Metal detectors now being used at after school activities

by Ava C.

Students, teachers and parents have mixed reactions to the new metal detectors at the after school activities at AHS, a new safety initiative since the beginning of the school year. These metal detectors at after school activities are for preventing gun violence at after school activities.

This is the first time, Airport has done anything like this. Even though it brought in a lot of shock for not doing it previous years it's been dying down. It has been going around that parents made them feel safe dropping their kids off now at the football games.

The district started implementing this for multiple reasons. One being a lot of parents last year were bringing weapons to school and the school doing nothing about it. Another reason for doing this is because last year during the 22-23 school year there were a lot of school bombs and shooting threats made.

One student, Rita, said ,“It’s more of a double check to make sure no one has anything other than what the rules already set.” Rita is a freshman who has friends who have been going to the games and telling her what’s been going on.

Hailiegh, another student, said, “It’s kind of unfair how our school is talking more precision than the other schools.”

Hailieghis a senior who just moved here and has heard a lot of her friends say how its been stupid for us to have them and not other schools.

A third student, Allison, said, “The metal detector policy doesn’t affect us as band kids.” Allison is a band kid who is a sophomore and she sees everyone walk through the metal detectors at every game.

People are having mixed emotions about the metal detectors because it puts a thought in people’s head about something happening. On the other hand people are happy about it because it makes it feel more safe.

According to one article found via Google, in 2019 metal detectors at school entrances has gone up by only 3.2% in last 18 years, suggesting that they are not looked at as super necessary in recent years. According to some, metal detectors can give students, staff and parents a sense of false fear by making them think gun violence is more prevalent than it really is.The lack of evidence that metal detectors increase or decrease school violence, is really unbeneficial for the fact of “safety” in school systems.

Metal detectors do seem like an easy solution for a big problem. David Riedman, the founder of the K-12 School Shooting database, says it’s actually not a cure for all. “For someone that’s committing a deliberate attack against a school that metal detector isn’t going to stop them,” says Riedman.

For more info on Riedman's perspective towards metal detectors, you can read the article here.