Burbank OKs Extra School Security Aides

The Burbank Board of Education, bowing to demands from teachers for increased classroom safety, agreed Thursday night to hire one additional campus security aide for each of Burbank’s two high schools.

The board voted unanimously to hire additional aides for both Burbank and John Burroughs high schools. Each school already has one campus security aide and, on a part-time basis, one unarmed police officer, district officials said.

The aides’ primary job is to patrol school grounds to ensure that students are not skipping class and to keep strangers off the campus, officials said. The aides are equipped with two-way radios and are instructed to alert administrators of emergencies.

The additional security personnel will cost the district about $40,000 a year and could be on campus within two weeks, Supt. Arthur N. Pierce said.

The board also discussed teachers’ recommendations that the district install emergency telephones at the high schools to help speed communications between teachers and administrative offices.

Pierce said workers would go to Burroughs today to evaluate where such phones could be installed there. Pierce also said he plans to meet with Burbank Police Chief Glen Bell today to discuss how the Police Department might help improve security at the two campuses.

The board’s action Thursday was prompted by demands by Burroughs teachers for more security. The teachers staged a one-day wildcat strike Oct. 20 to protest the board’s decision not to expel a student who was accused of hitting a teacher and threatening to kill him and another instructor.

Teachers said the board’s leniency in not expelling the student could encourage future assaults at Burbank schools, where violence has increased sharply over the last five years, according to state statistics.

The number of attacks on students and teachers reported on the district’s 17 campuses has increased from 19 during the 1984-85 school year to 127 last year.