Public education needs to improve active shooter safety on campus

Sydney Carpenter | News Editor

Gun control is an exhausted conversation that ultimately divides people. The arguments lead to more arguments that lead to people being angry and nothing being accomplished. When all is said and done, neither side is able to persuade the other and we are still left with the issue of school shootings. In 1970, the Center for Homeland Security recorded eight students were killed on campus from gun violence ⏤ a 237.5% difference to 2018’s 27 fatalities. My question is, if we aren’t able to come to any kind of agreement on guns, why do we keep on fighting with each other? Let’s talk about the real issue of protecting students and staff from school shooters.

A 2018 USA Today article entitled “How secure are our schools? Since Columbine they are locked tightly, research shows” states that , “The year of the massacre at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., just 19% of schools said they used security cameras to monitor buildings. By the 2013-14 school year, 75% had the devices up and running.”

This statement proves that schools are upgrading security. Additionally, according to GuardianBooth.com, the number of schools implementing school resource officers has grown from 13% in 1994 to 57% in 2018. 

In addition to upgraded security, most schools have implemented lock down procedures. While many schools say that their lock down drills prepare students and teachers for if a gunman were to enter the school, many safety officials argue that existing lock down drill policies are not effective. 

According to an interview conducted in 2012 by ABC News, former SWAT officer Greg Crane stated, “most schools tell teachers to lock their doors and sit quietly until help arrives. We don’t recommend just locking a door because locked doors have been defeated before.”  

When I read this interview, the first thing that came to my mind was the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting. The gunman, a former student of the school, was familiar with the school’s emergency plans and rendered that preparation useless with a flick of a fire alarm. This is an example of school safety needing to adapt to situations like these.

At Western we don’t even have lockdown drills. We have fire drills and earthquake drills — why not active shooter drills? I understand that universities are larger than high schools, but the university could randomize a few buildings each month that could practice. At least the resident halls should practice a lockdown drill once a term as they do with fire drills. 

In the emergency procedures pamphlet for Western, there is a whole section dedicated to active shooters, and it lists a procedure known as ALICE ⏤ alert, lockdown, inform, counter and evacuate. In their procedures, the plans reflect a high school lockdown, but their plans constitute half a pamphlet page. The other half of the page is dedicated to how the news of the shooting will be relayed to media outlets. Why are we using half of a page to talk about how the information is going to be conveyed to the media? Why not use the entire page to include or expand on plans in the event of an emergency? We could even have video orientations made available on our portal.

My point is, we exhaust ourselves by fighting with each other over gun control when neither side is going to be swayed. We have come a long way since Columbine, and after the Parkland shooting, new gun legislation in Florida was passed because of students marching for their lives. However, the buildings in which these tragedies happened still need to be secure. If we invest a little more time and energy in preparing the places where they happen, maybe it would help students feel more secure.

Contact the author at scarpenter18@mail.wou.edu