During the 2022-23 school year, the Alexandria City School Board made the decision to implement weapon detection scanners at ACHS. The scanner’s primary purpose is to scan for weapons such as knives and guns. Students have been going through these scanners every day for a few months now, and among students, there seems to be a common consensus that the scanners are simply disruptive and seem to be causing more of a hassle than anything.

“It just takes up time” and “I don’t feel any more safe with them around” are all common statements shared by many students around the school. When students come into the building, they are forced to wait in a long line with Chromebooks in hand just to get into the building while passing through the scanners. Not to mention that if you trigger a false alarm by having a notebook or binder in your bag you have to step off to the side and get your bag checked which makes the time to get in the building even longer. Not only is this a hassle for students, but also for security guards as they have to spend their entire time standing up and passing students through scanners which makes for an audacious task to be repeated every single day for hours at a time.

Of course, it can be argued that the scanners are in fact keeping the school more safe, however, it can also be said that the drawbacks of the system do outweigh the pros of it. For example, scanners wouldn’t do much to stop someone with a weapon whose intent is to hurt as many people as possible especially when you take into consideration the large crowds that form due to the long waits from the scanners, but the school has added more security guards to help with such emergencies.

Another drawback is that because of the amount of false alarms that get triggered due to things like water bottles, binders, and notebooks, it can be tedious for students to have their bag checked over something like forgetting to take an umbrella out of their bag.

With the implementation of the metal detectors still being fairly new, the student and teacher opinions on them are still being formed and we have yet to see a truly positive impact on the school stemming from the scanners. So far, the problems and disruptions they cause stick out more than anything as they impact every single student and teacher in the building. If this continues, the time to question if the metal detectors are really necessary will come sooner than we might think.