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Teacher’s got a gun

February 23, 2013 by

Arming educators is a reality in some places and under serious consideration in others, reports Education Week.

 In Utah, school employees have been able to carry concealed weapons onto campus for about a decade—without telling a soul—and at least four Texas school districts are known to have granted select employees permission to take concealed weapons to school.

A rural Texas district, Southland is 15 miles from the nearest law-enforcement agencies, says Superintendent Toby Miller. Deciding “we are the first responders,”  Southland is training some of its employees to carry guns.

The armed employees, a small subset of the district’s 32-member staff, went through mental-health screenings and trained for their concealed-weapons licenses together. The training will be ongoing, he said, as long as Southland employees carry weapons. And the guns fire so-called frangible ammunition, which breaks into small pieces on contact, preventing ricochet.

Armed staffers must carry their weapon at all times in a concealed holster: Guns cannot be carried in a purse or locked in a desk.

Michael S. Dorn, who runs the nonprofit Safe Havens International, worries about a new attitude among school employees since the Newtown shootings: “Now, I’m supposed to die” to defend students.

Dorn, a former school police chief, thinks too many teachers and administrators have switched to attack mode. “We’re seeing so many [school employees] saying they would attack” someone, he said, “whether it’s two parents coming into the office arguing over a custody issue or people pulling a handgun but not actually shooting anybody.”

A few weeks ago, a school principal told me she’s been thinking about whether she’d give her life to protect her students from a gunman as the principal of Sandy Hook Elementary did. Another woman said. “I’d want a gun.”

Other schools are taking a different tack: Marietta, Georgia public schools are installing “panic buttons” that call 911.  At an Alabama school, teachers and staff wear panic buttons around their necks that trigger a school lockdown.

Filed Under: Safety Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Study: TV can teach empathy to preschoolers

February 20, 2013 by

When 3- to 5-year-olds watch less violence on TV and more shows featuring cooperation and friendship, they’re less aggressive toward other children, concludes a study published in Pediatrics.

One group of parents received guides highlighting positive TV shows for children and newsletters encouraging them to watch with their kids and discuss  the best ways to deal with conflict. Researchers called monthly to help parents set television-watching goals for their preschoolers.

The control group got dietary advice, but no guidance on TV watching.

After six months, parents in the group receiving advice about television-watching said their children were somewhat less aggressive with others, compared with those in the control group. The children who watched less violent shows also scored higher on measures of social competence, a difference that persisted after one year.

Low-income boys showed the most improvement.

“It’s not just about turning off the TV; it’s about changing the channel,” said Dr. Dimitri A. Christakis, the lead author of the study and a University of Washington pediatrics professor.

Preschoolers average 4.1 hours of television and other screen time daily, according to a 2011 study.

“Law enforcement sources” believe Adam Lanza was motivated to kill Newtown’s children by “violent video games“and his desire to outkill Andres Breivik, the Norwegian mass murderer, reports CBS.  “Call of Duty” was his favorite.

Filed Under: Children, Early Education, Parenting Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Armed guard disarms school shooter

February 1, 2013 by

An Atlanta middle-school student shot a classmate yesterday in the school courtyard. An armed security guard — an off-duty police officer — took the gun away. The 14-year-old victim has been discharged from the hospital.

Ida Price MIddle School students must walk through a metal detector to enter the school. It’s not clear how the shooter got the gun into the school.

An armed police officer and an unarmed guard will be stationed at every elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, if the school board can persuade the local police to provide the manpower.

After the Dec. 14 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, some parents who attended the school board meeting asked for  two armed guards at each school. ”The only thing that stopped that guy that day was when the two Newtown police burst in the building,” said parent Donna Lorenz.

Filed Under: Violence Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Safe or stupid?

January 18, 2013 by

Since the horror of the Sandy Hook shootings, Americans are suffering from Post-Traumatic Stupidity Syndrome, writes Lenore Skenazy on CNN.

Folks in the throes of PTSS are so traumatized by a tragic event that they immediately demand something – ANYTHING – be done to prevent it from ever occurring again. Even if the chances of it happening are one in a million. Even if the “preventative measures” proposed are wacky, wasteful, ridiculous – or worse.

One of her readers at Free-Range Kids reported that the local school created a new rule for its first-grade Christmas concert:  Parents had to hand in their car keys to the office before entering the auditorium.

