Independent review finds security systems and plans in place but not yet unified across Revere Public Schools

Guideposts, an outside security consulting team, told the Revere Public Schools Security & Safety Committee on Aug. 13 that the district has many safety tools in place but lacks a single, districtwide security plan and full integration of its systems.

"We did not perform an audit. We were not auditing any of the schools' safety and security measures, processes, programs, resources, or tools," Michael Bairstone, senior consultant with Guideposts, said while presenting the firm’s review. The consultants described their work as a holistic review based on site visits, document review and interviews, not technical system testing.

The consultants said Revere Public Schools (RPS) operates 11 schools at eight locations and that individual schools have many security elements — door contacts, proximity readers, video systems, emergency operation plans and periodic "enhanced drills" conducted with Revere Police Department. "The district has some good security features and technologies," the presenters said, while adding the technologies are "not well integrated" and are "not consistently used." John Galina, introduced as a senior managing director at DIPOST Solutions affiliated with the presentation team, said he was presenting as a Revere native and praised staff cooperation during the review.

Why it matters: consultants told the committee that a single districtwide security plan would consolidate existing provisions and create consistent guidance for emergency operations, training, equipment use and reporting. Guideposts recommended using the federal high-quality emergency operations plan template as a district-level model and said current building-level plans do not align with that…