Dist. 300 parents, keep your phones handy

Officials in Community Unit District 300 will have fewer phone calls to make this fall.

The District 300 school board Monday approved an automated system that will call and text-message parents during snow days and emergencies.

The district will pay Raleigh, N.C.-based AlertNow $41,000 to implement the system this year, $9,000 less than the district's budgeted cost.

The district estimates the emergency notification system could be in place by the end of September.

The contract will be paid for with funds from a projected surplus for the 2008-09 school year.

The district also has created a policy to allow searches with hand-held metal detectors and plans to hire a district safety coordinator as part of an effort to beef up safety at the district's schools.

The policy allows administrators to search individual students with reasonable suspicion and conduct random searches of entire classrooms.

The safety coordinator will train the staff in safety procedures, create and implement safety plans and serve as a liaison to local authorities.

The district plans to use $100,000 of the 2008-09 surplus for the safety coordinator's salary, benefits and equipment.

Several area school districts have recently implemented or plan to adopt an emergency notification system, including Huntley Unit District 158, Kaneland Unit District 302 and Central Unit District 301.

Area districts also have adopted some of the other safety measures District 300 plans to roll out in the fall.

Elgin Area School District U-46, the state's second-largest district, last year hired a safety coordinator and expanded random searches to all of the district's high schools.

For the emergency notification system, District 300 solicited proposals from nine companies and received offers ranging from $41,000 to $55,000 from five of the firms.

AlertNow, which provides emergency notification systems to school districts throughout the United States, offered to implement the system at the lowest cost.