our school district and we can’t share all of those because if you let everybody know what you’re doing then they will know how to respond back to us and we want to keep those things to ourselves.”
The selected program staff are currently going through extensive training, extensive reviews from the Walton County Sheriff’s Office (WCSO) and are trained by the sheriff himself and WCSO staff. The guardians’ accuracy has to be 10-percent better than a normal law enforcement officer coming out of training. “Because we want to make sure that they have the skills that we need them to have,” said Hughes. “I am going to have some staff members [identities confidential] on campuses…that are licensed, trained and skilled and certified to engage any bad actor that wants to harm children. We’re excited about it.” Hughes stated that the School Board is completely on board with the program. “I actually came in and they were doing some extensive active assailant responses. That started Monday [June 10, 2019]…Our Sheriff is very proactive in making sure that we are exceeding the State and national standards,” Morse informed.
These days, many parents and expectant parents are not comfortable with the idea of placing their children in the care of a public school. Often these parents consider alternatives such as home-schooling and virtual courses. In response to these parent concerns Hughes stated, “Here’s the thing, we are in a free world. We are not going to live in fear. Shootings happen at grocery stores, shopping malls….This is so bad that it is now happening in churches. Here is another fact, there are six deaths in homes every day. It’s amplified when it happens at school. No one expects it there. The reality is it is happening in homes everyday, these kinds of violent deaths. We can’t get used to it. We’re not going to be fearful about it. It is a reality they [the parent] have to deal with. We’re doing all we can with Charlie Morse and the guardians and the SRDs to give the assurance and the necessary confrontation needed.”