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 In 1993, the U.S. Justice Department surveyed 758 high school students in inner city schools in four different states. The results were startling:
45% of the male students said that they had been threatened by a gun or shot at on the way to or from school 22% said that they owned a gun The number of high school students threatened with a weapon or injured with one on school property has fluctuated from year to year between 1993 and 2003, but hovers between 8% for white students, 9% for black students and 10% for Hispanic students. Despite the fact that fewer students reported carrying a weapon to school declined between 1993 and 1999, the number of students who reported being threatened or injured with a weapon remained constant – about 8% overall – that’s 8 out of every 100 students attending school who faced a weapon on the school grounds. 35% of American schoolchildren believe that they are likely to be shot
As frightening as the other statistics are, that last one is a heartbreaker. Over one-third of our teenagers who attend school believe that they are likely to be shot. Imagine having to leave your home every morning and go to a place where you believe that you are that unsafe. Is it any wonder that 160,000 children report that they have stayed home from school out of fear?
The good news is that schools are taking the initiative in taking control of a dangerous situation. According to the latest report from the U.S. Department of Education:
66% of all schools surveyed had a violence prevention program in place 66% of schools surveyed provide classroom management training to teachers 35% provide training to teachers in recognizing potentially violent students 31% provide crime prevention training to teachers 54% involve parents in some way to help prevent school violence 45% provide training and technical assistance to parents in dealing with potentially violent incidents at school 97% require visitors to check in on arrival 75% control access to the school building in some manner 65% close the school campus to visitors during lunch
While those statistics are encouraging, if you flip them the other way it becomes obvious that there are far too many schools that are not yet doing all they can to protect our children while they are in school:
34% of all schools surveyed do NOT have a violence prevention program in place 46% do not reach out to parents to involve them in violence prevention 25% do not control access to the school building Further, only 34% control access to the school grounds and only 1% require students and/or visitors to pass through metal detectors 25% require school staff to wear picture IDs, but only 4% require students to wear them. While 91% of schools have a written plan for dealing with a natural disaster, only 74% have a written crisis plan for dealing with a shooting, and 61% for dealing with a large-scale fight or riot.
Statistics prove that taking measures to stem school violence and crime work. Since 1990, as the percentage of schools using a gun-free schools approach has increased the incidence of students carrying weapons in school has decreased. The presence of a formal, written crisis plan prevents injury and death – yet many schools don’t have one yet. Many schools still hesitate to involve the police in a violent or potentially violent situation despite the fact that police involvement makes a difference. What could we be doing to make our children feel safe in school?
In 1999, Dr. Mark Rosenberg, Director of the National Center for Injury Prevention had this to say to Congress:
“We need to work together, if we do that, I think the schools will have a never before seen potential to make real change… The pattern of violence in our schools reflect.. the pattern of violence in our communities.. We have to look at the schools in the context of the communities. We just must do that. … We found that youth violence has become more lethal. The number of deaths has increased out of proportion to the number of fights. … The fatality rate has increased. It has increased because young people have firearms, they have guns”
At that same hearing, Chief Wesley Mitchell, Chief of Police, Police Department of the Unified Los Angeles School District, offered the following observation:
“I stress that it is the fear of violence that does the most harm in our educational system. .. Fear is why our children, and sometimes even teachers, arm themselves. Fear is what causes some students to react violently to simple stresses… let me offer you a few things we know effectively diminishes fear among school children. Small schools, small classes, aesthetically well-maintained facilities, well-trained staff, well-organized school leadership, and effective crisis management.”
Chief Mitchell’s words were borne out by a Justice Department survey of 743 youths. In that survey, 43% of the boys who reported carrying a gun in the past six months said they needed it for protection. In addition, 50% of the respondents stated that they’d ‘have no problem’ getting a firearm if they wanted one. While that might be dismissed as adolescent bravado, it’s far more difficult to dismiss the fact that 48% of those who reported owning or carrying a handgun stated that it was given to them by a friend or family member.
As disturbing as those figures and beliefs are, the report from the National Institute of Justice contained even more disturbing statistics relating to the attitude of schools and principals toward guns in their schools. When asked if guns were a problem in their schools, only 2% of the principals surveyed considered guns to be at least a ‘somewhat serious problem’ in their schools. When asked about incidents involving guns in their schools in the past three years, however, the results were far different: 58% recalled incidents involving guns on the school grounds in the three years previous, and 45% reported that one of their students had been shot, on or off school grounds.
We believe that one incident involving guns is one too many. All it takes is one gun to turn a school into a tragic story in tomorrow’s headlines.
What Schools Are Doing Around the country, schools have been taking action against guns. In accordance with the 1994 Gun Free Schools Act, every U.S. state must have a state law requiring a mandatory one-year expulsion of any student determined to have brought a weapon to school. The GFSA does provide for case-by-case exceptions to the expulsion so that, for instance, an 8 year old who accidentally forgets to leave his whittling knife at home isn’t excluded from school for a year, but those who bring a weapon to school with them face a year’s exclusion. In addition, the GFSA defines weapon clearly, but allows school systems to broaden the definition to include other weapons that are not covered under the national guidelines. Under the terms of GFSA, a student who is determined to have deliberately brought a weapon to school must be removed from the regular classroom setting. Most states provide for some alternative setting, and include counseling and remedial learning or tutoring as part of the expulsion plan.
