From left, Clarkston High School staff members Bob Fletcher, Emily Seward, Scott Ballard, Jessica O’Rorke and Shannon Carolin practice a “take down” technique as part of Monday’s ALICE simulation training. Photo provided

BY PHIL CUSTODIO
Clarkston News Editor
While students had the day off honoring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Monday, Clarkston teachers and staff trained with local law enforcement for a worst-case scenario, a gunman storming a school.
“We appreciate the support and partnership of the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office,” said Clarkston Community Schools Superintendent Shawn Ryan. “Our local law enforcement shares our commitment to keeping our school community safe and secure. Though this is training we hope we never have to use, it’s very empowering to know that we have trained in a real-life setting alongside true experts.”
Clarkston Community Schools staff engaged in active shooter response training facilitated by OCSO Deputies and SWAT team members, in collaboration with the district’s School Safety Task Force. The exercise was conducted at all of the district’s school campuses as part of the ALICE Training Institute’s organizational certification process.
“The Sheriff’s Office is grateful for its partnership with Clarkston Community Schools in this collaborative training to better equip their staff with the knowledge on how to better protect their students and colleagues,” said Sheriff Michael J. Bouchard. “While we hope to never witness any tragedy in our community, hope is not a strategy we can rely on. With this training, the Clarkston community is prepared for any threat to its campuses.”
The ALICE protocol – Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, and Evacuate – was designed to provide staff and students with proactive, options-based strategies to increase survivability of a potential mass-casualty incident, Ryan said.
Clarkston Community Schools began the ALICE certification process last year with all-staff training from an ALICE instructor and an online training module.
“I am proud of the efforts of our School Safety Task Force in coordinating this important training for the district,” he said. “This is a team of district administrators and building principals who were trained last summer by ALICE to help facilitate today’s exercises. They did an outstanding job making sure everything ran smoothly in our buildings today.”
All employees also received Stop the Bleed trauma training from St. Joseph Mercy Oakland last September, and all classrooms are being stocked with necessary first-aid supplies.
“Staff members received focused hands-on training on how to intervene before EMS arrives to the scene, stop blood loss, and increase the likelihood of survival for the injured,” Ryan said.
Following Monday’s simulation trainings, the district joins more than 4,200 ALICE-certified K-12 schools nationwide.
The final and ongoing step of ALICE training will be to train students, Ryan said.
“Our training will be age-appropriate and customized to each building’s layout and location,” he said. “As a parent myself, I understand how unsettling it can be to consider the circumstances that might necessitate the use of this training. Please know that our intention is not to spark fear or panic, but to best prepare and equip our school community with every tool possible to stay safe.”
The $76.6 million school bond approved by voters in 2016 included new, reinforced security entrances at Clarkston Junior High School, and Clarkston, Independence, Pine Knob, North Sashabaw, and Springfield Plains elementary schools, built in 2018. Security entrances were installed in 2017 at Andersonville and Bailey Lake elementary schools.
The renovated entrances require visitors to be “buzzed” in to the main office for sign-in before passing through to school hallways and classrooms. Buildings and parking lots have also been equipped with additional security cameras.
In order to remain ALICE-certified as an organization, all staff will need to complete the online training module on an annual basis, and those who are certified as instructors recertify every two years. For more information, go to clarkston.k12.mi.us/departments/school-safety-security.