Published: October 1, 1995

Under Surveillance

Thirty-seven surveillance cameras. Six metal detectors. Five full-time police officers. Intruder-resistant gates. This may sound like your average prison, but it's actually the newest addition to the Dallas public school system.

The $41 million Townview Magnet Center, which opened its doors in August, is state-of-the-art in many ways: It has well-equipped science laboratories, a minihospital, and a 350-seat theater, for starters. But the designers of the mammoth 2,172-student high school had something else in mind, as well--security.

"This is a school for the 21st century,'' says C.W. Burruss, the district's director of safety and security. "The...