The Future of Lockdowns at Riverdale
On October 16, at 1:50 pm, an alarm sounded throughout the Upper School campus notifying students and faculty that a real campus-wide lockdown was taking place. The speakers blared “This is not a drill” repeatedly and told Riverdale the police were going to open their doors. Feelings of anxiety, confusion, and fear flowed through the Riverdale community as teachers locked doors, pulled blinds, and gathered students. Very few members of the community were aware that this lockdown event alarm was unintentional, and most treated it as if it was a real lockdown.
The lockdown was an accident. For the safety of the community, RUVNA has a “panic” button that teachers can easily activate in case of a real emergency. After checking people in during the fire drill, one member of the Riverdale faculty pressed the button, alerting the community of a lockdown. In a panic, they closed the lockdown event on RUVNA, hoping it would stop the panic signal. However, this stopped all communication that could normally occur between faculty and administration because teachers communicate on RUVNA during drills and emergencies. Because the event was formally closed, no one could communicate directly through RUVNA to determine what was happening. This caused additional confusion among faculty, as RUVNA indicated there was no longer an ongoing lockdown even though teachers were locked down.
Many students were deeply affected by the lockdown. Senior Laura Dougé shared her experience, communicating that she and her class had to lock down by themselves because their teacher left the classroom to print copies. She explains: “We were honestly completely blind in this situation, which made it a lot scarier… A student came by and they were knocking on the door trying to get in, and we couldn’t let them in. It was a very heartbreaking moment to see the fear on his face, knowing that he wasn’t going to get in.” Many students agreed that the student body—and possibly the faculty—were unprepared to handle the situation.
Although the lockdown was a difficult event for almost every community member, there were some aspects that students and faculty identified went well during the event. There is a general consensus that everyone took the lockdown seriously. Specifically, Head of Upper School Mr. Mike Velez states that the Riverdale community “did what they were supposed to do in terms of moving into secure spaces, locking doors, and pulling shades. So on a lot of levels, those protocols that were in place work really well.”
On the contrary, there were also features of the lockdown event that undoubtedly need improvement, particularly with how it ended. Dougé recalls her experience at the end of the lockdown, calling it very insensitive: “They started knocking on the door like they were going to break it down… No one knew that the person on the other side [of the door] had a key or that the lockdown was lifted in any way shape or form…you don’t know if [they are] a shooter or the janitor.” Director of Security Mr. Michael McGinn notes that there was a disconnect in “communicating to the community that it was accidental, even though they’ve already heard it was real” on the speakers. Overall, communication–both notifying people the alarm was unintentional and ending the event–needed serious improvement.
Furthermore, Dougé pointed out that the new Heads Up Phone Policy troubled her during the lockdown. She continued, “It really irritated me because you can’t contact your family in times of need. You can’t contact them at all. I think that made people question the validity of that rule and question whether the [Upper School] faculty has the students’ best needs in mind.” The Head Up Phone Policy continues to be analyzed and updated to take into account certain unforeseen situations.
Using the information of what succeeded and what needed improvement, the administration and security have since worked closely together to implement changes to the current lockdown system. Mr. McGinn explained how he’s “retrained all the maintenance and all the public safety staff, [and some other facility staff like the grounds people] on [how to end a lockdown].” The training included standardizing the procedure for opening doors in drills and real lockdowns. To end a lockdown staff members are supposed to first, “announce [themselves] coming into the room,” then, “announce [themselves] again, [turn] on the lights… mak[e] sure everybody is okay, and” finally, “giv[e] instructions” on what to do next. Additionally, since some classrooms were not unlocked and alerted that the lockdown was over, Mr. Velez added that staff in charge of opening doors will have a “list of every room, whether it’s a classroom, a closet, an office, bathrooms, locker rooms, and they’ll check all of it.” Keeping in tandem with a real lockdown, this will be the procedure for most, if not all future lockdown drills.
Another change the administration implemented is updating the communication procedures for handling unintentional alarms. According to Mr. McGinn, a communication plan has been enacted for unintentional alarm activations where immediate communication will occur via email, text, and the speaker system so everyone is aware of the situation—whether it’s real or accidental—and people won’t have to be on their phones to find out. Additionally, security and the administration will “provide more updates so that [community members] are kept abreast of what’s going on.”
Finally, to rebuild the trust of the student and faculty body after this unfortunate event, students and faculty will participate in lockdown training sessions led by Mr. McGinn. Mr. McGinn states that the training sessions for students will go over the foundations of what to do in a lockdown, but it will also go deeper by addressing and giving advice on what to do in more specific situations. These situations can range from what to do if you’re by yourself to what to do if you’re outside. Likewise, for faculty, the training sessions will go over how to manage a classroom in terms of barricading doors and other steps they can take to ensure safety.
Ultimately, the lockdown event was an eye-opening event for almost every member of the Riverdale community. It helped bring to the surface underlying issues of communication and safety that were unaddressed before the event. Though the event was a frightening and disturbing experience for many members of the community, it highlighted how the school can improve its preparedness for future lockdown procedures.