Pubdate: Tue, 11 Nov 2003 Source: Post and Courier, The (Charleston, SC) Copyright: 2003 Evening Post Publishing Co. Contact: http://www.charleston.net/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/567 Author: Donna C. Williams UNITE FOR SAFETY As a parent and former educator, I found the raid at Stratford High School both appalling and shameful. The idea that this is to "deter" drugs is ludicrous; the dog search and the school's ability to do random locker searches would do that sufficiently. However, drawn guns pointed at our students and handcuffing students crosses the line and possibly violates civil liberties. Having been an active teacher who has witnessed these dog/drug searches in a school, I can't begin to imagine how this latest incident occurred. When a drug search of this nature takes place, the school goes into a "lockdown" mode where no one goes anywhere. These searches can take two hours or more and are, by the very nature of how they take place, fearful. Fearful (not because you are guilty of anything) because you surmise that a drug search is ongoing, yet, you have no actual knowledge of this until the dogs and police arrive at your classroom door and have everyone exit. Until your room is searched, students/teachers have absolutely no way of knowing what is actually transpiring. After incidents such as Columbine High School and Sept. 11, we live with the realization that terrible things can happen. So, at best students are only somewhat traumatized by these events. Never, in any of the random searches that I witnessed, did I have occasion to see a weapon drawn much less pointed directly at a child by a police officer. I can only imagine how traumatized the students who were in the firing range of these weapons must be. Knowing the nature of children and how they sometimes panic in fearful situations, we can only be thankful that nothing worse took place in this raid. This begs the question; do we want to traumatize good students in an effort to get the few bad? If the school was under surveillance for four days (as reported), shouldn't the suspected wrongdoers' lockers/ school bags simply have been searched? It is time for the citizens of Goose Creek to stand up and hold the school district accountable. Please unite for the safety of our children and contact your school board and the district office and insist that safeguards be put in place to prevent this type of action from ever again occurring in our schools. Good students should not have to fear looking down the barrel of a weapon from police officers in school. DONNA C. WILLIAMS 142 Londonderry Road Goose Creek - --- MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman