One year since the Covenant shooting, here’s how private school security has changed in Tennessee

Addie Brue was a 16-year-old enrolled at St. Cecilia Academy, a private Catholic school in Nashville when an assailant killed three students and three adults at the Covenant School four miles away.

A few days later, Brue attended a vigil in Nashville’s Public Square Park.

Alexis Marshall WPLN News

High school students Addie Brue (left) and Madeline Lederman attended Wednesday’s vigil. Brue called for stricter gun control to protect children from gun violence.

“I just feel so upset,” she said through tears, “especially for the parents who lost their child. Because I have a sister, and I can’t imagine losing her. My whole world would just fall apart.”

The shooting at Covenant also stirred fears about Brue’s own safety. She said she doesn’t want to think about what to do if there’s a shooter, where she should flee.

“I don’t want to… feel scared going to school anymore,” Brue said. “I’m tired of living in fear.”

The shooting mobilized communities into action. In the weeks that followed,thousands of protesters showed up to the state capitol — many of them students and parents — demanding gun reform.

The Republican-controlled state legislature ignored those demands.

But lawmakers did approve more than $200 million to support school security. They dedicated $14 million of that money to private school security grants.

Security upgrades at Tennessee private schools

Private schools have put the grants toward a wide variety of measures, including but not limited to:

• Building or improving fencing and security gates
• Securing exterior doors of school buildings
• Installing window film that reduces visibility and/or resists bullets
• Implementing visitor background check systems
• Increasing surveillance
• Upgrading communications with local law enforcement

According to a recent report, Tennessee’s Department of Education has approved 341 grant applications, totaling a little over $13 million, or 93% of allocated funds.

Still, TDOE Chief Operating Officer Shannon Gordon acknowledged all these measures have limitations.

“We don’t have products out there that are going to keep people outside. There isn’t a product out there that is going to stop all bullets from coming in. Those products just don’t exist,” Gordon said.

What they can do is buy time for law enforcement to arrive, Gordon said, adding that those extra minutes can be critical.

A school safety mindset

Brian Yarbro, who serves as senior director of school safety for TDOE, hears from a lot of private schools administrators who are grateful to have these grant funds.

“They’re putting them to good use,” Yarbro said. “All school administrators have the same goal, and that’s to make sure that we do everything possible to keep our kids safe and our staff safe.”

Yarbro said a crucial part of mitigating risk is changing how we think about school shootings.

“We’ve got to get out of the mindset of, ‘Oh, it can’t happen here,’ because it can,” Yarbro said.

How one cluster of private schools has responded

And schools across the state are taking note.

The Catholic Diocese of Nashville — which directly oversees 17 schools — received about $750,000 in school security grants. Diocese superintendent Shana Druffner said they used that money for bullet resistant film, more cameras and other physical security measures.

They also renewed focus on teacher training.

“You can have… as much of the infrastructure as you want, and spend a lot of money,” Druffner said. “But if a teacher props a door open, there’s an issue.”

Also, Druffner said schools in the diocese have added armed security officers. Now, they’re figuring out how to keep them on staff after the one-time grant money runs out.

“Because now parents are used to that, [officer] on campus and are happy with it, and so are the principals and the teachers,” Druffner said.

Despite the millions of dollars Tennessee has spent hardening schools to intruders, critics say these investments don’t address some of the root causes of school shootings, like Tennessee’s easy access to guns, which allowed the Covenant school assailant to buy seven guns including an AR15-style weapon.

It’s something Addie Brue identified at the vigil last year in the immediate aftermath of the shooting.

“I really want there to be better gun control,” she said. “I feel like that’s a must.”

One year after Covenant, calls for gun reform continue. To date, lawmakers have not passed any new bills limiting what kinds of guns can be purchased or who can carry them.