Concerns of students, parents to be addressed following security alert at Regina schools

Muffled automated calls that mispronounce “Regina” put out by the Regina Public School Board are one of the areas getting criticism from some people in the wake of a security alert at all schools in the city Wednesday.     

Some parents say they received no automated call at all. Others, even some with no children in school, say they received as many as five calls.  

Terry Lazarou with the Regina Public School Board says he thinks the automated alert system may have been overloaded.

“That’s not great.” Lazarou admitted. “And we apologize for any inconvenience that parents had.”
 
The security alert went into effect after Regina police received an anonymous call at 11:41 a.m. Wednesday in which a male said only that “I’m calling to report a murder at some school”.

Police contacted both Regina school boards which then issued the security alerts to all schools.

The security alert procedures have also raised some concerns. In some cases, even within the same school, some teachers instituted a lockdown procedure by turning off the lights and keeping all students in one area of the classroom. Other teachers followed the normal security procedure, carrying on classes while school doors were locked and severely restricted anyone trying to go in or out.

Lazarou says it comes down to communication. However, he says those teachers still did the right thing.

“Without having complete information, they erred on the side of safety for all the students.”

Lazarou says there will be full meetings in the next weeks to completely go over the security plan to determine what went right and what did not.

He also says any students who are feeling stressed by what happened should talk to their teachers, and if more counselling is required, parents should contact the school and that will be arranged.