Posted on 10/07/2004 10:14:24 AM PDT by crushelits
WASHINGTON - The Education Department has advised school leaders nationwide to watch for people spying on their buildings or buses to help detect any possibility of terrorism like the deadly school siege in Russia.
The warning follows an analysis by the FBI (news - web sites) and the Homeland Security Department of the siege that killed nearly 340 people, many of them students, in the city of Beslan last month.
"The horror of this attack may have created significant anxiety in our own country among parents, students, faculty staff and other community members," Deputy Education Secretary Eugene Hickok said in a letter to schools and education groups.
The safety advice is based on lessons learned from the Russia incident. But there is "no specific information indicating that there is a terrorist threat to any schools or universities in the United States," Hickok said.
Federal law enforcement officials also have encouraged local police to stay in contact with school officials and have encouraged reporting of suspicious activities, the letter says.
In particular, schools were told to watch for activities that may be legitimate on their own — but may suggest a heightened terrorist threat if many of them occur.
Among those activities:
_ Interest in obtaining site plans for schools, bus routes and attendance lists;
_ Prolonged "static surveillance" by people disguised as panhandlers, shoe shiners, newspaper or flower vendors or street sweepers not previously seen in the area;
_ Observations of security drills;
_ People staring at or quickly looking away from employees or vehicles as they enter or leave parking areas;
_ Foot surveillance of campuses involving individuals working together.
The effort is the latest by the Education Department and other federal agencies to encourage school officials to maintain and practice a plan for responding to emergencies.
After the terrorist takeover of the Russian school, President Bush (news - web sites) asked his top advisers to review their strategies for dealing with hostage situations, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge has said.
The federal government is advising schools to take many steps to improve the security of their buildings. Those include installing locks for all doors and windows, having a single entry point into buildings and ensuring they can reach school bus drivers in an emergency.
The Education Department sent its letter by e-mail Wednesday to school police, state school officers, school boards, groups representing principals and many other organizations.
The Homeland Security Department also sent a bulletin Wednesday to federal, state and local emergency officials to provide fresh guidance based on the review of the school siege in Russia.
Oh - the warning. Gotcha. Sorry.
Our polls are in schools, also.
Thanks for the ping Gran. :)
That crap happens over here and it will Muslim Season in Texas....No limit..Stuffed and mounted at no expense.
Yeah, before we can do any of these things, we need the world to know and understand and approve that this is okay and in no way infringing on the rights of people that are not citizens of the US.
CNS NEWS.com: TERROR ATTACK ON RUSSIAN SCHOOL SEEN AS 'REMINDER' FOR AMERICANS" by Susan Jones (ARTICLE SNIPPET: "The attack on a Russian school should remind Americans that the world is engaged in a campaign that pits barbarism against civilization, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said on Wednesday.") (September 1, 2004) (Read More...)
CNS NEWS.com: "TERRORIST 'PROBING ATTACKS' SAID TO BE HAPPENING NATIONWIDE" by Scott Wheeler and Heather Wier (ARTICLE SNIPPET: "Another videotaping incident involved a Jewish girls' school near Baltimore, Md., last October. The Baltimore Jewish Times reported that outside the Bais Yaakov School for Girls, "a man described as Middle Eastern in physical appearance was observed videotaping the school. "A parent chased the man's car, wrote down the license plate and informed the FBI, whose agents later questioned the man," the newspaper reported. The man was not on any terrorist watch lists and no arrests were made in connection with that incident.") (August 9, 2004) (Read More...)
"U.S. Alerts Schools About Terror Threat"bump!
Ok, thought i was one of them??:) what i mean , i think a hit on anywhere USA, a school, a mall, a movie theater would have a bigger mental effect with more people then the twin towers 9/11 as far as being terrorized..
Polling places in schools. Here also.
Scared myself this time too.
The majority of polling places here are in schools, churches, libraries, fire departments and VFW halls.
I thought F'ing Kerry told us terrorism wasn't a threat.
Where my mom works (an elementary school), they have locked all the doors, and only buzz in people who the admins know or who can prove they are parents/guardians of a child enrolled in the school.
They did this over the past summer, so it is fairly new.
We home school and the primary teacher, Mrs SLB, is a fairly decent shot as are all of the past and current students.
| Hell to the UN! Hey Mr. Annan what exactly is your job there? Your people are being chased away and killed by the same people who took Egypt - show some responsibility for Mother Africa and her children who started it all. I prefer all the UN dead weights die who sports luxury than those poor Africans who never seen a single day of joy from birth to death. Jesus Christ , Muhammad and Saint Mary were Black? Islamism, worse than communism!
|
This is a start. Though more needs to be done to make the students aware of their surroundings.
In an earlier thread, it was stated the Israelis once had this problem back in the '80s with Palestinian terrorists attacking their schools and killing schoolchildren. They solved it by arming teachers and having armed volunteer parents and grandparents patrol the school and school grounds of their public schools. Ever since, there have been no attacks on Israeli public schools. The terrorists headed to softer targets.
Note, they didn't put a few more uniformed police in the hallways or beef up their SWAT Teams (who will show up well after the fact).
We won't even consider that in today's political climate. We are going to have to lose thousands of school children in a massive, coordinated attack before our socialist pantywaists educrats would be forced into such measures by parental lynch mobs. So, until then, they will hide their coiffured heads under their pillows and pretend there is "no problem" - just because they wish it that way and have the power to poo-poo it,... just like in this article from San Diego.
Political Correctness reigns in the USA and will until something much more terrible than 9/11 happens. Incredible. Our betters would rather have dead kids in our schools than armed citizens preventing it!
I read that the vaccine may have been contaminated. Chiron had a previous episode where a vaccine was contaminated with mad cow.
Thank God im not calling the shots.
May I be added to the Threat Matrix ping list?
Yeah, I misunderstood your post at first. Oh I agree - Israel-style terrorism would have everyone in a panic. I'm really surprised it hasn't happened here.
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