As schools close up for the summer, security concerns arise amidst increasing numbers of incidents on school grounds. 2020 saw a surge in cases involving school sites where their security had been compromised. Fortunately, there are measures that can be put in place quickly to strengthen security, but it’s important that schools pay more attention to it in order to avoid facing issues.
School Incident Rates Surge Over Summer Holidays
According to a Farsight Security report, there was a significant increase in the number of incidents affecting school security, likely due to a combination of the school summer holidays and the disruption caused by lockdowns.
There has been a sharp increase in cases of students congregating on school grounds, with these events often developing into anti-social behaviour, vandalism and in rarer cases, even theft and arson. Due to schools being empty for long periods of time over the holidays, opportunistic students and criminals take advantage and unfortunately often get away with it.
Incidents of Theft Are On The Rise Due To The Pandemic
As a result of the global pandemic, supplies of certain equipment and products have been limited, with laptops, computers and tablets being particularly affected. When you combine this with the increase in remote working and learning, you get a huge demand for these products that simply can’t be met.
On average, secondary schools have 431 computers onsite and primary schools have 70, making them a highly prioritised target for theft. According to D-Tech, a computer is stolen every 53 seconds in the UK at the moment, setting records at an all-time high. This unfortunately means that schools are extremely vulnerable to theft, increasing the importance of security measures, especially over the summer where nobody is onsite.
What Can You Do About It And How Can We Help?
Luckily, there’s a wide range of measures for schools that will help them to significantly strengthen the security of their grounds. The most effective of these include:
- CCTV monitoring – an affordable solution that keeps the school safe and secure, even when nobody is around. They have the ability to protect your school 24/7, and act as a great deterrent.
- Mobile patrols – having random security patrols in high-profile vehicles come by your school regularly will act as a strong deterrent, putting most opportunistic criminals and students off. They will also be able to deal with any potential incidents or student gatherings if they happen to arise.
- Key holding & alarm response – this provides a rapid response team of professionals to any alarm trip. They can deal with any incidents and leave a full report.
- Perimeter security – adding access barriers, gates, proper fencing and clear signage will make the perimeter of your grounds clearer and significantly harder to penetrate.
Aegis Support Services can help your school with any of these security measures and more, in order to help you become more secure and help protect you against anti-social behaviour and vandalism incidents, theft of computers and equipment, and any alarm trips. For more information, please get in touch with us or visit our security services section.