A pronounced emphasis on safety and security will be evident when Memphis City Schools open Aug. 11.
Middle and high school students will face metal detector screenings every morning, at least for a few months.
About 500 metal detectors will be in operation across the city, and all school staff will be trained to use the machines to cut down on the time it takes.
And new high-tech ID badges will allow administrators to scan a student's badge to find out which class he or she belongs in and to determine their access to other parts of the school building.
By December, Supt. Kriner Cash plans to increase the number of officers walking the halls of middle and high schools to 104. Seventy-seven will be in place when school opens.
Gerald Darling, currently chief of the Miami-Dade County Schools police force, will join Memphis City Schools on July 28 as chief of school safety, security and emergency management.
Among his first tasks will be implementing a beefed-up safety and security plan.
Work on the comprehensive plan began earlier this year under the direction of former interim superintendent Dan Ward. Ward ordered the additional officers be hired as part of the district's response to a year in which three shootings took place inside classrooms.
Darling is one of two new staff members Cash will be relying upon as part of his new administration. The security chief will be paid $160,000.
The other is Irving Hamer, who is taking the newly created position of deputy superintendent of academic operations, technology and innovation. He will be paid $180,000.
During his initial review of the school district, Cash said he found about 12 schools where the most serious incidents are occurring.
Those schools will have highly trained officers - with at least 480 hours of training.
The relatively small number of schools, he said, challenges the public perception that school violence plagues all of MCS.
"The data ... suggests this is a 6 percent problem, not a 100 percent problem," Cash said.
Vulnerability studies of all school campuses will show where security needs to be strengthened.
Work is also taking place on prevention and intervention. At a summer institute, 239 educators learned about strategies to improve safety.
He presented the board with about 60 key activities and initiatives he will choose from to carry out during his first 100 days on the job.
Those activities will be part of his framework to bring "breakthrough leadership" to Tennessee's largest school district.
Cash and the board leave later this week for their first meeting as part of the invitation-only Reform Governance in Action training the district will undergo for the next two years.
During the retreat in Park City, Utah, the board and district leaders will work on joint priorities.
