Douglas County charter school to launch first drone shooter response system in Colorado
A Sterling Ranch charter school will become Colorado’s first with a drone shooter response system, promising a 15-second response and raising fresh privacy questions.
John Adams Academy Douglas County will become the first school in Colorado with a drone-based active shooter response system, putting a new layer of aerial security inside a Sterling Ranch campus still months from opening. Campus Guardian Angel's drones, remotely piloted from off site, are designed to confront and degrade a threat within seconds.
On July 1, Campus Guardian Angel will launch its first Active Shooter Suppression System at John Adams Academy Douglas County, a tuition-free public classical charter school scheduled to open with grades K-8 in fall 2026. The campus will sit on 25 acres donated by Sterling Ranch LLC, and the Colorado Charter School Institute approved the school after the Douglas County School District released the proposal to the state authorizer.
The drones are already positioned on charging pads inside the school and can respond in about 15 seconds. Older school security tools depend on doors, cameras and human response after a threat has already moved into a building. Campus Guardian Angel previously demonstrated similar technology at Regis Jesuit High School in Aurora in July 2025, where it showed how drones could locate a shooter in seconds.
Douglas County has scrutinized school safety since the 2019 STEM School Highlands Ranch shooting killed Kendrick Castillo and injured others. County leaders have held community safety forums and added security measures in response. Public debate around John Adams Academy has already been contentious because of the school’s classical charter model.
Questions include how a school will handle privacy, false alarms and coordination with law enforcement once the technology is operating inside an active campus. CBS Colorado counted 108 school incidents in Colorado since 2014 in a 2025 report.
This article was produced by Prism’s automated news system from verified source data, official records, and press releases, then run through automated quality and moderation checks before publishing. The system is built and supervised by the people who set the standards it runs under. Read our full AI policy.
Did this article answer your question?
