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Is Gun Control The Answer to School Shootings?

The standard script after mass shootings goes like this: Democrats make the case for passing more stringent policies about what types of firearms are available and who can own them; Republicans make the argument for Second Amendment rights because “guns don’t kill people; people kill people.”

But what does the evidence say?

There is a large body of data on policies and programs shown to prevent gun violence, and the vast majority of successful interventions take a public health approach to this deadly problem.

First, let’s take a look at the big picture : More than 45,000 people died from gun violence in 2020 (That’s the most recent year data are available). This represents a 25% increase from 2015 and a 43% increase from 2010.

Drilling down to specific states, the evidence is clear that the states with lower rates of gun deaths have the strongest gun violence prevention policies.

The five states with the lowest gun death rates (Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Rhode Island and New York) have two standard safety measures in place: a licensing system to make sure that people purchasing firearms are allowed to have them and an extreme risk protection order law, which temporarily prohibits people prone to violence (e.g., violent criminal offenders or those who have survived a suicide attempt) from purchasing a firearm.

Conversely, all five of the states with the highest rates of gun deaths (Mississippi, Louisiana, Wyoming, Missouri and Alabama) have “stand your ground” legislation, which allows citizens to use deadly force to defend themselves against crime. And three of these states (and since the study was conducted, a fourth), have laws which allow citizens to carry a concealed weapon in public without a permit.

While gun safety policies are one solution, working with individuals at risk of carrying out violence provides another clear path to saving lives. In 2013, the American Psychological Associatio n took an evidence-based look at the motivations that drive people to commit acts of gun violence, and programs designed to prevent these tragedies.

At its core, the report found there are complex reasons that people resort to gun violence, which differ for every situation.

“For this reason, there is no single profile that can reliably predict who will use a gun in a violent act,” the authors wrote. But they find evidence that can help predict which individuals are most likely to commit acts of violence with firearms, and programs proven to prevent gun violence.

The most consistent and powerful predictor that someone will resort to gun violence is a history of violent behavior, the report found. Other than previous violence, gun violence is related to a combination of individual, family, school, peer, community, and social risk factors that interact over time during childhood and adolescence.

The report identified prevention programs found to reduce the likelihood that firearms will be introduced into conflicts. One successful program, called Behavioral Threat Assessment, relies on a team of people spread throughout an organization – such as a school or workplace – who work to identify suspicious, disruptive, or unusual behaviors, and then report these to law enforcement. Research finds this method is one of the most effective ways to prevent potential acts of gun violence in public spaces.

Males commit the most gun violence. The report suggested that psychologists need to develop programs that change male gender expectations of toughness, and violence. There are currently youth programs to help develop new social norms around what it means to be masculine, but additional studies are needed to assess whether these program help reduce the risk of violence among participants.

Most people suffering from a mental illness are not dangerous, the report found. For the few who become violent as a result of a mental health problem, medical treatment helps to prevent violence. But because most people with mental illnesses in the U.S. don’t receive adequate services, it is difficult to identify people who may be a potential threat. Offering more comprehensive mental health care regardless of insurance status is another avenue for reducing violence.

Policies that prevent high-risk groups from obtaining guns — including domestic violence offenders, people convicted of violent misdemeanor crimes, and people with mental illness and a history of violence —reduce violence, the report found. In addition, public health campaigns on safe gun storage can help reduce accidental gun deaths and prevent violent individuals from having access to guns.

The take-home message: There are evidence-based solutions to help prevent the senseless tragedies that result from gun violence. Although there is not one magic solution, the data show that a broad set of policies and programs would make a difference.

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School shootings: What we know about them, and what we can do to prevent them

Subscribe to the brown center on education policy newsletter, robin m. kowalski, ph.d. robin m. kowalski, ph.d. professor, department of psychology - clemson university @cuprof.

January 26, 2022

On the morning of Nov. 30, 2021, a 15-year-old fatally shot four students and injured seven others at his high school in Oakland County, Michigan. It’s just one of the latest tragedies in a long line of the horrific K-12 school shootings now seared into our memories as Americans.

And we have seen that the threat of school shootings, in itself, is enough to severely disrupt schools. In December, a TikTok challenge known as “ National Shoot Up Your School Day ” gained prominence. Although vague and with no clear origin, the challenge warned of possible acts of violence at K-12 schools. In response, some schools nationwide cancelled classes, others stepped up security. Many students stayed home from school that day. (It’s worth noting that no incidents of mass violence ended up occurring.)

What are the problems that appear to underlie school shootings? How can we better respond to students that are in need? If a student does pose a threat and has the means to carry it out, how can members of the school community act to stop it? Getting a better grasp of school shootings, as challenging as it might be, is a clear priority for preventing harm and disruption for kids, staff, and families. This post considers what we know about K-12 school shootings and what we might do going forward to alleviate their harms.

Who is perpetrating school shootings?

As the National Association of School Psychologists says, “There is NO profile of a student who will cause harm.” Indeed, any attempt to develop profiles of school shooters is an ill-advised and potentially dangerous strategy. Profiling risks wrongly including many children who would never consider committing a violent act and wrongly excluding some children who might. However, while an overemphasis on personal warning signs is problematic, there can still be value in identifying certain commonalities behind school shootings. These highlight problems that can be addressed to minimize the occurrence of school shootings, and they can play a pivotal role in helping the school community know when to check in—either with an individual directly or with someone close to them (such as a parent or guidance counselor). Carefully integrating this approach into a broader prevention strategy helps school personnel understand the roots of violent school incidents and assess risks in a way that avoids the recklessness of profiling.

Within this framework of threat assessment, exploring similarities and differences of school shootings—if done responsibly—can be useful to prevention efforts. To that end, I recently published a study with colleagues that examined the extent to which features common to school shootings prior to 2003 were still relevant today. We compared the antecedents of K-12 shootings, college/university shootings, and other mass shootings.

We found that the majority of school shooters are male (95%) and white (61%) –yet many of these individuals feel marginalized. Indeed, almost half of those who perpetrate K-12 shootings report a history of rejection, with many experiencing bullying. One 16-year-old shooter wrote , “I feel rejected, rejected, not so much alone, but rejected. I feel this way because the day-to-day treatment I get usually it’s positive but the negative is like a cut, it doesn’t go away really fast.” Prior to the Parkland shooting, the perpetrator said , “I had enough of being—telling me that I’m an idiot and a dumbass.” A 14-year-old shooter stated in court, “I felt like I wasn’t wanted by anyone, especially my mom. ” These individuals felt rejected and insignificant.

Our study also found that more than half of K-12 shooters have a history of psychological problems (e.g., depression, suicidal ideation, bipolar disorder, and psychotic episodes). The individuals behind the Sandy Hook and Columbine shootings, among others, had been diagnosed with an assortment of psychological conditions. (Of course, the vast majority of children with diagnosed psychological conditions don’t commit an act of mass violence. Indeed, psychologists and psychiatrists have warned that simply blaming mental illness for mass shootings unfairly stigmatizes those with diagnoses and ignores other, potentially more salient factors behind incidents of mass violence.) For some, the long-term rejection is compounded by a more acute rejection experience that immediately precedes the shooting. While K-12 school shooters were less likely than other mass shooters to experience an acute, traumatic event shortly before the shooting, these events are not uncommon.

Many shooters also display a fascination with guns and/or a preoccupation with violence. They play violent video games, watch violent movies, and read books that glorify violence and killing. Several of the shooters showed a particular fascination with Columbine, Hitler, and/or Satanism. They wrote journals or drew images depicting violence and gore. The continued exposure to violence may desensitize individuals to violence and provide ideas that are then copied in the school shootings.

To reiterate, however, there is no true profile of a school shooter. Plenty of people are bullied in middle and high school without entertaining thoughts of shooting classmates. Similarly, making and breaking relationships goes along with high school culture, yet most people who experience a break-up do not think of harming others. Anxiety and depression are common, especially in adolescence, and countless adolescents play violent video games without committing acts of violence in real life. Even if some commonalities are evident, we must recognize their limits.

What can we do?

Understanding the experiences of school shooters can reveal important insights for discerning how to prevent school shootings. So, what might we do about it?

First, the problems that appear to underlie some school shootings, such as bullying and mental-health challenges, need attention—and there’s a lot we can do. School administrators and educators need to implement bullying prevention programs, and they need to pay attention to the mental-health needs of their students. One way to do this is to facilitate “ psychological mattering ” in schools. Students who feel like they matter—that they are important or significant to others—are less likely to feel isolated, ostracized, and alone. They feel confident that there are people to whom they can turn for support. To the extent that mattering is encouraged in schools, bullying should decrease. Typically, we don’t bully people who are important or significant to us.

Second, because most of the perpetrators of K-12 shootings are under the age of 18, they cannot legally acquire guns. In our study , handguns were used in over 91% of the K-12 shootings, and almost half of the shooters stole the gun from a family member. Without guns, there cannot be school shootings. Clearly more needs to be done to keep guns out of the hands of youth in America.

Third, students, staff, and parents must pay attention to explicit signals of an imminent threat. Many shooters leak information about their plans well before the shooting. They may create a video, write in a journal, warn certain classmates not to attend school on a particular day, brag about their plans, or try to enlist others’ help in their plot. Social media has provided a venue for children to disclose their intentions. Yet, students, parents, and educators often ignore or downplay the warning signs of an imminent threat. Students often think their peers are simply expressing threats as a way of garnering attention. Even if the threats are taken seriously, an unwritten code of silence keeps many students from reporting what they see or hear. They don’t want to be a snitch or risk being the target of the would-be shooter’s rage. With this in mind, educators and administrators need to encourage reporting among students—even anonymously—and need to take those reports extremely seriously. Helpful information for teachers, administrators, and parents can be found at SchoolSafety.gov . In addition, Sandy Hook Promise provides information about school violence and useful videos for young people about attending to the warning signs that often accompany school shootings.

