PORT ORANGE, Fla. (FOX 35 ORLANDO) - The Volusia County School District addressed the public Wednesday following an incident that has parents alarmed.
Friday morning, deputies say a man rode his bike through the front gate, eventually walking into a classroom and sitting down.
Superintendent Tim Egnor said a campus advisor at the front gate noticed the man briefly as he checked in another car.
He said the advisor then called another advisor with his cell phone. That person then put out a radio call.
Egnor said staff, however, failed to put the school on lockdown.
"Neither the sheriff’s deputy or anyone else called a lockdown, instead they went to pursue the person," he explained. "People knew what to do, they practiced what to do and then they didn’t do it."
Egnor said he believes staff did not want to cause a false alarm.
"May have thought innocently that there were reasons not to follow through with the full impact of a code red, but they should not have over thought the situation," he said.
He said now changes are happening both internally and externally. Principals and campus advisors are being retrained and they plan to discuss monitoring doors more closely.
In this case, Egnor said the door was locked but not closed properly, allowing the man to get in.
"The door actually wasn’t pulled too so the intruder was able to pull the door open," he said.
The district said the school has added speed bumps at the entrance and plans to move the guard shack to keep a closer eye on cars coming and going.
"So it’s not easy for someone to take another road, unnoticed or with difficulty in stopping them," he said.
Chief Operations Officer Greg Akin also said changes will be made at the front gate.
"We will go ahead and start putting in some gates to be able to lock down for a single drive way in, single exit coming out," he said.
As for the staff involved, Egnor said he couldn't comment specifically on what and if they will be disciplined. Instead, he said it is being thoroughly investigated.
"Everything is being investigated in regard to everyone’s response," he said.