By Xavier Smith
WILSON COUNTY, TN — Wilson County state legislators Sen. Mark Pody and Rep. Susan Lynn announced plans to introduce the school safety legislation.
“I look at this bill as an important update to classroom safety technology. It’s high time that technology reaches the classroom when it comes to school safety items like this,” Lynn said.
The technology would mirror body-worn cameras frequently used by law enforcement personnel, but would include three buttons for an alert system.
Pody said one button would be used for disciplinary issues, the second one would be used for medical emergencies and the third one would be used for active shooter situations.
When teachers push the disciplinary button, the system will stream footage to the school’s principal and school resource officer, if there’s one at the school.
When the medical emergency button is pushed, an alert is sent to the school resource officer and local 911 agency.
The active shooter button will alert local law enforcement and the device’s GPS system will allow responders to accurately locate the threat.
Pody said he worked on the legislation for more than a year after he started representing a portion of Davidson County and spoke with Metro Nashville school board members, teachers and parents and learned that some teachers had been assaulted by students.
“It’s like having a Ring doorbell on teachers’ lanyards, and when they press that button they know help is coming,” Pody said.
He said the lack of proof in some of the cases spurred the push for the technology, which was expedited by the Covenant school shooting last March.
“It changed a lot of us as legislators how we’re looking at school safety in a way we’ve never done before,” said Pody, who said he spoke with Covenant parents regarding the legislation.
Pody said he also spoke with Gov. Bill Lee and state finance personnel and said the state would fund up to $300 per device, which districts could access through a grant process.
Pody said local districts would have their choice of using the technology and vendors, but any device costing more than $300 would have to be covered by the district. He said he also didn’t favor mandating the technology for districts and hoped district leaders would follow the wishes of teachers and parents.
Pody and Lynn noted the technology was being used in Florida and Texas. They said the 2024-2025 school year would be the earliest the technology would appear in schools if approved during the next legislative session.