Many years back I was head of security and safety for a large for-profit education management company. We managed Charter schools and Partnership schools throughout the country. I once had occasion to visit a school in Baltimore because it had experienced a burglary over the weekend. I visited the school a week later. When I walked around with the school’s Operations Manager I asked her why all the surveillance cameras were pointed toward the ceiling? She said, “The Burglars did that when they were here.” So, I said, “wasn’t that 7 days ago?” Sadly, nobody in charge at the school took the initiative to re-aligned the cameras. They just left them like they found them and nobody in the school had a problem with that.
Here’s a little test you can try on your security staff the next time you have a chance to observe them. A good opportunity would be in a classroom setting during training. Take a fire extinguisher off the rack on the wall and place it on its side on the floor. See who goes over to examine it or puts it back on the wall. Or lay a trash basket on its side and see who places it back up. There are many small things you can do to that room and its fixtures that would require someone to be proactive and fix it with very little effort. See who does it. Then, recognize them for it.