Security is on the front burner for school districts around the country, but how to make students, faculty and visitors safe is a tricky and touchy subject.

There are multiple layers of possible security, including armed officers, armed teachers, metal detectors, video cameras and visitor management systems. They all have their pluses and/or minuses but there are common denominators in any effort to secure a school or any similar location.

All of the above are just one facet of security and not a guarantee of anything, and the human factor is as important or more so than any other.

Consider the visitation management system, where visitors can be screened by having their drivers’ licenses scanned and the visitor checked against some sort of database. These are becoming popular in some areas and can be of value, but there are holes, like in any system.

Ed Davis, former commissioner of the Boston Police Department and current security consultant, said all of the systems available are dependent on human intervention and vulnerable to the extent of human failure.

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