CHESAPEAKE, Va. — Tuesday marked the first day of school for many Chesapeake students, but the children weren't the only ones experiencing first-day jitters.
Parents across the district expressed heightened concerns about school safety following recent tragic events. Chesapeake Public Schools says that before the tragic event unfolded, they had already implemented several new security measures for the school year.
Mina Nolen, whose two children attend Western Branch Primary, said she felt emotional as she prepared to send her kids back to school.
"Very emotional, cried a lot just thinking about the events that happened recently, and was I actually ready for this?" Nolen said.
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Nolen was referring to the recent tragedy in Minnesota, where a gunman shot and killed two students at a Catholic school and injured several others. The incident weighed heavily on her mind and likely affected many other parents sending their children to class.
"Every parent felt something. I have chills thinking about it. We all feel it in our core, so we just want to hold our babies tight, and we want to make sure they are safe, and that is our number one priority," Nolen said.
Leaders with Chesapeake Public Schools say safety remains their top priority.
"If students don't feel safe, they aren't learning," said Dr. Penny Schultz, assistant director of school safety and security for Chesapeake Schools.
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Schultz said the district has made changes to school safety protocols and procedures. The district recently conducted a full-scale exercise focused on school reunification procedures.
"We made sure our teams were fully prepared should we have to enact our reunification team, and we can get our students and parents reunited as quickly and safely as possible," Schultz said.
The school division is also nearly finished implementing police Knox Boxes, which would give law enforcement easier access inside schools.
"Which will also afford quick entry and response for our police officers and our first responder partners," Schultz said.
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As previously reported, the school division has partnered with the sheriff's department to increase coverage across the district. High schools currently have weapons detection systems in place.
"We are going to expand them across our middle schools this year to conduct random weapons detection. I believe we spoke in previous years where we piloted it across all grade levels," Schultz said.
The school division has also created an emergency response platform that can be used on mobile devices.
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"So everybody in our building can activate a critical alert that will sound across the whole school. It's similar to an Amber Alert. A foghorn alert goes across to all teachers. It goes to their mobile devices," Schultz said.
Nolen said the safety measures helped put her mind more at ease.
"We felt so at ease with the security. We had a police officer on site, and just seeing the level of how things were handled were just fantastic," Nolen said. "The reality is that we need to put our faith in God and trust that everything is going to be OK."