Fourth, school leaders should be aware that not every apparent act of prevention is worth the costs. Some people believe that lockdown drills, metal detectors, school resource officers, and the like are useful deterrents to school shootings and school violence more broadly. However, researchers have also demonstrated that they can increase anxiety and fear among students . Students may also become habituated to the drills, failing to recognize the seriousness of an actual threat should it arise. Additionally, most K-12 shooters are students within the school itself. These students are well-versed in the security measures taken by the school to try to deter acts of violence by individuals such as themselves. While few would suggest getting rid of lockdown drills and other security measures, educators and administrators need to be mindful of the rewards versus the costs in their selection of safety measures.

Ultimately, our goal should be creating an environment in which school shootings never occur. This is an ambitious aim, and it will be challenging work. But addressing some key issues, such as mental health, will go a long way toward preventing future tragedies in our schools. As so aptly demonstrated in the Ted Talk, “ I was almost a school shooter ,” by Aaron Stark, making someone feel that they have value and that they matter can go a long way toward altering that individual’s life and, consequently, the lives of others.

Why do school shootings keep happening in the United States?

Vcu homeland security expert william v. pelfrey jr. answers this question and more., share this story.

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By Joan Tupponce

The first thought that raced through William Pelfrey Jr.’s mind when he heard the breaking news about the school shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, was typical of any parent with young kids.

“It made me want to get into my vehicle and drive to their schools,” said Pelfrey, Ph.D., an expert in the field of homeland security, terrorism and radicalization and a professor of homeland security/emergency preparedness and criminal justice in the L. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs at Virginia Commonwealth University. “From a professional perspective, it reminded me there are too many people with guns, the wrong people with guns and that nothing is going to change.”

Guns are now the leading cause of death among children and adolescents in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. No other developed economy has as many violent firearm deaths as the U.S., according to the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.

“School shootings happen in the U.S. at an alarming rate, but they rarely happen elsewhere in the world. Eighty or 90 percent of all the school shootings in the world happen in the U.S. They are concentrated here,” Pelfrey said.

How did the U.S. get to this point and what can be done? Pelfrey fields those questions and more with VCU News.

Why does this keep happening?

It’s a simple question, but the answers are extremely complicated. There are some political overtones to it. Guns are ubiquitous in the U.S. There are more guns than people. The U.S. population is about 334 million and the number of guns in the U.S. is more than 390 million (according to a report by the Small Arms Survey, a Geneva-based organization). We have the highest civilian gun ownership in the world by a huge margin. That’s an extraordinary number relative to the rest of the world. The next countries that have as many guns are war-torn countries like Serbia or Yemen.

Another element is school safety is not as high as it should be. It’s easy to maintain basic school safety but not everybody does a good job of that.

A third element is social media, a component that revolves around how people make it OK on social media to act on violence. There is a faction of government, particularly a right-wing government element, that condones or encourages violence. They do so in an oblique way saying something like, “Our country is under threat. We have to stand up and protect our country. We need to take up arms to defend our country, our way of life.” When you do that, you are condoning acts that are dangerous. The U.S. border is populated by a lot of citizens who have dubbed themselves border protection and they stand at the border with guns waiting for someone to illegally cross the border and they take them into custody even though they are not law enforcement.

How do you categorize mass shootings?

Some are artifacts of bullying. A victim of bullying decides they are going to respond with extreme violence, and it’s usually not against their perpetrators. It’s a show of force to demonstrate they won’t be bullied again. They can stand up for themselves. That describes Sandy Hook and Columbine and some other shootings.

The second category of mass shootings is domestic terrorism. Those people had been self-radicalized on social media and believe their actions represent a higher good. What they are doing is for a bigger purpose than themselves. They are willing to die, almost like a suicide terrorist, to further the goals of the theology they support.

A lot of people don’t fit into either category. The mass shooting era began with Charles Whitman in 1966 when he climbed a bell tower at the University of Texas and started shooting people. He did that because he had a tumor in his brain. There was no kind of pattern, but it created a behavioral matrix that has been followed by any number of people in the U.S.

How easy is it to buy a gun?

In the U.S., you can walk into a gun store and buy as many assault rifles as you want if you have cash and are over 18 and you meet just a couple of other loose criteria. Guns are so easily obtained that it’s easy to commit violent crime. We don’t do a good job in our criminal justice system of prohibiting people that probably shouldn’t have them from securing guns.

In most countries there are tests you have to take. You have to demonstrate you need a gun for a specific reason. You have to pass a gun ownership exam to show you can use it safely. You have to maintain license requirements. We don’t do any of that in the U.S. We are going the other way. Texas last year made it easier for people to get a gun in what was already an incredibly permissive state.

What types of guns are especially dangerous to own?

Assault weapons — assault rifles and assault pistols. We don’t track who buys them. You go into a gun store and buy a gun. A criminal background check is run, but no one keeps track of what you bought or how much you paid for it or what you do with it when you walk out the door. You could buy 20 assault rifles, drive to Washington, D.C., and sell them and nobody knows it because there is no reporting mechanism to identify that you sold the guns.

