CHARLEVOIX COUNTY -- It has only been two months since the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting shocked the nation and since then, local authorities have been working together make sure your kids schools are as safe as possible.
The Charlevoix County Sheriff's Department held active shooter training today at Charlevoix Elementary School since students had the day off and the building empty.
Deputies learned how to navigate school hallways, enter and search rooms, and locate a potential shooter.
"This gives officers the capability and the knowledge to react to a situation instead of way for SWAT. They go in as a team one officer, two officers, four officers. Whoever's on scene to try to eliminate the threat and to stop the loss of life," Sheriff's Deputy Nate Kaminski said.
Immediately after hearing the tragic news out of Newtown, the Sheriff's department and the county's three school districts scheduled training like today's.
The goal is to make sure authorities from different departments know how to work together quickly to address a problem.
"You have city officers and deputy sheriffs training together, because that's what we need to do in an incident because were so thin up here in the north we have to work his team so that's exactly what we do," Sheriff Don Schneider explained.
Active shooter training was created in response to the Columbine school shooting in 1999 which took the lives of 12 students. Since then, local authorities have made this an annual practice.
YouTube EXTRA: Active shooter training at local school
