Reflections on School Shootings from an Educator
Education Policy Brief | By: Rudy Lurz | September 09, 2024
Featured Photo: www.newsweek.com
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I originally wrote this article in February 2018. I return to it after each school shooting to see if my thoughts have changed. They do not.
Since the date of this original post, many more cities and towns have been added to that heartbreaking fraternity of tragic and unnecessary death. Oxford Township, MI. Uvalde, TX. Winder, GA, to name a few.
JD Vance, echoing Bill O’Reilly’s “price of freedom” viewpoint, recently called school shootings a fact of life in American society. Like others in the past, his answer is to create more security at schools. As I noted six years ago, this is a blithe reply that is unlikely to significantly alter the body count.
This brief has been shortened from its original length. The original post from 2018 can be found here.
ANALYSIS (based on previous article from February 2018)
As a teacher, hearing the news of last week’s tragedy hit me hard. All school shootings affect me in a similar manner. Even lockdown drills create a crippling feeling in the pit of my stomach. As I huddle with my students against the wall in the dark, contemplating oblivion, I wonder how we have fallen so far as a society.
I once had a semblance of optimism. After years of pain, vitriol, and random terror, I don’t have that optimism anymore. As dozens more cities and schools have become hashtags, and more dates on the calendar have been stained black, stoic fatalism has settled in.
My despair is not assuaged by policy statements from the right or left. Let’s break down these arguments, moving right to left on the political spectrum. Here is what Republicans propose:
I. Arm the Teachers
Imagine your 11th-grade math teacher. Now imagine your school librarian. Now imagine your 9th-grade English teacher.
Imagine a hallway filled with screaming kids, running from a lunatic with an assault rifle. Is old Mr. Fuddlesticks going to step into that hallway and win that firefight with his .38 special?
Analysis: This is a bad idea all around. Body count: unchanged, maybe even higher.
II. Beef Up Security
Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich was one of many who wrote in favor of additional security measures at schools. Using familiar rhetoric of “good guys with guns,” he pushed for more uniformed officers on campus.
I think Mr. Gingrich is half-correct. More security on campus would keep students safer. It would also bring the first rapid-response officers much closer to the scene. It wouldn’t stop the body count. If a school has a 70-acre campus with over a dozen buildings, are you going to put uniformed police officers in each of them?
Analysis: More cogent proposal. Expensive. Body count reduced, but not eliminated.
III. Fortified Campuses with Security Measures at Building Entrances
Do you love TSA lines at the airport? Then bring them into schools. Radically restructure open campuses nationwide into single-building entities with a security checkpoint at the entrance(s). You’ll probably have to spend billions creating covered connections between buildings, along with billions more for hiring screeners and equipment to monitor each backpack and student entering the building.
You also create a huge target in front of the school as everyone lines up to enter. Will you do the same for football and basketball games, or will sports become the next sacrifice as a society?
Analysis: Expensive as holy heck. Body count: unchanged. Schools radically altered.
IV. Patriot Militia on Campus
This is a popular idea I’ve seen pop up on right-leaning social media. Veterans will volunteer to patrol their kids’ schools for free.
The patriot militia will likely be faster than local PD’s rapid-response teams since they’re already on campus. Just like Mr. Gingrich’s proposal for more security, there are similar issues on large campuses. Will they patrol every building? As a teacher, I also worry that some members of this patriot militia could turn into vigilantes.
Analysis: Similar to Mr. Gingrich’s proposal but cheaper. Slightly reduced body count, but also adds the complication of vigilantism/reprisals against students and teachers.
Now let’s analyze the proposals from Democrats:
A. Ban Assault Rifles (and maybe more?)
Let’s assume you can. Let’s say we get a reprise of the 1994 Clinton-era assault weapons ban passed. No assault rifles = no school shootings, right?
Doubtful. The Columbine massacre of 1999 happened in the middle of Clinton’s assault weapons ban. Some of the weapons used during that slaughter could be classified as conventional. The Virginia Tech mass shooting, one of the deadliest in U.S. history, was committed with a humble 9mm handgun.
The toothpaste is out of the tube on this one. While I like the idea of an assault weapons ban, and I think stopping production of all new AR-15s will be useful, it won’t stop the violence. 357 million guns are in circulation and you can’t find them all.
The violence will slow down, but it will continue.
Analysis: Sound and fury. Record levels of vitriol. Violence in the streets if you attempt confiscation. Body count in schools: slightly lower. Weapons of choice might change, but kids will still die.
B. Raise the Age for Gun Purchase, Expand Background Checks, Close Gun Show Loopholes, Restrict High-Capacity Magazines (30+), Fund Mental Health Facilities, Raise Taxes on Ammunition, Restrict Access to Firearms for Everyone with a History of Domestic Violence and/or Status on No-Fly Terrorist Watch Lists, Charge Parents of School Shooters with Negligent Homicide, Improve Detection of Threats with Cybersecurity Advances
These are the ideas that have a chance at denting the violent epidemic of school shootings. It won’t be enough. The numbers will be moderately reduced, but to me, it’s a math equation that can be done on a napkin. 320 million Americans. 357 million firearms. Let’s assume that just one in a million is deranged enough to shoot up a school. We’ll still have at least 1-2 school shootings a year.
Analysis: Body count moderately reduced. Incidence number: reduced. Best ideas so far.
FINAL THOUGHTS
The moments after school shootings feel like an American rendition of the dystopian Hunger Games. We are all glued to our TV sets. We hear stories of the carnage. The faces of the fallen are displayed on CNN and Fox News.And we do it all again next time.
Whether you are left, right, center, or somewhere on the fringes, we all must face the realization that there is something seriously wrong with our country right now. You can’t just repeat one or two of these common talking points and triumphantly sit back in your chair and believe you have the answer. Or maybe you can.
I can’t. My name is in the American Hunger Games lottery.
I hope that the odds are in my favor and that today is not the day that my kids and I are chosen as tributes to this madness.
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