CHARLESTON, W.Va. (WSAZ) – When you send your child to school every day, you expect them to be safe.

On Sunday, a West Virginia legislative committee learned the state of school security across the state.

These details were provided in an annual report by the State Board of Education.

The report focuses on how many of the state’s nearly 700 schools lack key safety features, from traps to resource officers and surveillance technology.

The report also included a price tag of more than $250 million to get those safety measures in every school.

Sen. Amy Nichole Grady, R-Mason, the state education chair, said, “The amount they suggested we needed for school safety was astronomical, but we’re asking them in those reports to give us a number, so we’ll know what to work.”

Grady said at the top of her list are traps in every school building.

“That extra set of doors where you have a person standing and waiting, but they’re not necessarily in the school, but they’re in that little waiting area because it’s in the state code,” Grady said.

In last year’s report, the State Board of Education said fewer than 300 schools still needed traps. In this year’s report, that number dropped to 272.

According to the 2024 report, the number of schools with a full-time school resource officer decreased, while the number of schools with a part-time officer increased.

Grady says he thinks it comes down to schools struggling to fill the positions.

“They’re understaffed and so to think that we would have a full-time school resource officer in every school, I think that’s a very positive thought and I’d love that, but I don’t think that’s going to happen. to happen,” she said.

A new item included in the 2024 report: the number of schools requiring a secondary access road for emergency vehicles. This number, more than 175, which is about 25% of schools.

“Making sure that those access roads are available for emergency services is really important for the safety of our children, whatever the emergency. Whether it’s a medical emergency or it’s, God forbid, like a school shooting or something like that, we’ve got to make sure they can get to the students as quickly as possible,” Grady said.

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