Fall 2008

Welcome back to school!  We are very excited to see all of the bright smiling faces back in our halls and classrooms. 

At Southside School, student safety is a top priority and we will be working this year with local and state emergency agencies to enact new regulations regarding emergency response and school safety. 

Throughout the year we will be conducting our usual emergency drills, with the addition of a “Shelter in Place” drill and several drills in coordination with our local Sheriff’s Office and Fire District.  Working together, we will do our best to make certain that our students are prepared in the unlikely event of an emergency.

This fall we are also taking part in the State wide initiative to digitally map all public school facilities.  This data will be used at the local and state level to identify any areas for improvement with school safety.

Additionally, we have identified some federal grant money that we have used to purchase a campus video surveillance system.  By the end of September, all exterior areas of the campus, and all interior hallways will be under video surveillance.  This will serve several useful purposes.  It will enable us to have a video record of which vehicle picks up which child from school each day.  It will provide security to our campus and parking lot in the evenings and on weekends.   It will also serve to protect our community’s investment in our school by helping to reduce vandalism.  This new system also has secure remote viewing so that our local law enforcement officers can see what is going on inside, prior to entering the building in the highly unlikely event that we go into a lockdown situation.

Schools all across our state and our nation are taking these steps to ensure that your children have the safest possible learning environment.  Southside School is proud to be onboard with these efforts.

Sincerely,

Tim Garchow
Principal/Superintendent

161 SE Collier Road ‚ Shelton, WA 98584 | phone (360) 426-8437 Fax (360) 426-9970
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