Bill Haines, a former military and law enforcement officer, now uses his expertise at ASSET, which stands for Advanced Security Services Evaluation and Training. As their title suggests, they offer clients in depth security solutions by assessing their needs and developing security programs.
“Where were those gaps that were maybe taken advantage of to expose risk that we can try to fix,” Haines said.
Some of their clients are school districts in Tennessee. Haines said it's imperative for districts to work on integrating school staff with school resource officers, but that doesn't necessarily mean putting more firearms inside schools.
“It can’t just be x,y,z; run, hide, fight; or arm teachers. It's integrating all those things, and you can only do that by validating it with people who really understand how to look at it from the bad guy perspective and see those voids and figure out ways to fix them,” said Haines.
There's no easy answer, and the services ASSET provides takes time but Haines believes there are school districts moving in the right direction. He encourages all school leaders to consider this: where there's a lack of attention given, that can become a target of opportunity.
