Thursday, May 01, 2008

What can you do about school shootings?

What can you do about school shootings?
Photo credit: CNN

Shots are fired many times a day in many, many communities. What's make it any less likely that it'll occur on a school campus? What makes it more likely? They are "gun-free" zones!

These two examples of school shootings or suspected threats of same from a Google News query from items which occurred today(!):

Lockdown at Florida college after gunfire - CNN.com

(CNN) -- Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton instituted a campus lockdown early Wednesday, following an outbreak of gunfire at a school dormitory.

Police are looking for an unidentified male suspect after shots were fired around 1:15 a.m. at University Village Apartments, said FAU Deputy Police Chief Keith Totten.

"The suspect -- at this time -- we have been unable to locate," Totten said. "Due to that, we activated the emergency notification systems on campus ... and closed all the campus entries."

Do you think that if the subject of this search was actually intent on killing several students and/or faculty that he would've been successful?

Scare Prompts School Lockdown

(KSFY) -- A scare at O'Gorman High School prompted a lockdown for about a half-hour Thursday morning.

Around 9:45, the school got a report of two people in the building wearing camouflage military jackets with their faces painted.

The school was locked down until about 10:15, when police determined the two were actually drama students in a different part of the building than expected.

Officials say freshman were in a drama class practicing applying makeup. Two boys had dressed in that military attire and then wandered to show their friends.

Administrators called for the lockdown to look for the students, but other classmates say it was a scary experience.

"I thought it was kind of a joke at first. Just because it was a drill. But then I kinda had this panicky feeling like oh my gosh like shaking almost and everyone around me was kind of like scared," said Freshman Kristy Kayser.

"We kind of freaked out. We were all quiet and nobody really knew, some of us were praying, some of us were trying to keep a straight face, just act like nothing's going on. We were wondering what our parents were thinking because we didn't want them to be worried because we were in a safe place," said Sophomore Josh Duus.

The response to the scare was, what? Make sure all of the students were "locked down." In other words, stationary targets. Again, had the two students been real killers, what do you think would've happened?

You may not be aware that these types of incidents occur nearly every week. Are you and your child prepared?

For more information:

TDA School Attacks - take your safety into your own hands? - UPDATED
Convocation of Combat Arts Thread Compliance with a school shooter
Self Defense Sense Nugent: Gun-free zones are recipe for disaster
Self Defense Sense Eyewitness Accounts at Virginia Tech
Wikipedia (pretty comprehensive) School shooting
Kicksboxes A TRAGEDY ON CAMPUS
Good NY Times article In an Era of School Shootings, a New Drill

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