Boerne - Fair Oaks Ranch | August 2025

Education

BISD focuses on safety, security leading into new school year

As a new school year gets underway, Boerne ISD safety and security sta are working to ensure students and sta can approach education in a safe environment. Coming into the 2025-26 school year, House Bill 33 required each school system to have at least one breaching tool and one ballistic shield avail- able at each campus, marking a new unfunded mandate that the district was required to comply with. Rick Goodrich, chief of safety and security, told Community Impact the school district has been ahead of the curve when it comes to safety mea- sures, utilizing local partnerships and resources to provide the best school security. What’s happening? Partnerships with Boerne, Fair Oaks Ranch and Kendall County provide the district with school resource ocers at each campus. Goodrich said these partnerships allow the district to access the best sta, which would not be possible if the district operated its own police department. “We wouldn’t be able to recruit and retain the same level of ocers that we are able to contract for,” he said. While responding to emergencies and calls is a priority for the district, Goodrich said the team has taken the initiative to work on prevention. Through various methods of monitoring social media and other forms of communication, the district can identify potential threats or scenarios before they come to fruition. These preventative eorts help keep BISD students safe and help students in need of mental

Safety snapshot

threat instances in 2024-25 42 BISD campuses 13 school resource ocers 9

SOURCE: BOERNE ISDCOMMUNITY IMPACT

Boerne ISD safety sta completing CPR classes in preparation for the school year.

COURTESY BOERNE ISD

BISD, said predictive policing is a challenge, but district sta are focused on evolving the way they approach student safety. “We are trying to predict and show these signs that may have been missed by school personnel because they don’t have the resources that we have and our experiences,” Gault said. Ultimately, the goal of the district is to ensure all sta and students can be educated in a safe environment, Goodrich said.

health support and other care. “In my three years, we haven’t lost a child to self-harm, violence or overdose,” Goodrich said. Each of these initiatives through the school dis- trict has made BISD a staple of safety across the state, and district sta have led training programs to help other districts and groups enhance safety, Goodrich said. What they’re saying Isiah Gault, threat intelligence specialist for

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