In a few days, thousands of students in Lee County will be saying goodbye to summer and hello to the new school year, and at Estero High School, students will notice some changes.
"We want to make sure the students and staff are safe; want to make sure parents know their kids are in good hands, so we’re always looking to improve security at all of our school sites," said David Newlan, executive director of safety, security and emergency management. "We have the safe-area location identifiers or decals that are in every classroom and instructional space that are identified to students as where to go during an emergency."
Newlan says the safe-area locations must be explained to students within the first ten days of school.
"If something was to happen, they know what to do and how to respond," said Newlan.
In addition to the safe-area locations in classrooms, there will also be vaping detectors in the bathrooms as well. Four other schools in the district will also have them.
"It really is much more dangerous than people realize," said Rachel Gould.
Gould has been in the school industry for 27 years. She never thought the district would have to resort to this, but she says this is necessary.
"Kids stop vaping; that’s the overall goal," said Gould. "We want to make sure that they learn how dangerous it is, and we want to include their parents and give them education on how damaging vaping is for them."
This is all to make sure this generation of students, as well as the next, continues to be safe so they can succeed.
"They can concentrate on getting a world-class education and not have the anxiety about safety concerns," said Newlan.
"We’re doing everything we can to make sure our students are getting the best in Lee County," said Gould.