Shooting changes security at Madison schools - WAFF-TV: News, Weather and Sports for Huntsville, AL

The Madison community has dealt with their own school tragedy.

Two years ago in the hallway of Discovery Middle School, a student pulled out a gun and fatally shot his classmate, 14-year-old Todd Brown.

That experience changed the school, the district, and the community forever.

The superintendent, Dee Fowler, reached out to school leaders in Connecticut because he knows what they are going through.

He let them know that this community is weeping for them, but he gave them a bit of advice on how to move forward, that you can't put it behind you or keep it in front of you all the time, but you keep it alongside you.

And the teachers and students of Discovery Middle School know how hard that is.

February 5, 2010, Discovery Middle School became a crime scene; one student was dead, and parents and children were left shaken.

For the past two years, the district has worked hard to improve safety and ease fears.

They've put a number of things in place since, starting with the text to protect program where students can anonymously text a tip on anything from bullying to the extremes of a weapon being on campus.

They are constantly doing emergency drills and even the SWAT team goes into schools to train and understand the layout of each.

The work to keep students safe is constant.

"We're doing everything that we can and we are working with a lot of different security groups to make sure our schools are as safe as possible, but I'm not going to go into details about that to let someone who wishes us harm know those details - but how can you rationalize an irrational action?" said Fowler.

The superintendent also said all the new schools already have a double door barrier system - basically an extra door before you can access students.

They are about to start retro-fitting the older schools with the same thing.

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