At the November regular meeting of the Culpeper County School Board, division officials presented a detailed security update covering prevention, building and campus security, law-enforcement collaboration, communications systems and surveillance.

The update, introduced by Ms. Hoover and led in parts by Dr. O'Brien and security technician Brandon Hunt, emphasized prevention strategies that include staff training, regular drills, safety audits and threat-assessment teams that the division says it began in 2005. "We started threat assessment training in 2005 before the legislation came out in 2013," Ms. Hoover said, adding that the division shares threat-assessment information across behavior teams to coordinate interventions.

On physical security, officials described visitor-management systems that require ID scanning, badge access for staff, and digital building maps intended to aid first responders. Dr. O'Brien highlighted measures to harden glass with ballistic film and to ensure classroom doors can lock quickly: "We have added this film that makes it very difficult for [an intruder] to be able to penetrate it," he said.

Brandon Hunt, the district security technician, described credentialing for local law enforcement so responders can gain building access in emergencies without handling keys, and explained that cameras can be accessed from an Emergency Operations Center device during incidents. "We have approved access for cameras for [law enforcement] to use during drills and events," Hunt said.

Officials also described electronic monitoring and communications: about 680 cameras across facilities (with additional cameras recently installed), device-monitoring software used to flag threatening content, phones in classrooms, internal radio systems, and a mass-notification protocol that sends phone, text and email alerts in a true crisis.

Transportation safety was included in the overview: buses have interior cameras (passive, retrievable on demand), stop-arm cameras that produce citations, GPS tracking and emergency radio buttons for drivers. Officials said GPS can locate a bus within roughly 500 feet if a driver goes 'radio dark.'

Board members praised the comprehensive approach. One member said the public may not be aware of the scope of measures and thanked staff for the work. Officials told the board that many steps were funded with past security grants and division budget support and that some measures are expensive to implement across older buildings.

Next steps cited by staff included continued collaboration with the sheriff’s office and town police for exercises, ongoing camera rollout and monitoring refinements. The board did not take formal action on the security presentation itself during the meeting.