When asked how they would respond to the event of a violent intruder entering the building many students are at a loss in regards to proper procedure.

“I don’t know…Hide?” said sophomore Ryne Fletcher.

Luckily for students such as Fletcher, a new safety program called ALICE will be implemented soon, according to school resource office Thomas Wooten.  ALICE is an acronym for alert, lock-down, inform, counter, evacuate.  The program emphasizes education and aims to ensure all school inhabitants know how to react if an emergency situation threatens the school.

“We need plans in place to counter attack acts of violence.  This program would allow us to think about it and train,” said Officer Wooten.

The program has a more thorough approach to safety compared to current procedures as it assigns different roles to individuals.  The program also introduces defense methods such as disarming to students and teaches them which methods to use in specific situations. 

The program involves training in order to assure that every student knows how to behave in response to an emergency, according to Officer Wooten, as we act to the level of our training.

“ I want to retrain and rethink how we can react to an emergency crisis such as a violent intruder,” said Officer Wooten.

ALICE is currently in the planning phase in order to make it the status quo of Springdale Schools. Officer Wooten, as well as other members of the Springdale Police Department, are working to determine how and when the program can be incorporated.