By Colonel Mark T. Lisi, US Army (Retired)
There is no question that it’s society’s responsibility to safeguard children. This very basic social requirement is often neglected, and the children of the world are violated and targeted by evil. Here, in the Greatest Country in the World, evil targets our most precious resource in what should be the safest of all places, our schools.
They say, “it takes a village to raise a child”; but the entire village must be ENGAGED in the process. The reason it requires the entire village is that evil lurks in the shadows. Evil must be identified, segregated, and eliminated or it will manifest itself.
The horrific problem of school shootings is massive in scope and does not start with a shooter at the school door. Nor is the focal point the act or the weapon. The ugly truth is that a school building is a perfect shooting gallery and once in the school, the weapon of choice doesn’t really alter the outcome. The event must be examined from the beginning and the media only examines the outcome and the tool.
What causes a person to decide to hurt children in large groups? What message is being sent? The pieces of this puzzle are many and complex. School is the nexus of social interaction for young people and perhaps this is where the answers can be found.
Schools are an intersection of social, political, and behavioral activities. These activities are shaped by local, state and federal rules, regulations and laws. Most basic is the requirement for all children to attend school. There they are exposed to the topics du jour and become the vessels of those shaping the environment and information flow.
School and home are the first places dangerous behavior is manifest; where the first pieces of this terrible puzzle are shaped and stored. A child doesn’t simply get up one morning and decide to walk to school with a gun. There ARE signs, but they must be acted upon. The sad reality is that they rarely are.
The knee-jerk reaction to a school shooting is to attack the pieces that are obvious: the shooter and the weapon. The liberal media is alive with grand plans and ideas that will stop the shooter and reduce or eliminate this sort of terroristic event forever more. Balderdash! This is just a bunch of talking heads quacking and slapping band aids on a metastasizing cancer. The school-shooting problem cannot be solved with the information generated after the fact. Schools, parents, and local governments cannot listen to the talking heads whose only contribution to the solution is another sound bite. Once the event starts, it becomes a terrorist act (without regard to political view) with the destruction of young lives its only aim.
We can’t turn every school into a neighborhood gulag in the hopes it will safeguard the student population. Oppression on this level speaks to some very dark countries that have particularly oppressive governments and societies. That is NOT the “American Way.” However, it may not be the smartest idea to label the school building as a “Gun-Free Zone” (aka “soft target”). That sort of thing just makes the armed intruder the boss. Common sense must prevail in this discussion.
The gateway to the solution is found at the local level. I don’t believe arming teachers, more police or a volunteer force of school guards is the solution. One shooter in the school is too many and the security force only serves to compound the problem. Although, once the event is underway, direct fire is the only way to stop it.
All the stakeholders in public education must be called together. They must review the data in a dispassionate manner and agree to a common problem set. This is no easy task. The problem will be found in the shooter, in many cases a student (or former student) in the targeted school. This places responsibility squarely in the lap of the municipality, the school district, and school board. These are the organizations that set the educational conditions for all the local schools. If there is any consideration given to “school shootings,” it’s always law-enforcement centric and after the fact. Stopping these events before they happen is the ONLY acceptable solution.
There are some hard facts that must embraced during this discussion. “The Bell Curve” is in effect in every population; yes, even populations of school children. The left side of the curve is alive and well in every school building, every day. Is this the population that spawns the shooter of tomorrow? The leadership needs to know.
This is an ugly topic to have to write about. However, if this problem isn’t cast into the harsh light of day, it will never be resolved. School shootings appear to belong to the citizens who have come of age in the 1990s and 2000s: children of the smart phone, Internet, and video games. Is there a message hidden inside that data? Only the very smart guys know, and it doesn’t seem like they’re talking.
What is known is that sick people choose to target our most vulnerable population. Everyone will agree that school buildings should be the safest of all places for children to gather. Most states require all school-age children to attend school. The State, then, plays a specified role in safeguarding schools. Often this requirement is pushed to local law enforcement and even the school district. Do any of these levels of government or school districts take school safety seriously? The same districts that put “Gun-Free Zone” signs on every school. That the “gun-free zone” concept may be sound is debatable, but does that sign make ANY sense? Perhaps it does to a would-be shooter.
THE SCHOOL – Districts can’t turn all their school buildings into gulags or prison camps as a function of school safety. This fact makes safeguarding the building problematic. A single, controlled point of entry is essential to ensure that bad people do not get into the building. If the wolf can be kept out of the building, the school and first responders still have the upper hand and can be proactive in reducing the impact of the event. Once the shooter is in the building, his basic aims have been met, and the shooter has the initiative.
School building safety and access management is a very practical topic. It’s a concrete discussion that balances social, educational and environmental issues against the horrors of an active shooter inside the walls. The Center for Crime and Justice Policy, University of Nevada, Las Vegas conducted a study published in December 2014 that “provides an assessment of a K12 school shooting prevention effort in Clark County, Nevada. The School Violence Initiative (SVI) was developed and implemented in response to a series of school shootings that occurred between 2004 and 2008. The SVI represents a formal collaboration between several police agencies in Clark County.”
