An Epidemic of School Violence

After a week like this one, it’s hard to think of much else other than the series of deadly school shootings that have rocked our nation.  In the course of a week — from Thursday, February 8 to Valentine’s Day — our school systems experienced five separate incidents of violence.  A woman was shot at an elementary school in Ohio.  Three women were shot at a technical college in Louisiana.  A student was shot at a high school in Tennessee.  A student was shot at a junior high school in California.  And yesterday, students were killed in a seemingly random massacre in Illinois. 

What exactly is compelling these depressed and deranged shooters to resort to homicide and suicide?  What can we do to prevent more violence in our school systems?  It is easy to feel helpless or overwhelmed in the face of such nonsensical brutality, but something has to be done.  The outlook hasn’t always looked this bleak.  So what has changed?  How can we change in order to ensure that our nation’s school systems are safe for our youth?

These are the questions that we should all be asking.  Please review NCPC’s information on school safety and add your own comments to this blog post.

Comments

[Weer'd Beard]

When somebody is insane, I'd say the ability to understand "What makes them tick" is aproaching impossible....I think that's kind of definative of insanity.

Also I can't imagine how things could have been any WORSE if somebody in the room had been a lawful holder of a Concealed Weapons permit.

I think in this man's case (While this appears to be his ONLY serious crime) nothing would have stopped him from getting the guns he wanted for whatever reason. If a person REALLY wants Heroine, they can get it, banned or not. I'd say the same thing would go for guns in the case of somebody who wants them badly enugh.

You can't control outliers like this, what you CAN control is lawful people. In this case they were controled. The law disarmed them, and the results were swift and tragic

[Justin]

There are 2 realistic and needed solutions.

First -prevention- establish and promote an anonymous tipline via web,text and phone.

Second -intervention- arm teachers and approved students with training and taser guns.

[Debra]

Regarding Justin's comment above, while I agree that in cases such as school violence prevention is paramount and intervention may save lives, I find it callous to "arm teachers and approved students." How does one go about approving a student? In this last tragic case of school violence, most teachers gave glowing reports of the former student who opened fire in a lecture hall. There has to be a more reasonable method of intervention aside from the student shoot out that I feel the above comment alludes to. As someone who plans to go back to school in the future, I don't want to be in a classroom where students are strapped with tasers and handguns.