Greenfield Police Department holds active shooter training
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Preparing for the unthinkable is what police and public safety officials are doing this week at Greenfield-Central High School. The active shooter training comes just weeks after the tragedy in a Texas elementary school.
At Greenfield-Central High School, police officers are focused on learning how to stop active shooters as fast and effectively as possible.
Monday through Wednesday, Greenfield police officers will have an active shooter training that includes entering hallways and classrooms pretending to be in an active shooter situation.
“Every year, unfortunately, the more that there’s incidents the more that we’re learning about different things,” Lt. Corey Decker at the Greenfield Police Department said.
“We’re constantly evolving and changing our tactics, and that’s an every year occurrence. Something new is being changed to where we have to basically adapt to the situation and adapt our tactics to how we want to go through and do room and building clearing,” Decker said.
It’s also a chance to learn the layout of the school. The Greenfield-Central Community School Corporation says this a partnership to help make sure students are as safe as possible. 40 Greenfield police officers will go through the training.
“It can be nerve racking, and a little heart wrenching to watch a drill like this happen, and you hope it’s nothing that you ever see in the course of a regular school day,” the director of secondary education at the Greenfield-Central Community School Corporation, Lori Katz, said.
“However, I’m grateful that we have the opportunity to drill and practice, so that if we were to ever in that sort of scenario, we could respond, and have the best outcome possible,” Katz said.
To help maintain effective communication, police officers are focused on lining up in a stack as they move through the school, and work as a team. They’ll also learn the best tactics when approaching a staircase with an active shooter nearby. The Greenfield Police Department says these tactics can be used inside other buildings.
“With us, with ease of communication and flexibility, and flow to get down a hallway, we use a stack and it allows someone to be able to drive that stack and communicate with the whole element,” Decker said.
“Allowing them to enter the space and use that as a training facility at all times of the year only benefits our students. It benefits them professionally, and makes us all feel safer and better prepared,” Katz said.
The Greenfield-Central Community School Corporation says they’ll continue to work with police officers to keep their community safe.