UPDATE: A third training session is now available at St. Mary’s Episcopal School on April 21. You can register here.
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MEMPHIS, Tenn. — The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and a safety and security consulting firm are working together to provide free training to help the public respond to active violent threats.
Whether it’s at a school or your neighborhood grocery store, we’re seeing active violence scenarios like shootings happen across the country.
Former law enforcement officer Brink Fidler is with Defend Systems, a company that is a life safety and security consulting firm out of middle Tennessee. Next month, in partnership with the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, his team will offer two free training events in Memphis.
“I wanna be clear one thing we don’t do is traumatize people. That is not what we do. Our goal is to empower people to save lives including their own,” Fidler said.
Fidler created his own curriculum for the training, primarily geared toward gun violence. It comes on the heels of yet another school shooting out of Nashville after six people were killed at the Covenant School.
“At the end of the day that’s the biggest difference maker in any kind of active violence event is the people in the event knowing what to do. That’s where we’ve seen kinda the biggest lag, if you will, over time in historical events,” Fidler said.
Tuesday, Memphis-Shelby County Schools addressed campus safety questions and described what the district is doing to keep students safe.
“Some of the safety measures that we have put in place as a district include cameras throughout the schools, we have school resource officers who are assigned to certain schools and visit every school. We also have metal detectors that our high schoolers go through every day,” said Dr. Cathryn Stout, Chief of Communications with MSCS.
Tracey Mendenhall with Defend Systems says this upcoming training can make a difference for everyone.
“We teach people life skills. Anyone in the community is encouraged to come to our training. We love to teach teachers, that’s where our heart is, but any human being that walks the planet needs to have this training,” Mendenhall said.
The training will take place at St. Mary’s Episcopal School on April 19 and 20 from 6 p.m. – 8 p.m. 250 people can attend each session. You have to register for the event.