It is a crime to sell a gun to a convicted felon or to take them out of state to sell. But our penalties are so lax that it’s not a deterrent. A straw buyer is a person who buys guns legally and then illegally sells them for profit. There are a small number of gun stores that welcome straw buyers and subsequently represent easy funnels for guns in illegal locations. Straw buyers go to stores where they know they can walk in with $30,000 or $40,000 in cash and walk out with a bunch of pistols and assault rifles and go back to the streets and sell those guns, especially in cities with restrictive gun laws. That’s one of the cheap mechanisms for guns getting into the hands of criminals.

Why is screening a person who wants to buy a gun so important?

There are people who should have red flags that would preclude gun ownership, but we don’t have that in place. We could look over the past 20 or so years at some of the major school shootings like Parkwood (Florida); Newtown (Connecticut); Columbine (Colorado); Uvalde (Texas); even the shooting in Buffalo (New York). These were people that had a history of mental illness or a history of being bullied and were threatening to lash out. People don’t seem to connect the risk factors to gun ownership and the propensity for subsequent violence. And that is just a tragedy.

What is the role of social media in all of this?

It has a powerful role because of far-right extremism. The Buffalo shooter was a self-radicalized domestic terrorist. He had a strongly held belief about the infringement of races on the Caucasian race. He was an avid follower of far-right extremists’ diatribe and used some of what he found as rationalization to act and commit violence.

Not true for every shooter. In Columbine, Newtown, Uvaldi, these were bullied misfits. They didn’t fit in groups and had a history of being marginalized by their peers. They found a different path for getting even and that was through violence. But there is a different population and I believe it’s one of the most dangerous threats to the U.S. and that is far-right extremists, which inspired far-right violent extremists. Social media has a tremendous role in that. There is no single bad guy we can legitimize or take out. There are hundreds of podcasts and thousands of self-proclaimed thought leaders and they write really nasty, vicious stuff and have followers. Some of those people act on what they read. No government entity does a good job counter-messaging extremists.

How does bullying play into this?

Schools don’t do a great job with bullying prevention. One of my areas of research is bullying and cyberbullying. I’ve worked with schools, and we talk about bullying identification. Schools don’t do that until it’s too late. Schools need to adopt bullying and cyberbullying identification measures and then practice them. The best tactic I’ve seen is analogous to the “see something, say something” messaging that was rampant in New York after 9/11. That same logic can be applied in schools to enable citizens to get involved in terrorism prevention. Students can be empowered to identify bullies and then the school can come in to support fellow students.

Some people talk about arming teachers or school administrators. What do you think of that as a way of prevention?

Several years ago, Virginia considered doing that. I did a report for the Department of Criminal Justice Services in Virginia on the merits and risks of arming school personnel. Most high schools have an armed resource officer on scene, but most middle and elementary schools don’t. Arming teachers or school personnel is an incredibly dangerous enterprise that could lead to the death of that person because if police respond to a shooting and see someone with a gun, they are going to shoot them. Or, the teacher could accidentally shoot another staff member or police officer or, in the worst case, a student.

At Uvalde, there was a police resource officer on scene, at Columbine a school resource officer was on scene, at Parkland a school resource officer was on scene. If a trained police officer can’t prevent a school shooting, what are the chances that a teacher who is not well trained can prevent a school shooting? I think the odds are pretty low. I think the risk dramatically outweighs any potential benefits.

Can you talk about the opposite views we have in the U.S. about guns?

We live in a country with two competing paradigms. One thought paradigm is that everybody needs guns and then we will all be safe. The other is the exact opposite. Nobody should have guns and we will all be safe. Those two paradigms cannot coexist. They are diametrically opposed. But our political structure is such that they can’t be reconciled.

After the Sandy Hook shooting there was a huge motivation for gun control, limiting who could buy guns and the kind of guns people could buy. That faded away rapidly. I expect the same thing will happen here, and it’s depressing to say that, but I see very little political will to enact any meaningful changes.

Mass shootings are going to happen again. It’s a pattern. School shootings and mass shootings happen about every year or two in the U.S. and I guarantee that there is going to be another one in a year and another one after that and nothing is going to change until enough people develop a political will to support meaningful gun changes.

What predictions do you have for the future when it comes to gun laws?

I expect there will be some change in gun laws, but they won’t be substantial. It will provide political cover for some people to say we are doing things, we are making things safer, but they won’t make things safer. I expect gun sales will go up even more because people now feel like they have to protect themselves and their family members because the government isn’t doing that.

I also expect that there is going to be some investigation into police practices at Uvalde because police didn’t go into that school immediately. In fact, several police officers stood outside waiting for reinforcements to arrive. That is going to lead to internal investigation and also police policy changes, which I expect will become popular across the U.S. Many police departments implemented a policy suggesting officers need to go into a school and engage an active shooter no matter what. That didn’t happen in Uvalde. As a policing expert, I don’t know how that is possible.

Do people use mental health as a scapegoat for these shootings?

Yes, it’s an easy target. A lot of people point to mental health and say the U.S. needs more mental health funding. They disregard there was a gun that shot these people. Only a small percentage of these shootings were people that had been diagnosed with a mental illness. We want to rationalize this type of behavior. We want to understand it. We presume that the people who commit these vile acts are disturbed, that they are mentally ill, otherwise they are like us and that’s untenable.

