The Department of Education (DepEd) is moving away from simulating armed attacks in school safety drills, saying exercises should prepare students and teachers to respond to emergencies without unnecessarily exposing them to distressing scenarios.

DepEd Undersecretary Malcolm Garma said the department removed the “active attacker” scenario from its nationwide school safety drill on Thursday and instead used a distinct alarm to signal schools to activate their emergency response protocols.

“We no longer included the scenario that there is an actual attacker. We don’t want to use the word ‘attack,’ so we used school safety,” he told reporters during the drill.

Garma said the exercise was designed to determine whether schools knew what to do once an emergency occurred, including how to call for police assistance, evacuate or secure learners, and coordinate with medical responders.