Communities can come together to ensure the safety of their schools, workplaces and more by using CPTED strategies.

Middle and high school students feel safer with security officers and a moderate level of security camera use outside of their schools, but a greater deployment of cameras inside school buildings makes them feel less safe, according to a school climate survey of more than 54,000 students from nearly 100 schools in Maryland, published in the Journal of Adolescent Health.

The single most important thought when securing our schools is maintaining an open, supportive environment that is conducive to learning. School security directors all too often worry that their campuses will become “prisons” if a well-thought-out design or renovation does not take into account the purpose of the facility. As security professionals, this is our primary concern and at the forefront of any security solution we would recommend.

As enterprise security executives, we are largely trained to focus our security plans toward a Design Basis Threat (DBT) – the most likely or credible threat(s) to a site, weighted by probability and impact of successful attack. Primarily this focus is aimed towards three common categories: Insiders, Outsiders and Outsiders with Connections to Insiders.

Security executives in property management secure commercial buildings in a variety of ways, depending on location, risk, whether the building is public, private or semi-public, what sort of asset is being protected, hours of operation, and the like. Protecting buildings from risks such as theft, loitering, vandalism, rioting and workplace violence comes with a variety of unique challenges and can take a lot of forethought, planning and creativity.