New Jersey School to be Equipped with Surveillance Cameras

As part of a strategic initiative to try and give students and faculty additional protection, Millburn High School in New Jersey will begin installing surveillance cameras over the next year. Approximately $100,000 was set aside to finance the surveillance project and Patricia Balko, interim business administrator for the district, is hoping the security plan will broaden to other schools as more funds become accessible. Another key figure in the surveillance project, board president Noreen Brunini, stated that security initiative was not being pushed into action over any specific event, threat, or incident, but was rather a preventative measure. Millburn High School is already ranked as one of the state’s schools.

Surveillance cameras have become increasing popular with school districts as a way to monitor potential illegal activity as well as ensure the safety of students and staff.

Surveillance: The Answer?

Although Brunini stated that no specific event was the catalyst for the surveillance measure, the security initiative does come shortly after a high-profile and public incident earlier in the year where a student got into an altercation with another student, beating him with a baseball bat in the school’s parking lot. As horrific and barbaric as the incident was many people began asking some important questions such as:

Would the fight have occurred if surveillance cameras were installed in the parking lot?

Will surveillance cameras prevent this type of situation from happening in the future?

Is this an effective and appropriate way to spend tax dollars?

Would surveillance cameras have prevented a serious situation such as Columbine?

Unfortunately, the answers are not simple and should come with concern. Surveillance cameras are great tools to record the movements of people; however, almost all surveillance cameras used in schools are not monitored by anyone in a “control room” type of environment where staff can quickly dispatch authorities to the scene of any trouble. The most effective surveillance programs typically involve a combination of video surveillance and human monitoring. Surveillance cameras can do nothing to stop a situation when or if it is occurring all they can do is record the events for future playback. In fact, the surveillance cameras probably would have done nothing to stop or even help the student who was assaulted in the parking lot with a baseball bat. The only thing that may have prevented the fight in the parking lot, or at least brought a quick end to it, would have been additional security in the form of people, watching and walking the grounds of the campus.

At the end of the day, everybody wants to send their children and teens to school and have the peace of mind knowing they are safe. However, is the spending of millions of tax payer dollars in surveillance or security cameras the answer? Convenient stores and other retail locations are all equipped with surveillance cameras and that does nothing to reduce the crime rates. The only stores that have a solid track record of success against crime or deviant behavior are the establishments or companies that have security guards or personnel monitoring the grounds. Nothing is stronger at deterring law breakers than the presence of a uniformed guard. The questions that need to be addressed now are:

Is the money being allocated in an effective manner or is the school having a knee jerk reaction to one terrible and publicized event?

Are there other alternatives that could be more cost-effective?

Surveillance cameras have done little or nothing to reduce burglaries; will they be as ineffective in reducing school violence?