“Eleven school shootings occurred in Clark County between 2004 and 2008. Based on an analysis of these incidents and problems identified with existing response strategies, police developed and implemented the School Violence Initiative (SVI). Since the implementation of the SVI in early March 2008, no shootings have occurred at Clark County schools. The numbers of weapons reported and recovered on school properties also have declined substantially.”
The CCJP, UNLV study suggests that committed professionals focused on sound analysis and cultural change can find ways to safeguard schools. This also begs the question: Why have the strategies of the Clark County School District School Violence Initiative not been reviewed and put in place across the Nation?
School districts that do not like or endorse the Clark County plan are free to do their own analysis and craft a district-unique plan, but a workable plan must be put in place. Now!
EMERGENCY ACTION PLAN -Every school building must have an approved “Emergency Action Plan” (EAP) that is published and rehearsed. Everyone, administrators, staff, service staff, and the students must know, understand, and be able to execute the EAP. Execution of the EAP facilitates the actions of the first responders and aids in accountability.
All of this starts with the identification of the intruder and the intruder’s intent. If gunfire is the first indication of a problem, it’s too late. The building must have an instantaneous signal that means only one thing: “Intruder in the building!” What that signal is and how it’s transmitted is NOT important. That it’s clear and reaches every part of the school IS important: classrooms, administrative spaces, lunchroom, and gym…all of it! Every person in the school family must know where to go and what to do without hesitation. Safety and accountability are paramount at this point in the event. These skills and the ability to execute them may well add an incalculable level of safety to the school population.
Time is the enemy here. An active shooter in the building OWNS the situation. The “good guys” are now forced into a reactive position. The school EAP may well support the first responders and protect the student body by keeping the shooter away from the intended victims. Evacuation is another tool that can be planned for and rehearsed. Like fire in a building, if the children are near the fire, get them out. Adults must lead the escape and they must be visually identifiable. Perhaps orange reflective vests are a good solution. Strangers roaming in the hallways will be considered targets for the first responders.
Clearing the school is not a job for educators. In my opinion, merely “arming teachers” is not a sound solution. Gun-on-gun conflict (gun fighting) is a very perishable skillset, and just because teachers may have guns does not necessarily mean they are adequately skilled with them or that they will have the resolve to use “deadly force” when the time comes. But make no mistake, the only solution to an active shooter inside a school building is deadly force. While law enforcement officers have the training and the legal support to use deadly force when required, the reality is that it takes time to gather and assemble them. An armed and trained staff member can put the right tool at the critical place.
Again, time is the enemy. The alarm goes out and it takes time for the appropriate formation to be notified, gathered, equipped and moved to the school. All the while, the active shooter is in the school. The school’s EAP and the staff’s ability to execute that plan will prove to be beyond value if executed vigorously. The currency of this task is the lives of the children.
STOPPING THE SHOOTER – In all likelihood, this will be the role of a local law enforcement agency. Schools might have full-time peace officers who may encounter and defeat the intruder at the door. However, this best-case outcome will be rare indeed. The shooter getting into the school, making his intentions known, and acting on them will mark the beginning of the event. The school’s EAP will serve to protect the students and staff, as well as make the law enforcement officers’ job less complex.
To clear the school rapidly, the EAP must help law enforcement identify safe/secure rooms/spaces, code words to communicate with teachers in secure rooms, escape routes, when to use them, and visual clues to be used to help safeguard the student population. Signals like the universal hand signal that states “I am in danger.”
Law enforcement officers are trained in how to clear a building, but the effectiveness of law-enforcement response in recent events has been less than stellar. A school is a shooting gallery from both the perspective of the school shooter and the rescue force. Care must be taken. There’s no room for collateral damage in a school. It must be a precision event with two goals: (1.) Save the children and staff and (2.) Render the shooter inert.
The identification of the “right” individuals or organizations that can effectively respond to a school intruder/ shooter is important. If responding to a school shooting remains the synergistic spin-ex that it has proven to be, the outcome will not change. The entire culture of education must embrace that this ongoing threat is real and begin to analyze the facts and develop plans that can be put into action.
The bottom line: It is the duty of the school and district to make the school safe. This is not accomplished by hand wringing and carping against gun ownership. It’s old-fashioned hard work developing a good plan that can rehearsed and put into action at the flip of a switch.
About the author: Mark T. Lisi is a retired US Army Infantry Colonel who was also an educator and coach at a middle school. He served in Afghanistan in the Army and as a contractor in Iraq after he retired. Currently, he’s a USPSA Chief Range Officer and a classified pistol shooter in USPSA and IDPA. References: School Violence Prevention in Nevada by Tamara D. Madensen, Ph.D., William H. Sousa, Ph.D., Joel D. Lieberman, Ph.D., and Joseph Belmonte, B.A. UNLV, Center for Crime and Justice Policy, Research in Brief, December 2014 CCPJ 2014-05 https://www.unlv.edu/sites/default/files/page_files/27/ SchoolViolencePrevention.pdf US Secret Service National Threat Assessment Center: Protecting Americas Schools, A U.S. Secret Service Analysis of Targeted School Violence, 2019 (page 11) https://www.secretservice.gov/sites/default/files/2020-04/ Protecting_Americas_Schools.pdf