Fights, arguments, disagreements, and other conflicts occur at schools, so administration and school staff hold a lot of responsibility to help keep staff and students safe. Security professionals Chris Carr and Shay Serrano are two of six security guards at West. 

Security guards go by many names. They could go by security, patrol officers, bodyguards, or their preferred name, “security professionals.”

“The correct name for them would be campus supervisors,” Associate Principal Charlie Driscoll said. “But they call themselves security professionals.”

You might see security guards patrolling the halls during passing time or after school by the exits.

 “Keep the kids safe and the school safe,” Carr said.

Teens require attention. They need support and need to feel at ease in a place that can bring about stress. 

“I feel like we give support to the kids. We mediate, and we solve problems,” Serrano said. 

Security experience many altercations and have to handle the situations with the correct procedures. They have to know how to handle the situation without making it worse. They de-escalate situations by pulling students to the side and speaking to them. If this does not work, then other steps are necessary such as a call home, in-school suspension, out-school suspension, or if necessary, expulsion from school.

“Breaking up the fights and getting everybody to calm down and getting them back to the place they’re supposed to be is the job of a security professional,” Serrano said. 

Consistency is extremely important when it comes to dealing with high school students.

 “Why do I feel safe, because we have police and regular security guards for the school,” junior Janiya Wilson said. 

Some kids may not feel safe as other kids while they’re attending school. Some kids may feel like we need more security at our schools because of all the past altercations at other schools and around our area. Such as school shootings, fights, inappropriate behavior from teachers and/or  the students.  

 “I mean, we just got more security. We don’t really have as many fights here as we used to before we received more security so I feel like there’s enough,” Wilson said. 

Students need to feel safe and have people that care about them in an environment that they spend most of their time in. The security staff of West helps to meet this goal for many students.

“The security guards actually care enough about us to make bonds with us. They make their responsibility to actually check on us, ask us how our day was, or just converse with us in general. So yes, I feel safe at school,” Wilson said.