It creates an easy political target that allows politicians to rationalize their failure to enact reasonable gun laws. We have laws about who can buy guns — you have to be 18, you can’t be a convicted felon. There are guns that are restrictive. It’s not legal to sell fully automatic weapons. You can’t buy a tank. But whenever reasonable gun restrictions are opposed or discussed, there is a small faction of citizens and politicians that go crazy, and that’s a tragedy.

Over the past 50 years there has only been one meaningful law passed limiting guns — the 1994 Federal Assault Weapons Ban, passed under President Bill Clinton. That expired 10 years later under a Republican president. When that expired, people began buying guns at a substantially higher rate than ever before. They presumed that under another Democratic president or Congress gun sales would be limited again. So assault rifles, which had been a small portion of gun purchases prior to the ban, became a big part of gun sales.

Estimates are that a quarter to a third of all guns sold now in the U.S. are assault rifle platforms. That is a big number. Seven years after the ban expired, guns sales had doubled. A few years later they doubled again. It’s amazing that the ban had a counter-productive effect, which is it dramatically increased gun sales and people’s motivations to buy guns, particularly assault rifles.

As a policing expert, there is no reason anyone who is not military or law enforcement should ever have an assault rifle. I come from a family of hunters. Every year we would go hunting. I know rifles and shotguns. An assault rifle is a vastly inferior tool for anything other than shooting people. It’s not good for hunting or self-defense. A shotgun or a pistol is more effective. There is no reason for a civilian to have an assault rifle, but they do.

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Uvalde elementary school shooting

Experts say we can prevent school shootings. here's what the research says.

Jeffrey Pierre

Cory Turner

School safety experts have coalesced around a handful of important measures communities and politicians can take to protect students. LA Johnson/NPR hide caption

School safety experts have coalesced around a handful of important measures communities and politicians can take to protect students.

Before the Golden State Warriors took to the court for a pivotal playoff game on Tuesday, Steve Kerr, the team's head coach and a vocal activist, stopped the pre-game interview to say that he didn't walk to talk about basketball. The news of the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, had visibly pushed him to tears. And instead of talking about the game, Kerr wanted to talk about why the shootings were becoming all too common.

27 school shootings have taken place so far this year

"There are 50 senators right now who refuse to vote on H.R. 8, which is a background check rule that the House passed a couple of years ago," Kerr said. "It's been sitting there for two years."

U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., was on the Senate floor, echoing a similar sentiment on Tuesday. "Why are you here," he said to his colleagues, "if not to solve a problem as existential as this."

Can Schools Use Federal Funds To Arm Teachers?

Tuesday's violence follows a familiar pattern of previous school shootings. After every one, there's been a tendency to ask, "How do we prevent the next one?"

For years, school safety experts, and even the U.S. Secret Service, have rallied around some very clear answers. Here's what they say.

It's not a good idea to arm teachers

There's broad consensus that arming teachers is not a good policy. That's according to Matthew Mayer, a professor at Rutgers Graduate School of Education. He's been studying school violence since before Columbine, and he's part of a group of researchers who have published several position papers about why school shootings happen.

In this aerial view, law enforcement works on scene after at shooting Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. Jordan Vonderhaar/Getty Images hide caption

In this aerial view, law enforcement works on scene after at shooting Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas.

Mayer says arming teachers is a bad idea "because it invites numerous disasters and problems, and the chances of it actually helping are so minuscule."

In 2018, a Gallup poll also found that most teachers do not want to carry guns in school, and overwhelmingly favor gun control measures over security steps meant to "harden" schools. When asked which specific measures would be "most effective" at preventing school shootings, 57% of teachers favored universal background checks, and the same number, 57%, also favored banning the sale of semiautomatic weapons such as the one used in the Parkland attack.

Raise age limits for gun ownership

School safety researchers support tightening age limits for gun ownership, from 18 to 21. They say 18 years old is too young to be able to buy a gun; the teenage brain is just too impulsive. And they point out that the school shooters in Parkland, Santa Fe, Newtown, Columbine and Uvalde were all under 21.

School safety researchers also support universal background checks and banning assault-style weapons . But it's not just about how shooters legally acquire firearms. A 2019 report from the Secret Service found that in half the school shootings they studied, the gun used was either readily accessible at home or not meaningfully secured.

Of course, schools don't have control over age limits and gun storage. But there's a lot they can still do.

Schools can support the social and emotional needs of students

A lot of the conversation around making schools safer has centered on hardening schools by adding police officers and metal detectors. But experts say schools should actually focus on softening to support the social and emotional needs of students .

"Our first preventative strategy should be to make sure kids are respected, that they feel connected and belong in schools," says Odis Johnson Jr., of Johns Hopkins University's Center for Safe and Healthy Schools.

Members of the community gather at the City of Uvalde Town Square for a prayer vigil in the wake of a mass shooting at Robb Elementary School. Jordan Vonderhaar/Getty Images hide caption

Members of the community gather at the City of Uvalde Town Square for a prayer vigil in the wake of a mass shooting at Robb Elementary School.

