Student and staff safety is reported to be a large concern at this school and steps are taken each day to ensure well-being. Security cameras are one of the tools that the school uses to maintain a safe and fair environment. To increase student safety, administration recently installed twelve new cameras.

With a total of approximately forty cameras throughout the buildings and in the parking lot, administration is able to monitor almost everything that happens on school grounds. Cameras provide a way to look deeper into disciplinary actions and safety violations to help maintain the fairest outcomes for all situations.

“Our goal is to basically have it to where the areas of the building, not only here, but out in the exterior buildings are all covered,” district technology assistant Brenda Barger said. “Out in VoAg and Brooks, there are a lot of situations where people can get hurt and if there’s no cameras we can’t determine what exactly happened.”

The desire for more cameras has been around for a few years now, but since it can be an expensive and time-consuming activity, installing said cameras is still an ongoing process. According to Barger, an indoor camera can be anywhere from $300 to $500 and an outdoor camera costs between $500 to $1000.

Aside from the price, there also needs to be enough storage on computers to hold the video’s recordings and an adequate location on where to set up the camera. Ultimately, employees have found that the best way to install new cameras was to do it in shifts, which is a strategy they have been carrying out since 2016.

“Since the cameras record, you have to have so much storage on our servers that allow us to view things that happened,” Barger said. “The decision as far as how many to install and where to install comes from administration. How we [district technology assistants] are involved is when they ask for more cameras, we look at how much storage we have to cover the amount of cameras they want and location wise as to if we can physically do it.”

With the substantial amount of students attending school and the large buildings they are in, administration needs to be able to prevent or control any dangerous situations before they get too out of hand. With the help of cameras, they can do just that.

“We will be able to see more of what’s going on,” director of technology Brenda Thompson said. “Of course you can’t get every nook and cranny but it gives a better view of what’s happening.”