Parents are beginning to focus on violence prevention rather than COVID-19 safety when it comes to their children’s schools.
New figures from research commissioned by Ballistiglass suggest parents have strong views on how schools should best protect their children:
- Parents across all school levels are more worried about COVID-19 prevention (45%) than violence prevention (40%)
- However, 51% believe it’s the time for schools to start focusing on violence prevention over COVID-19 (55% for primary school parents)
- Lockable classroom doors are the most common safety feature (66%), but parents want bulletproof protection and low profile metal detectors
The research of 400 parents with children of school age has found that there is one overwhelming desire: for schools to do more.
COVID-19 Safety In Schools
COVID-19 remains the largest concern amongst parents, with 45% putting it down as their key concern. However, physical security is very close behind, with 40% marking it down as a source of worry. Not many parents are concerned about IT security (14%).
Most parents consider safety precautions like frequent disinfecting of surfaces (59%) and having a hand washing regimen in place (89%) to be ‘very important’ or ‘important’. Parents are much more divided on the use of temperature scanning devices for the purposes of COVID prevention, with 40% being in favor of those, and 37% not considering them important.
However, 42% of parents report their kids’ schools already have temperature scanners in place, with a further 17% wishing their schools did have it in place.
Next Steps For Schools
Parents are almost equally split on what they think schools’ next steps should be. At a small majority, 51% believe that educational institutions should start the process on focusing more on violence prevention rather than COVID-19 prevention – 49% don’t think it’s the time for this yet.
While the split of opinion on this is almost identical amongst parents of most age groups, one does stand out; more primary school parents believe it is the time to focus on violence prevention than any other group (55%). This may be due to children of very young age being unlikely to become seriously ill with COVID-19 yet requiring more protection in terms of being sheltered from weapon violence.
Ballistiglass’ VP of Growth and Strategy, Steve Steinman, said, “As research on kids and COVID-19 emerges and we are starting to see an uptick in violent incidents around the country, I’m not surprised by the return of the focus on making schools harder targets.”
Weapon Violence Prevention In Schools
The safety feature reported by parents most often as present at their schools are lockable classroom doors (66%), the presence of security guards (32%), bulletproof school doors and windows (7%) and bulletproof classroom doors (5%).
Coincidentally, bulletproof school doors and windows and bulletproof classroom doors are also the safety features parents want to see the most in schools, with 55% more parents wanting bulletproof protection than lockable classroom doors.
Metal Detectors In Schools
When it comes to stopping weapons being brought into schools in the first place (through metal detectors), the three key features of those according to parents are:
- Creating a welcoming atmosphere – 52%
- Accuracy – 47.8%
- Traffic efficiency – 40%
It is, therefore, not a surprise that out of the parents who wish their school had a metal detector (and worth noting is that there is only 34% of parents who are not in favour of using metal detectors at schools), 56% more wish for low profile metal detector over a gate-style metal detector.
As COVID-19 restrictions ease, Ballistiglass is well equipped to help schools handle the safety of children, with security solutions encompassing low profile metal detectors, bulletproof glass, and temperature scanning devices.