That means building kids' skills around conflict resolution, stress management and empathy for their fellow classmates – skills that can help reduce all sorts of unwanted behaviors, including fighting and bullying.

In its report, the Secret Service found most of the school attackers they studied had been bullied. And while we are still learning about what happened in Uvalde, early reports suggest the shooter there was a regular target of bullying.

Jackie Nowicki has led multiple school safety investigations at the U.S. Government Accountability Office. She and her team have identified some of things schools can do to make their classrooms and hallways feel safer, including "anti-bullying training for staff and teachers, adult supervision, things like hall monitors, and mechanisms to anonymously report hostile behaviors."

Active Shooter Drills May Not Stop A School Shooting — But This Method Could

The Secret Service recommends schools implement what they call a threat assessment model, where trained staff – including an administrator, a school counselor or psychologist, as well as a law enforcement representative – work together to identify and support students in crisis before they hurt others.

There's money to help schools pay for all this

One bit of good news: Because of pandemic federal aid, there's been a big jump in schools' willingness and ability to hire mental health support staff. According to the White House, with the help of federal COVID relief money, schools have seen a 65% increase in social workers, and a 17% increase in counselors.

NPR's Anya Kamenetz contributed to this story.

Did you know we tell audio stories, too? Listen to our podcasts like No Compromise, our Pulitzer-prize winning investigation into the gun rights debate, on Apple Podcasts and Spotify .

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Gun violence prevention in schools: Strategies and effects

What are schools doing to prepare against gun violence? We've gathered research on strategies and effects.

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by Chloe Reichel, The Journalist's Resource February 26, 2018

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In the wake of a school shooting, conversation can quickly turn from grief to prevention. School administrators, parents and politicians debate ideas ranging from restricting access to guns to arming teachers .

But what are schools already doing to prepare against gun violence? How do these preparations affect their students? Are these measures effective?

We’ve collected recent research that addresses these questions, along with a legal analysis of the issue and additional resources offered by national organizations.

“ Crime, Violence, Discipline, and Safety in U.S. Public Schools: Findings from the School Survey on Crime and Safety: 2015–16 ” Diliberti, M.; Jackson, M.; Kemp, J. U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, 2017.

Introduction: “This report presents findings on crime and violence in U.S. public schools, using data from the 2015–16 School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS:2016). First administered in school year 1999–2000 and repeated in school years 2003–04, 2005–06, 2007–08, 2009– 10, and 2015–16, SSOCS provides information on school crime-related topics from the perspective of schools. Developed and managed by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) within the Institute of Education Sciences of the U.S. Department of Education and supported by the National Institute of Justice of the U.S. Department of Justice, SSOCS asks public school principals about the prevalence of violent and serious violent crimes in their schools. Portions of this survey also focus on school security measures, disciplinary problems and actions, school security staff, the availability of mental health services in schools, and the programs and policies implemented to prevent and reduce crime in schools.”

“ School Shooting Simulations: At What Point Does Preparation Become More Harmful than Helpful? ” Rygg, Lauren. Children’s Legal Rights Journal , 2015.

Introduction: “This article will first discuss the background of school shootings in Part II, from the 1990s, to the most recent tragedies including Newtown, Arapahoe, and others. Part III will examine the legislative proposals and enacted legislation for the active shooter drills in various states, as well as any citizen complaints that have arisen as a result. Next, Part III will also explore how teachers are required to respond in these drills. Part IV will then discuss the efficacy of active shooter drills, whether this is the best approach to school safety, and the possibility of alternatives. Part V will look at the impact the legislation has for current and future students as well as potential results and overreached boundaries of the school districts, and any potential legal consequences.”

“ Parents’ Expectations of High Schools in Firearm Violence Prevention ” Payton, Erica; Khubchandani, Jagdish; Thompson, Amy; Price, James H. Journal of Community Health , 2017. DOI: 10.1007/s10900-017-0360-5.

Abstract: “Firearm violence remains a significant problem in the U.S. (with 2,787 adolescents killed in 2015). However, the research on school firearm violence prevention practices and policies is scant. Parents are major stakeholders in relation to firearm violence by youths and school safety in general. The purpose of this study was to examine what parents thought schools should be doing to reduce the risk of firearm violence in schools. A valid and reliable questionnaire was mailed to a national random sample of 600 parents who had at least one child enrolled in a public secondary school (response rate = 47 percent). Parents perceived inadequate parental monitoring/rearing practices (73 percent), peer harassment and/or bullying (58 percent), inadequate mental health care services for youth (54 percent), and easy access to guns (51 percent) as major causes of firearm violence in schools. The school policies perceived to be most effective in reducing firearm violence were installing an alert system in schools (70 percent), working with law enforcement to design an emergency response plan (70 percent), creating a comprehensive security plan (68 percent), requiring criminal background checks for all school personnel prior to hiring (67 percent), and implementing an anonymous system for students to report peer concerns regarding potential violence (67 percent). Parents seem to have a limited grasp of potentially effective interventions to reduce firearm violence.”

