By Trina A. San Agustin
Variety News Staff

STUDENTS can again bring bags to school after the Guam Education Policy Board voted unanimously to pass Policy 407 governing search and seizure, but plastic bottles remain prohibited in schools. The policy came into effect yesterday morning.
Education board chair Peter Alexcis Ada said there is now a clear policy on searches on student belongings, among other things, for the Guam Public School System.
“We wanted to straighten this out so it’s much stronger and it covers everybody to include people that may walk into a school as a visitor,” Ada told Variety.
Policy 407 does not preclude searches on students’ body. It includes things that are brought to school, stored in student lockers, and in student vehicles parked on school grounds.
“I am very pleased. Of course as we go along, we may find some problems and we will have to go back and make adjustments. It is not a perfect document, let me make that clear. If we have to go back and modify it, we will not hesitate to do so,” Ada said.
Yesterday, there were some 60 individuals in 12 middle school and high school campuses doing random searches of bags. Ada said the 60 have been trained and additional people will be trained to conduct random searches.
Ada said the term random search is a simplified term in the policy.
“It is more of like if there is doubt or suspicion of illegal activity, we may pull you to one side and conduct a search. It is to be conducted by an authorized person who has had training from the Guam Police Department and in compliance with personnel rules and regulations, as well as with the standard operating procedures of the school system,” Ada said.
Also included in the policy, as suggested by student representative to the board Jesse Quenga of Southern High School, is for the person conducting the search to wear a badge that states his or her specific job.
Another suggestion is to have the person doing the search to have the same gender as the student being searched.