Pulling a fire alarm is no joke. It is a felony to pull a fire alarm.
Recently fire alarms seemed to be ringing at random. Students and staff started to wonder if it was a drill, an event or a malfunction.
In one week alone the campus experienced three fire alarms, twice in one day and then again the next day.
When the alarms and bells ring so often students and staff are sometimes unsure as to what procedure to follow. At one point there were so many bells ringing that Principal Carmen Crosse announced over the intercom that the school was to follow normal evacuating procedures whenever a fire alarm sounded.
“There was a time when central office was working on the fire alarms. It ended up affecting the school bells too,” assistant principal Jesus Serna said.
Frequent unscheduled fire alarms are not a new issue.
“For the seven years that I’ve been here it has been going on even before I started working here. The school has had this same issue,” assistant principal Serna said.
A fire alarm can be an inconvenience for many, but it impacts the special education program. When a fire alarm rings students may be glad to leave class for a few minutes but evacuating the school is not fun and games for everyone. It is difficult to evacuate the special ed population. On one especially long wait for a drill to end the special education department found a way to pass the time.
“We had manual wheel chairs and mechanic wheelchairs racing against a robot race car,” special education teacher Papaleo said.
Fire alarms are no laughing matter, no one knows when the alarm is real, it’s important to follow procedure to keep safe.