“ Danger K12: Are U.S. Schools Really Safe? ” Adkins, Vernita Lynn; et al. Paper presented at the conference of the International Journal of Arts & Sciences , 2016. ISSN: 1943-6114 :: 09(01):53–64.

Abstract: “Through a meta-analysis of the literature, this article addresses the essential components within a federal comprehensive public school safety system and proposes the implementation of a comprehensive school safety program for students in the U.S. K-12 public school system. Review of the literature explores two questions: 1) What constitutes a comprehensive safety plan for students in the K-12 public school system? 2) Why has a comprehensive federal school safety plan not been implemented for students in the U.S. K-12 public school system? The authors contend that addressing school safety in a comprehensive manner will help solve the current inconsistent implementation of school safety policies and procedures. We also contend that the current Safe Schools Improvement Act, amended in 2013 and the 2015 amendment proposal, focusing only on bullying and harassment, is inadequate to address the myriad of safety issues that impact schools.”

“ Playing at Violence: Lock-Down Drills, ‘Bad Guys’ and the Construction of ‘Acceptable’ Play in Early Childhood ” Delaney, Katherine K. Early Child Development and Care , 2017. DOI: 10.1080/03004430.2016.1219853.

Abstract: “This study examines how acceptable play was framed for a class of pre-Kindergarten children by their teacher and classroom aide. Using comic subjectivity theory, the author explores how children’s playing at pretend violence (bad guy and pretend gun play) is forbidden, but playing at real violence (in the form of active-shooter lock-down drills) positioned the children in the classroom as victims of violence, rather than agentic powerful players. As gun violence in the United States continues to invade school spaces, this paper critically examines how ‘acceptable’ play for young children is being framed and defined by outside forces rather than pedagogical and professional knowledge.”

“ Adding Security, but Subtracting Safety? Exploring Schools’ use of Multiple Visible Security Measures ” Tanner-Smith, Emily E.; et al. American Journal of Criminal Justice , 2018. DOI: 10.1007/s12103-017-9409-3.

Abstract: “In response to continued concerns over crime and violence, schools are increasingly employing visible security measures such as cameras, metal detectors, and security personnel. These security measures are not mutually exclusive, but few studies have considered the relationship between the use of multiple forms of security and youth’s exposure to drugs, fighting, property crime, and firearms at school. To address this issue, we analyzed nationally representative school administrator-reported data from the School Survey on Crime & Safety, using a quasi-experimental design with propensity scores to adjust for potential confounding factors. The results indicated that utilization of multiple security measures reduced the likelihood of exposure to property crime in high schools, but most other security utilization patterns were associated with poorer school safety outcomes. Our findings provide guidance to policymakers in considering whether to use — or expand — visible school security measures in schools.”

“ Law Enforcement Executive and Principal Perspectives on School Safety Measures: School Resource Officers and Armed School Employees ” Chrusciel, Margaret M.; et al. Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management , 2015. DOI: 10.1108/PIJPSM-11-2014-0115.

Findings: “There is a large amount of support for school resource officers from both law enforcement executives and principals. However, in general, both groups of respondents do not believe armed administrators or armed teachers to be an effective school safety strategy.”

“ Impacts of Metal Detector Use in Schools: Insights from 15 Years of Research ” Hankin, Abigail; Hertz, Marci; Simon, Thomas. Journal of School Health , 2011. DOI: 10.1111/j.1746-1561.2010.00566.x.

Results: “Each of the papers reviewed utilized data that originated from self-report surveys. Four of the studies consisted of secondary analyses of national databases, with the other 3 utilizing local surveys. The studies varied as to the outcome, ranging from student/staff perceptions of safety at school to student self-reports of weapon carrying and/or victimization, and showed mixed results. Several studies suggested potential detrimental effects of metal detectors on student perceptions of safety. One study showed a significant beneficial effect, linking metal detector use to a decrease in the likelihood that students reported carrying a weapon while in school (7.8 percent vs. 13.8 percent), without a change in weapon carrying in other settings or a decline in participation in physical fights.”

“ Reducing the Risks of Firearm Violence in High Schools: Principals’ Perceptions and Practices ” Price, James H.; et al. Journal of Community Health , 2016. DOI: 10.1007/s10900-015-0087-0.

Abstract: “This study assessed the perceptions and practices of a national sample of secondary school principals regarding reducing firearm violence in high schools. Data were collected via three-wave postal mailings. A 59-item valid and reliable questionnaire was mailed to a national random sample of 800 secondary school principals. Of the 349 principals (46 percent) that responded, 17 percent reported a firearm incident at their school in the past 5 years. Principals perceived inadequate parental monitoring (70 percent), inadequate mental health services (64 percent), peer harassment/bullying (59 percent), and easy access to firearms (50 percent) as the main causes of firearm violence in schools. The three barriers to implementing firearm violence prevention practices were: lack of expertise as to which practices to implement (33 percent), lack of time (30 percent), and lack of research as to which practices are most effective (30 percent). Less than half of schools trained school personnel regarding firearm violence issues. The findings indicate that firearm incidents at schools may be more common than previously thought. A significant portion of principals are at a loss as to what to implement because of a lack of empirical evidence on what is effective. More research is needed to find the most effective school interventions for reducing firearm violence.”

