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It has been one week since Beaufort County Schools added metal detectors to campuses across the county. Principal of Northside High School, Tracey Nixon, shared with the Daily News how her school is adjusting to the change. 

Northside High School is a 1A school located in Pinetown that has about 385 students who take four classes every day. They can choose from 22 sports to participate in and more than 10 clubs and organizations. 

Northside received a metal detector set with two wands on Tuesday, Oct. 22, but implemented it the following morning. The metal detector has been in use for three days at different times and locations on campus. 

Nixon said most students  have had a “positive” response to the metal detector. “I think they feel safe. They’re glad we’re doing it.” She continued to say that there has been “no resistance” to the metal detector from students and parents. She believes metal detectors can help provide a “safe and orderly” learning environment. 

Students place their personal items into plastic bins that are inspected by two school staff members then they walk through the metal detector and wait as an administrator uses a handheld metal detector to do a second scan. Sensors on the metal detector will alert either on the left or right side of the student depending on where a piece of metal was found. 

Efficiency is one concern with metal detectors. If students are waiting in a line outside the school building to use a metal detector, it could pose a threat to their safety. To this, Nixon said Northside staff and administration have been using trial and error to determine the most efficient way to get students through the metal detector. 

“The first day, we did it the first 20 minutes and the last day we did it the last 20 minutes,” she said. “So we do it in small increments of time. When it gets to that time, we stop and let them go to class.” 

This process has shown Northside that having two staff members and two administrators operate the metal detectors helps cut down on time. 

“Metal detectors will be used on an intermittent basis at various school entry points and locations throughout the school building,” Beaufort County Schools stated in a press release sent on Oct. 18. Metal detectors may be used at athletic events and other extracurricular activities, they added. 

Nixon said Northside is “very blessed and fortunate,” because it has few incidents that put students’ safety at risk, but “that doesn’t mean it can’t happen,” she added. Metal detectors, she said, will help the high school be “prepared and proactive.” 

While metal detectors will assist with finding weapons students may carry, like pocket knives and guns, they will also find vapes. Nixon hopes that one year from now, the metal detectors will have reduced the use of vapes on campus. 

“If anything comes out of that, I certainly hope we don’t find weapons. I hope kids are not bringing weapons in here, but it will also cut down on [vaping] for their health and improve their health,” Nixon said. 

Assistant Principal Anthony Bailey believes that there will be a decrease in the number of disciplinary referrals for the possession and use of vapes, if they are caught early by the metal detector. 

Should a student be caught with either a weapon or a vape, Northside administration will follow school policy which can include out of school suspension. Beaufort County Schools maintains a zero tolerance policy on weapons brought to campus. Should a student bring a gun to campus, their principal will send a recommendation to Superintendent Dr. Matthew Cheeseman either suspending the student for 365 days or be expelled depending on the nature of the situation, per Beaufort County Schools’ policy manual

As of this semester, the school system has four mobile, metal detectors but has a goal to place one at each high school and middle school. Each unit costs $3,300, a spokesperson for Beaufort County Schools said. 

The Daily News reported eleven months ago that Beaufort County Schools was considering the purchase of metal detectors. This announcement was made two weeks after a handgun was found in a backpack belonging to a sophomore at Washington High School. In November of last year, Cheeseman said the incident “increases the urgency to do something sooner than later, absolutely, to help our students and employees and community feel safe.”