Pinellas Schools Begin Weapons Detection Pilot at Two High Schools

Pinellas County Schools started a weapons detection pilot at Palm Harbor University High School and Gibbs High School on Tuesday. Sensors and artificial intelligence scan students as they walk onto campus.

The district chose both schools because of their size and the number of entry points. Officials paid for the pilot using district funds.

"These systems are very much what you've probably seen in some of the larger events within the Tampa Bay area," said Sean Jowell, director of safety and security for Pinellas County Schools, according to FOX 13 News. "Disney employs some of these things. Very similar to the retail, big box stores."

Students pass through the detector at their usual speed. The technology searches for weapons. No touching required.

"It is a scan. It's not intrusive whatsoever," Jowell said. "If something does alert to it, if it's a bag, we're just going to do a bag check like we normally do, and we're allowed to do bag checks on our campuses."

To keep lines flowing, students must hand over four items to staff members before passing through. The district created an acronym, BLUE, so students can recall what to hand over: binders, laptops, umbrellas, and eyeglass cases. Cell phones stay in pockets. So do keys, coins, jackets, belts, wallets, watches, and jewelry.

Before launching the pilot, officials spoke with school leaders in Manatee and Sarasota counties, where similar technology already operates.

Last year, police arrested a 10th-grader for bringing a stolen gun to Gibbs High School. That incident revealed continuing worries about weapons showing up on campus.

"The last thing I want, the last thing our team wants, the superintendent, the board, is to make it feel like a prison. We don't want that," Jowell said. "But what we'd like to see is if you ask, hey, what's going on behind the schools? And we'll take a peek behind that curtain from a security standpoint. We do, and we're fortunate. We have a lot of things in place to ensure that we have the safest, secure school environment that we can."

The district will gather data and survey students and staff while the pilot runs. All responses will be shared with the school board.

"The idea or the concept is, if we can get this done and get it done correctly and efficiently at these high schools, we most certainly can (do it in) our middle and our elementary schools if the school board chooses to move forward in that direction," Jowell added.

The pilot runs through May, when the academic year ends.