Because guns don’t kill people … people with car keys kill people?

Another reader said a day care center has asked parents to slam the door on other parents entering behind them, so that everyone has to enter the security code.

Expect a fellow parent to hold the door open for you just because you’re standing there with a baby in one arm and a briefcase in the other? No way! This is a safe community, and a safe community treats all people, even the ones cradling their own children, as potential psycho-killers!

It’s the mindset that created the TSA. Treat everyone like a homicidal maniac. And never ever use your common sense.

A jogger running by a Kentucky school triggered a lockdown. “Seriously…six or seven different police and fire departments, including ambulances, EMS teams, and K9 units were called out, surrounding neighborhoods were searched, the school was put on lockdown, and everyone just shrugs it off as an unplanned practice drill?”

Filed Under: Parenting, Safety Tagged With: , , , ,

Obama urges school safety, mental health grants

January 18, 2013 by

In addition to various gun control measures, President Obama wants to fund school safety and mental health initiatives in response to the Sandy Hook massacre, reports Ed Week.

A new, $150 million Comprehensive School Safety Program would fund 1,000 additional school resource officers (guards), psychologists, social workers and counselors.  Another $30 million would help school districts develop emergency plans.

Obama wants $50 million to help 8,000 schools “put in place new strategies to improve school climate and discipline, such as consistent rules and rewards for good behavior,” reports Ed Week.

The mental health package would improve young people’s access to mental health services. Also:

 $15 million to help teachers and other adults who work with youth provide “Mental Health First Aid,” enabling them to identify students with mental health problems early and steer them toward treatment;

$40 million to help districts work with law enforcement and other local agencies to coordinate services for students who demonstrate need;

$25 million to finance new, state-based strategies to identify individuals ages 16 to 25 with mental health and substance abuse issues and get them the care they need.

$25 million to help schools offer mental health services aimed at combating trauma, anxiety, and bolstering conflict resolution; and,

$50 million in new money to train social workers, counselors, psychologists and other mental health professionals.

Before Newtown, Obama proposed eliminating grants designated for school counselors and nearly $300 million aimed at school safety, notes Ed Week. Now the administration is back to creating little pots of federal money for specific uses.

My daughter interned with the California Education Department’s office on preventing school violence two years after the Columbine massacre. She created a web site showing grants districts could seek to fund various anti-violence programs. When that was done, she was asked to help districts evaluate the various programs by posting links to research on their effectiveness. There was no such research. Perhaps we’re wiser now on what works for troubled kids.

Obama’s proposals — “well-intentioned and largely symbolic” — could undermine instruction by wasting time, energy and money preparing for a exceptionally unlikely event, writes Rick Hess.

The president’s proposed “mental health first aid” training grant works out to $150 per school.

. . . it’s likely educators will get a few hours of desultory training, which will be just enough to waste their time without making a difference. Or, if they actually get the training and support they need to do this well (with the $150 per school!), it’ll distract from training in their core work of preparing instruction, crafting assessments, monitoring student learning, and so forth.

An array of federal grants create “extra paperwork, meetings, and opportunities for small-dollar consultants,” writes Hess.

Filed Under: Health, Safety Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

California teacher ‘talks down’ shooter

January 11, 2013 by

Thanks to a heroic teacher who “talked down” a 16-year-old with a shotgun, nobody was killed at a rural California high school yesterday.  One Taft High School student was critically wounded, but is now in stable condition. Wounded in the forehead by a shotgun pellet, science teacher Ryan Heber talked to the shooter, letting 28 students flee the room. With help from a campus supervisor, Kim Lee Fields, who’d heard the shots fired, he got the boy to surrender to police. RyanHeber_1357858333303.jpg

About half of California’s high schools, 16 percent of its middle schools, and 5 percent of its elementary schools have police or resource officers on campus, and 83 percent of the officers at high schools are armed, according  an EdSource survey, reports the Christian Science Monitor.

Taft High’s armed resource officer wasn’t at school because he was snowed in. However, police reportedly were at the school within 60 seconds of a 911 call from a neighbor, who saw the boy enter a side door with the shotgun.

The Kern County Sheriff’s office is investigating reports the suspect threatened students last year, reports the Los Angeles Times.

Angela Hayden, whose 16-year-old daughter attends Taft, said the suspected shooter allegedly threatened to kill her daughter and other students last year while they were on a school bus during a field trip to Universal Studios.

