Physical Security Measures

How to Choose a Private School That Aligns with Your Family Values

Selecting a private school is more than picking a place for academic instruction—it’s choosing a community, a philosophy, and a partnership in raising your child. While class size, test scores, and extracurriculars matter, alignment with your family’s values is often overlooked yet essential.

Families who find their best-fit schools look beyond prestige and focus on shared priorities. Here’s how to approach your search with clarity and confidence, ensuring your child’s educational environment supports academic success—and personal and ethical development.

Define Your Family’s Core Educational Values

Start by clarifying what matters most to your family. Every school promotes ideals, but the best-fit ones will reflect the beliefs you already live and model.

Ask yourselves:

• Do we want a faith-based or secular environment?

• How important are character education or community service?

• Do we value academic rigor, creativity, independence, or structure?

• What are our views on discipline, leadership, and competition?

• Is diversity—of thought, background, or culture—a top priority?

By answering these as a family, you’ll be better equipped to identify schools that share your core values. For example, families seeking a religious foundation may explore Christian private schools, while others may prefer independent schools with a progressive outlook.

Look Beyond the Brochure:

The Evolution of Early Reading Strategies for Children

Early reading has always been a cornerstone of child development, forming the foundation of lifelong learning and comprehension.

• How we teach children to read has seen significant shifts over the centuries, reflecting changes in education theory, societal values, and technology.
• This article will explore these changes, offering insights into the past, present, and future of early reading strategies for children.
• To understand how we teach reading in the 21st century, let's look at how they taught reading in Roman times and the Middle Ages.

Canva generated this picture of a child reading.

During Roman times

In ancient Rome, the education system was quite different from what we know today.

• However, reading was an essential skill, especially for those belonging to higher social classes.
• Learning to read, write, and do arithmetic was a fundamental part of a Roman child's upbringing.

Here's how children were generally taught to read during Roman times.

• Roman education often began at home, especially for the elite, with either the father or a private tutor providing instruction.
• However, there were also rudimentary forms of schools known as "ludus litterarius," which children from a broader range of social backgrounds could attend.
• That's how the formal education for many Roman children began, focusing on reading, writing, and arithmetic.
• While it was rudimentary compared to modern standards, it

Ensuring the safety and security of students and faculty members in schools is a top priority for educators, parents, and community members alike. With the rise of school shootings and other violent incidents, it is essential to have a comprehensive plan in place to protect everyone on your school campus. In this article, we will comprehensively analyze the key factors that impact school security, including planning by a professional security firm, cost, how to implement recommendations, buy-in from stakeholders, and the importance of considering the impact on students and staff when making decisions.

Hire a professional security firm.

Planning by a professional security firm is a critical component of school security. These firms have the expertise and experience to identify potential risks and develop effective mitigation strategies. In addition, they can thoroughly assess the school's physical environment, including the building layout, access points, and existing security measures. Your board andThis information can then develop a customized security plan that addresses the unique needs of the school. However, the cost of hiring a professional security firm can be a significant barrier for many schools. The expenses associated with a comprehensive security plan can be substantial, and the school must weigh the benefits of increased security against the financial constraints of the budget. This tradeoff can be challenging, but ensuring that the school is adequately protected is vital while being mindful of the available financial resources.

Effective implementation is vital.

Implementing the recommendations made by a security firm

We see the never-ending reporting about school shootings. They occur in places we may have visited. We may even have friends and relatives whose lives have been impacted by this violence that seems endemic in our society. But that could never happen in our children's school, or could it?

Safety is at the top of the list of concerns for parents and students. Harassment, bullying, and COVID are all still concerns, but shootings have unnerved people in every age group and walk of life. It seems as though no public place is safe anymore.

Preparing for emergencies is an ongoing process—even if a school (public or nonpublic) is at a high state of readiness for an emergency, there will still be a need for continued security, safety, and emergency management. Source: REMSTA (Readiness & Emergency Management for Schools)

Prevention

Preventing incidents from happening requires action from you and your children's school. You are partners in keeping young people safe.

The Parent's Obligation

• Understand the measures your school has put in place to prevent incidents from occurring.
• Discuss these measures regularly with your children.
• Teach your children to be situationally aware.
• Keep your lines of communication open and relaxed, so your children will tell you about anything and everything.
• Keep your phone charged with the school's emergency alert application configured to notify you anytime.
• Monitor your local weather conditions as emergencies can include severe storms, tornadoes, and flash floods.
• Teach your children how to call 911 for help.
• Teach your children how

A tragedy like Newtown or Parkland could never happen in a private school, right? I certainly hope that it never does, but there are no guarantees. There are so many variables to consider in all of the mass shootings that have occurred since the Columbine attack in 1999 that it would be foolish to say that such events could not happen in a private school. Statistically, the odds of such an event are low. However, when it comes to the safety of our children, it is simply unacceptable to gamble. We, as parents and school administrators, must take steps to prevent disaster from occurring on our watch.

Equally unforeseen are natural disasters such as tornadoes, flooding, and earthquakes. Granted, certain regions of the country are more prone to these events than others. But you only have to read the news reports to realize that things can and do happen when and where you least expect them to.

So, against this gloomy backdrop, let's look at what private schools can do to protect their communities.

Protection

As I researched this article, I was impressed by the number of organizations that my search string "emergency response policy and procedure for schools" produced. You will find plenty of relevant and useful reading when you use a search string with a narrow focus.

As Benjamin Franklin wisely noted, "A pound of prevention is worth a pound of cure." While Franklin was referring to fire prevention, his