KINGSVILLE, Texas — Kingsville ISD held a school safety parent meeting Thursday night at King High School.
Dozens of parents, community members, and school staff were in attendance to hear the district's plans to improve security on campuses in the wake of the Uvalde school shooting massacre.
The mother of two KISD graduates and a current employee at King High School left the meeting pleased.
“I'm very happy with what I’ve heard today," Charlene Pena said. "I look forward to what’s coming in the future."
Future plans for the district include hiring at least two more people with extensive law enforcement experience to join the new School Safety Team.
It has five newly hired members right now, and earlier this week they went to all of the schools in the district for safety audits.
They say they now know where the weak spots are and how to fix them.
“We definitely have areas of concern that we need to address," Assistant Superintendent of Support Programs Dr. Juan Sandoval said. "We as a team are going around to assess different areas. We’ve put our list together of things we’re going to address, and we’re working on that list already.”
Superintendent Dr. Cecilia "Cissy" Reynolds-Perez hosted the meeting.
She says something else the district will do to promote safety is working towards having even better relationships with students.
The thinking is, that if a threat popped up on social media — like in Uvalde — a student might feel more comfortable reporting it.
“Unfortunately, we’ve had to learn some lessons from (Uvalde), and we have," Reynold-Perez said. "And we want to present things about where are we now, where have we been, and where are we heading."
The school district heading towards a seven-member — or even larger — School Safety Team in the future sits well with Pena.
She says the district's School Resource Officers are good, but it doesn't hurt to have more armed personnel to protect students.
"We have our SROs, and we’re very grateful to have them here," Pena said. "But having those extra guys here on our campus is going to help us a lot."
Those who weren't able to attend can watch the meeting on the KISD YouTube page.
