Soft Targets:Target Analysis

School Characteristics and Vulnerabilities As with all other possible civilian targets that are categorized as being “soft”, the main vulnerability of a school is that there are no military defenses or personnel on site to defend against possible attacks. Since the amount of access differs between different types of schools (e.g. Universities versus K-12 grade schools, public versus private) we decided to focus our analysis towards public high schools, performing a case study on Chula Vista High School, part of the Sweetwater Union High School District in San Diego County. The decision to evaluate the current policies dealing with an attack on an American public high school is due to relevant historical attacks (both domestic and international), the public’s natural sympathy towards attacks towards children, and (any other reasons??) Chula Vista High School is located in the city of Chula Vista, situated south of the City of San Diego in a community that stretches from the Pacific Ocean to the foothills and six miles to the international border. Chula Vista High School’s 2,500 students are composed of Hispanic (68%), White (13%), African American (6%), Filipino (4%), Asian (1%), Pacific Islander (1%) and American Indian (1%) 9th to 12th grade students. It is also served by a certificated staff of 110 teachers, 7 counselors, 5 administrators, and a classified staff of 31 employees. Public high schools in America have many characteristic making it susceptible to an attack. When looking at Chula Vista High School, the first think you notice is how open the campus is. Any intruder can easily walk on to campus and into any of the classrooms or administrative buildings. This is the first major vulnerability to an attack on the school. The National School Safety and Security Services recommend “providing special attention to perimeter security and access control issues.” Having a clearly defined perimeter and a staff that is trained to identify and monitor suspicious individuals would be a clear first step. Also, the classrooms are all closely spaced together creating a dense population target ideal for a high casualty attack. The “General Lock-Down Procedures” of Chula Vista High School, and all schools in the SUHSD, state for teachers to keep students in the room and to sit or lay on the floor. The school, as with almost all other public schools in the US, is also without any armed security guards. There are two staff members who are responsible for detecting intruders and act as peacekeepers on campus. However, their role is to deal with possible violence between students, and are not trained nor equipped for handling a situation like the ones that occurred at Columbine or Beslan, Russia. A teacher’s responsibility only extends to shutting and locking the classroom door, blocking any windows or glass doors and placing a green or red placard under the door to notify whether there is an intruder or not in the room. The only communication to these teachers are through a “crises email Broadcast” account” where messages and updates are posted.

Another vulnerability the school faces is its close geographic location to the border of Mexico. Being only a few miles north of the US-Mexican border brings up issues of possible terrorist attacks by possibly smuggling chemical or biological weapons across the border. If thousands of illegal immigriants cross into the United States every year undetected, can we stop terrorist from doing the same? The existence of a number of US military bases (the Marine Base at Miramar and Naval base at Camp Pendleton) just a few miles up the coastline also pose an interesting threat. (police chase of man who stole military tank for the national guard) http://www1.policejobs.com/photos.php

Along with the structural vulnerabilities to a public high school such as Chula Vista are training deficiencies. When talking to Richard Mutka, a 9th grade Social Science teacher at CVHS, he said the only training he received regarding what to do in case of an attack on school grounds was given to him in the form of one hand out (see Appendix A) basically saying to just keep his students in the classroom, lock the door, and wait. The topic of a terrorist attack on the school such as the one that occurred in Beslan, Russia where over 350 people were killed (including 156 children), was never mentioned nor are there any plans in the future for training to detect and defend against such an attack. This “Ostrich-Syndrome” approach to the problem or not addressing the issues at hand will only create Columbine like tragedies.