“He was telling everyone that he had a list of people who messed with him over the years and that he was going to kill them,” Hayden told The Times.  She said the boy allegedly said his brother would be the first victim.

Hayden said her daughter complained about the incident to a vice principal and that the boy was expelled for several days. After the boy returned, Hayden said, she called the principal wanting to know why he was not permanently barred from campus. The principal declined to discuss the punishment, citing privacy concerns, according to Hayden.

“Everybody knew about this kid,” Hayden said.

The shooter used his older brother’s shotgun, Sheriff Donny Youngblood said. He had extra ammunition in his pocket.

In response to the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School, the White House is now considering federal funding for schools that want to hire police officers and increase surveillance, California Sen. Barbara Boxer told NBC. The NRA, derided for proposing armed guards at schools, isn’t going to go along if it’s part of a bill also calling for a ban on high-capacity ammunition clips.

Filed Under: Bullying, Violence Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Student suspended for Sandy Hook poem

January 2, 2013 by

A San Francisco high school senior was suspended — and could be expelled — for writing a poem about the Sandy Hook massacre. “I know why he pulled the trigger,” wrote Courtni Webb, 17, in a notebook. She thinks gunman Adam Lanza felt isolated and unloved.

Webb goes to the Life Learning Academy, a small charter school for “troubled” students, including those with arrest records. It has a “zero tolerance” policy against violence, which school administrators say the poem violated. A letter to Courtni’s mother said the poem “contained deeply concerning, and threatening language.”

Here’s part of the poem:

They wanna hold me back
I run but still they still attack
My innocence, I won’t get back
I used to smile
They took my kindness for weakness
The silence the world will never get
I understand the killing in Conecticut
I know why he pulled the trigger
The government is a shame
Society never wants to take the blame
Society puts these thoughts in our head
Misery loves company
If I can’t be loved no one can

Writing about violence isn’t the same as wanting to commit violence, says Courtni.

The poem doesn’t read like a threat to me.

 

Filed Under: Safety, Violence, Zero Tolerance Tagged With: , , , ,

Lawyer withdraws Newtown suit — for now

January 2, 2013 by

That $100 million lawsuit claiming Connecticut failed to protect Sandy Hook Elementary students has been withdrawn, but could be refiled.

“I received new evidence on security at the school, which I need to evaluate,” (lawyer Irving) Pinsky said Monday.

The suit was filed in the name of “Jill Doe,” a six-year-old girl who survived the massacre but allegedly was traumatized by hearing screams, cursing and gunshots on the intercom. Pinsky said the suit’s goal was to improve school safety, not to make money. Of course.

Filed Under: Children, Safety, Violence Tagged With: , , , ,

The Sandy Hook lawsuits begin

December 31, 2012 by

Twenty children and six adults were gunned down at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Now the parents of a 6-year-old survivor are suing the school for $100 million because their child heard “cursing, screaming, and shooting” over the school intercom. “As a consequence, the … child has sustained emotional and psychological trauma and injury, the nature and extent of which are yet to be determined,” the claim said.

Why should the school be held responsible? asks Jazz Shaw on Hot Air.

The lawsuit claims the children were not protected from “foreseeable harm” because officials had failed to provide a “safe school setting” or design “an effective student safety emergency response plan and protocol.”

Sandy Hook Elementary’s doors were locked, writes Doug Mataconis, a lawyer, on Outside the Beltway. Adam Lanza shot his way in.

. . . teachers and aides did everything they could to evacuate the building or get the children into areas where they’d be hidden and safe. One teacher lost her life protecting her children from Lanza’s murderous spree. What, exactly, is it that this family asserts the school could have reasonably done differently? Perhaps they need to count their blessings, be glad their child is safe, and stop looking for a pot of gold out of this horrible tragedy.

I agree. Sandy Hook had a reasonable level of security for an elementary school — everything but armed guards. We can’t foresee and prevent every possible horror.

Here are the names of Adam Lanza’s victims.

Filed Under: Safety, Violence Tagged With: , , , , , ,

From PS22 to Sandy Hook Elementary

December 22, 2012 by

As a tribute to the children of Newtown and their families, the chorus at New York City’s PS22 sings Sandy Hook Elementary’s school song.

Filed Under: Children, Violence Tagged With: ,
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