Theme: ‘Today’s learners—tomorrow’s leaders’
By Loreen Berlin
Summer vacation has come and gone for students in many local school districts.
As of Tuesday, August 6, Anaheim’s Savanna School District students are back in the classroom.
To celebrate the earlier return of teachers to their classrooms to prepare for students, the district hosted its annual Pancake Breakfast Friday, August 2 at Hansen Elementary School. Included at the breakfast also were school support staff members.
“We had both teachers and support staff at the breakfast,” said Savanna School District Superintendent Dr. Sue Johnson. “We rely on these people for a myriad of jobs throughout the year and they do an outstanding job day in and day out, to support our students, teachers and parents.”
Preparing, cooking and serving the breakfast of pancakes, sausages, orange juice, milk and coffee was the loyal Buena Park Noon Lions Club, headed up by Pancake Chairpersons Jeff and Kari Schlagheck.
“Welcome back Savanna,” said Dr. Johnson, to an auditorium full of teachers, and then she gave nod to the Buena Park Noon Lions Club for the breakfast, which was acknowledged with a thunderous round of applause by the teachers. “The Lions arrived before daylight to prepare the grills and pancake batter.”
School Board member Chris Brown said all of the district’s schools now have new technology through bonds, which were overwhelmingly passed by the community. Upgrades to modernize and make the elementary schools safer began in 2008 and was completed in 2014.
Savanna School District is a K-6 district of four elementary schools that have all been updated for safety and security. Jim Harris, director of Maintenance Operations and Transportation, explained how the district is now linked to first responders through a virtual tool, noting that all of the school changes and upgrades will help students, teachers and staff stay safe throughout the school year. Also, the virtual tool allows teachers and staff to communicate with parents if there is a need for reunification of students and parents.
The virtual tool helps first responders have access to the school’s cameras in an emergency so they can understand where exactly the emergency is located by the alphabet letters on building tops and larger numbers on buildings.
“We added signage on the roofs with letters and large numbers on the sides of the buildings to help first responders; our school buses have numbers on the top so that on the road, they can collaborate with fire authority or police if need be,” Harris explained.
Harris stressed that the Savanna School District is a collaboration where everyone works together and everyone is valued and listened to.
All campuses are now “closed campuses,” with single-entry to each school, where ID must be swiped for entry. This is a direct effect of Megan’s Law, according to Brown.
The point of entry is controlled by magnetic locks and there is a completely automated fire alarm system at each campus.
Physical safety and security includes fencing around each of the schools and includes higher fencing with a tighter weave. Additionally there is exterior lighting, which has been upgraded, along with doors and door-hardware and metal doors and frames that have been installed. The doors are called “Columbine-type doors,” which have locks on all of the doors that allow teachers and staff to secure their doors from inside the classrooms so they don’t have to step outside of the classroom where they might be in harm’s way.
“Cameras have been installed throughout the campus; there are 50 cameras at each campus site, which allows vision of activity after hours,” said Harris. “We installed bullet-proof clear film on all front doors at all of our entry points.”
