Law enforcement officials need plan to protect schools

Once upon a time, schoolchildren ducked under their desks in mock preparation for an attack by enemy planes. Duck and cover during an air raid drill was a directive even the youngest students understood.

In a more modern era, it’s not uncommon to see students and teachers lined up outside of school for long periods while police check out the school building after a bomb threat is phoned in.

The former was play-acting; the latter, a stage somewhere in between naïveté and the harsh reality of living in a post-9/11 world.

Now, law enforcement and school officials have gotten a reality check about terrorism delivered, inexplicably, by a fallen Iraqi insurgent.

Primed by scenes on TV news of Columbine or Belran, Russia, they took the first steps in what must develop into an intelligent, comprehensive and coordinated plan to protect the schools.

The new world situation calls for schools to move beyond rote fire drills, and map out real plans for making their facilities — and students housed there — secure, day in and day out.

Such plans must go beyond checking out visitors via buzzers and video cameras. Points of entry are the obvious weak links. But what about, as Belran taught us, the workers on the construction site? A car bomb?

County and state law enforcement agencies should work with schools to educate the educators about how to assess their facilities, what steps to take to heighten security and how to react to possible scenarios, including one as extreme as a terrorist assault.

That process began last week in Rumson, where law enforcement officials told school administrators not to post floor plans on the Web. Plans should be in place and parents should be reassured.

All of this must be accomplished, somehow, without diminishing the quality of life for the school community and the educational experience of students. A tall, but necessary, order.

Most of us could not have imagined before Columbine, 9/11, and more recently, Belran, what we are now confronted with — the need to make plans to protect against terrorist targets as large as a nuclear power plant or as small as a child.