School Safety and Security Course for International Schools

Overview

School safety and security is a vital issue for all schools. Ensuring that the school is a safe, secure, clean, healthy, and orderly place that nurtures learning, trust, caring, professionalism, continuous improvement and high expectations is the final goal. In an international school setting there are many unique issues that must be considered when establishing or updating the requirements for safety and security. 

Purpose

This course is primarily designed to assist the professional staff employed at international schools abroad in complying with their mandatory professional development requirements. It is also designed to help practicing or in-service educators and staff enhance their professional knowledge, skills and effectiveness. A small portion of the course can be geared to educating students and parents on selected safety issues if the client school so desires. The course provides the attendee with a basic understanding of safety and security issues.

Objectives

• Understand the purpose of safety and the need for periodic physical security assessment in an international school setting
• How to construct a safety and physical security checklist. What are the important elements?
• Understand the importance of a drug policy: the role of school administrators, counselors, parents and students
• Understand how to deal effectively with drug addiction and the distribution of drugs in an international school setting: two perspectives; health and law enforcement
• Understand the legal ramifications for the school, school officials, students and parents if drugs are discovered on the premises or in the possession of students
• Understand the basic identification process of illegal drugs which may be encountered in an international school setting
• Understand the necessity of proper pre- and post-employment background investigations for staff
• Understand the basic profile of a child molester or a sexual predator as applied to an international school setting
• How to establish an effective kidnapping response plan in an international school setting
• Understand the importance of an adequate health and quality control policy in all food outlets located on the school premises
• How to establish measures designed to ensure that dormitory students have a safe and wholesome environment
• Understand the need for safeguards designed to protect students and staff against hazards such as accidents, fire, weather-related events, and natural disasters
• Understand the nature of bullying and how to establish effective measures to deal with this type of unacceptable conduct