The actions that schools have undertaken to reduce the threat of guns at school include preventive actions and programs, training for staff in dealing with violent incidents and recognizing potential threats, and emergency preparedness plans for crisis management to limit the deadliness of violent attacks at school. The most common actions that schools take are:
Require visitors to the school to check in (97%) Control access to school building via locked doors, etc (75%) Have a crisis plan to deal with a shooting (74%) Control access to school grounds (66%) Have an active violence prevention program (65%) Have a crisis plan to deal with a large scale fight (61%) Limit access to the school during lunch hour (65%) Involve parents in identifying and dealing with threats of violence (54%) Require all staff to wear identification tags (25%) Require students to wear identification tags (4%) Require students to pass through metal detectors to enter the school (1%)
Evaluating Effective Violence Prevention Research has shown that the single most effective way to prevent violence in schools is to have a violence prevention program in place. While the majority of schools offer violence prevention programs of one sort or another, a study funded by the U.S. Department of Education found that many of those programs are poorly implemented and supported, and have little effect on school behavior and violence.
The recommendations made by the researchers in that study are valuable ones for any school. They include the following guidelines for effective program implementation:
Serves a large target population Has highly trained staff Provides written curriculum and program materials Has significant funding Uses effective evaluation and monitoring Is well-integrated into the school
In addition, the researchers strongly recommend:
Relevant and consistently implemented security measures Clear expectations of students in following rules Consistency in applying consequences for misbehavior Strong, proactive approach to managing behavior Active involvement of teachers in maintaining order Strong lines of communication between teachers and students
The Importance of Crisis Planning The Office for Safe and Drug-Free Schools considers a crisis plan so important that they offer discretionary grants to schools to assist them in developing and implementing them. A crisis plan can help limit the damage of a violent incident that occurs in school by preparing teachers, staff and students in how to handle various types of incidents before they occur. According to the OSDFS, crisis plans should include responses to natural disasters, emergencies and violent incidents. Despite those recommendations, over 40% of the schools responding to a major Department of Education survey reported that they did not have any formal plan for dealing with a crisis involving violence or large-scale fighting in their schools.
The OFSDS recommends that all schools take the following steps to implement and review crisis plans:
Determine major problems in your school and how they are addressed Develop procedures for communicating with students, parents, the community and the media during and after a crisis Establish procedures to account for students during a crisis
The crisis plan should involve the following: Determine if a crisis is occurring Identify the type of crisis and determine the appropriate response Activate the incident management plan Determine whether a lockdown, evacuation or other student safety measures must be implemented Maintain communication among all relevant staff Monitor if and how emergency first aid is being delivered
A crisis plan doesn’t end when the immediate threat has passed. According to mental health professionals, the way that an incident, particularly a traumatic or violent incident, is handled in the aftermath can determine the extent of its effects on students and staff. During recovery, schools should” Return to learning and normal infrastructure as quickly as possible Restore and repair any physical damage immediately Assess students for emotional impact Identify follow up interventions if needed Conduct debriefings with staff and first responders to reconstruct the incident for what can be learned to prevent future occurrences
On the Spot – How It Worked in One School In 1988, a fifteen year old student at South High Community School in Worcester, Massachusetts pulled a knife during an alteration with another student. The fight began with words over the attention one boy was paying to the other’s girlfriend, and quickly progressed to fists. Before horrified students and staff could react, one boy was on the floor bleeding. He was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital. More than ten years before the killings at Columbine focused attention on school violence, Worcester had its own rude awakening to the realities of children carrying weapons and reacting with violence in its schools.
The incident galvanized community response. School officials, parents, community leaders and the police all came together to identify and resolve the problems associated with youth violence. Long before the 1994 No Guns In School Act, Worcester had implemented a zero tolerance policy for weapons in school. Teachers and staff are trained in crisis management and threat assessment, and the School Department maintains several layers of violence prevention programs geared to serving students who have been threatened and those identified as possible threats.
In most middle and high schools, teachers are assigned to monitor hallways. All students are issued picture IDs which they must wear at all times. School doors are monitored at all times that school is in session, and all visitors to campus must sign in and out at the main office. Hall monitors on duty carry walkie talkies to facilitate instant communication with the main office in case of emergency, and the units are maintained and used frequently. Students identified as possible threats are referred to counseling and anger management programs, and all schools promote an atmosphere of respect for students, teachers and learning. In addition, most schools make referrals to mediation mandatory when a conflict between students is identified, with a refusal to participate in conflict resolution being grounds for suspension and further disciplinary action. Finally, every student has a crisis management plan in place that is reviewed regularly and adapted to new conditions if needed.
One early November morning in 2005, a scuffle broke out between two students at another city high school. Nearby staff moved immediately to quell the disturbance, but a chain reaction had started already and within a minute, nearly forty students were involved in a violent scuffle in one hallway of the school. The crisis plan went into force immediately. The first teacher on the scene notified the main office of the incident. The secretary in the main office immediately called the police to request assistance. At the same time, the principal moved to the P.A. system to announce a school-wide lockdown. Teachers moved students immediately into classrooms and closed and locked doors. Assigned teachers checked exits from the school to ensure that they were locked, and three more teachers responded to the hallway where the fight was taking place to attempt to quell things. By the time police arrived, most students had been removed or isolated from the fighting. Teachers and trained staff had already begun debriefing students involved in the fracas and were able to identify those who started the fight and those who contributed to it. Police made seven arrests. Several more students were suspended or otherwise disciplined. The most serious injury sustained was a bloody nose. No weapons were drawn or used. The entire incident was resolved in less than twenty minutes, and the normal school routine was reinstated within an hour.
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