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ST. GEORGE — Washington County is leading the state in implementing a school guardian program that was passed into law in February that will require each school to have an armed person at the ready to intercept any active threats while children are in school.
The new law, HB84, dubbed School Safety Amendments, was designed to strengthen existing school resource officer programs by ensuring that each school has an armed volunteer, or guardian, on-site during school hours.
Guardians would only be activated in the event of a crisis situation or a serious threat, and while districts across the state are working to implement the program, Washington County has enough volunteers to man every school in the district.
Steve Dunham, communications director for the Washington County School District, told St. George News that while the new law does not go into effect until next year, the district wants to be ready to roll out the program as effectively as possible.
Volunteers are selected from a pool of school employees and resource officers, but cannot be principals, teachers, or others whose primary work is with students. Guardians do have to be existing staff, unless there are 100 students or less, and will be required to keep their weapons concealed while on school grounds.
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