By Mike Hutchens, UC Schools Communications Director
Union City, Tenn.–Faculty and staff at Union City Schools partnered with the UC Police Department and other local law enforcement Friday for a special training exercise as part of a professional development day.
A simulated intruder alert drill served to educate and instruct proper reactions, protocols and procedures by Union City Schools personnel and law officials in the event of such an emergency.
Raphe Whaley, head of SROs (School Resources Officers) at Union City Schools, coordinated the training session with the cooperation of fellow UCPD officer Brandon Adams and a number of other local law enforcement agencies. Included among those departments were the Obion County Sherriff’s Office, TBI, 911, and Emergency Medical Agency. The UC Fire Department and ambulance service also participated.
“What we’ve done here today is simply a form of conditioning for our staff as well as local law enforcement,” said Whaley, who was also assisted with planning the event by Union City Schools Director of Teachers and Learning Rene Flood. “You can never be truly prepared for an active threat simply because it’s almost always a fluid event. What you can do is train to respond in a way that hopefully will quickly resolve the threat and minimize, if not eliminate, the probability of casualties.
“That’s the focus — mentally preparing teachers and officers to stop an active threat and save lives. By staging scenarios such as this today, where we have off-duty personnel simulate active shooters in a school setting as well as having student volunteers portray victims, we can hopefully have staff and officers start to realize that daily precautions can break down in the face of a real threat.”
Whaley and Adams held a short debriefing afterward to answer any and all questions and address the scenario.
UC Director of Schools Wes Kennedy stressed the importance of being prepared with the exercise.
“As always, the safety of our students, faculty, and staff is paramount,” Kennedy said. “Obviously, we hope to never be faced with such (active shooter) circumstances. But if we are, we want our personnel to be well-trained and prepared as best as they can be.
“Officer Whaley and the other members of law enforcement were very thorough and specific about what our people should do and how they should react should such a disturbance occur. These types of training exercises are critical, I believe, with what we’ve seen occur throughout our country in the last several years.
“I’m proud of our people – their attentiveness and their awareness. God bless them.”