Other resources:

The National Association of School Psychologists and National Association of School Resource Officers produced “ Best Practice Considerations for Schools in Active Shooter and Other Armed Assailant Drills ,” last updated in 2017. Both associations have numerous other resources on the subject.
The National Center for School Crisis and Bereavement offers disaster preparedness resources.
On Journalist’s Resource, we’ve gathered relevant research on mass violence .

About The Author

Chloe Reichel

As Nation Reels From School Shooting, Supreme Court to Rule on Wider Right to Carry Guns

As the nation processes the horror of the mass school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, the U.S. Supreme Court is finishing its deliberations in a major gun-rights case that has drawn deep concern from groups formed in the wake of previous school shootings.

A decision is expected between now and the end of the court’s term in late June or early July in a case in which many legal observers believe the conservative majority of justices is poised to expand the right to carry weapons for self-defense.

To the gun-control groups that have emerged after infamous mass shootings of the last decade, including school attacks in Newtown, Conn., and Parkland, Fla., such a decision would represent a major clash between the goals of the conservative movement to expand Second Amendment rights and the reality of deadly gun violence at schools, places of worship, and retail stores.

“It will be hurtful for us all, but it will mostly be hurtful for [the justices]” if they rule to expand Second Amendment rights in the pending case, said Esther Sanchez-Gomez, a senior litigation lawyer with the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “There is still an opportunity for them to show that they are human and that they recognize their decisions have real-life implications.”

Supreme Court argument touched on schools as “sensitive places”

The pending Supreme Court case is New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen (No. 20-843), in which the justices are considering a New York state law that requires applicants seeking permits to carry concealed weapons for self-defense to demonstrate a special need, which has made such permits difficult to get in that state.

Groups such as the Giffords Law Center; March for Our Lives, which was formed after the 2018 shootings at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland; and Everytown for Gun Safety, which grew out of the 2012 attack at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown; filed friend-of-the-court briefs in support of the New York law and urged the high court not to expand Second Amendment rights.

At oral arguments in the case last November, justices and advocates discussed whether schools and college campuses would remain “sensitive places” in which states would have greater latitude to prohibit guns even if the court expanded Second Amendment rights. Even the lawyer arguing for overturning the special-need requirement for concealed-carry permits conceded that schools should remain sensitive places.

(The term “sensitive places” comes from the court’s landmark 2008 decision in District of Columbia v. Heller , which held that the Second Amendment includes an individual right to possess a firearm but that the decision should not be read to cast doubt on laws barring guns in places such as schools or government buildings.)

Still, the tenor of the oral argument led most observers to predict that the New York law would go down.

“We don’t have to answer all the sensitive-places questions in this case, some of which will be challenging no doubt,” Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh said during the argument.

During Kavanaugh’s Senate confirmation hearings in 2018, there was a notorious exchange when the father of a student who had been killed in the Parkland shooting confronted the nominee during a break. Fred Guttenberg, whose 14-year-old daughter Jaime was among the 17 students and adults killed in the Parkland incident, sought to have a conversation about assault weapons in light of Kavanaugh’s views that possession of semi-automatic weapons was protected under Supreme Court precedent.

(Kavanaugh recoiled from Guttenberg’s outstretched hand in the hearing room, thinking the father was a protestor. Kavanaugh later said , in response to a written question from a senator, that had he realized who Guttenberg was, he would have expressed sympathy, and “I would have listened to him.”)

Guttenberg was among a throng of people on both sides of the issue who were outside the Supreme Court during the arguments in the New York state case in November, and he has appeared on TV news shows this week providing perspective on the Uvalde incident.

“Here we are again,” Guttenberg told CBS News. “It is the same conversation again. Nothing is changing.”

No matter when the court issues its decision in the New York case, it will be hard to separate from the specter of mass shootings.

Adam Winkler, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, and the author of a book about the Second Amendment, said he doubted the latest mass shootings—the school incident in Uvalde and the attack at a supermarket in Buffalo, N.Y.—would change the outcome of the pending Supreme Court case.

“It’s not like mass shootings are a new phenomenon,” said Winkler, who favors stronger gun-control measures. “If you are going to issue an opinion expanding Second Amendment rights, there’s never a good time to do it. There’s always another mass shooting in the news.”

Federal appeals court blocks California ban on sale of some semi-automatic rifles to young adults

Meanwhile, another recent legal development appears salient in the wake of the Uvalde, shooting, where the assailant obtained two semi-automatic rifles soon after his 18th birthday, which Texas law permits.

On May 11, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, in San Francisco, ruled 2-1 to block a California law that generally bars the sale of certain semi-automatic rifles to 18- to 20-year-olds.

The majority in Jones v. Bonta said “the tradition of young adults keeping and bearing arms is deep-rooted in English law and custom” and that militias in colonial America often required those 18 and older to possess guns, and some militia members were as young as 16.

The court noted that young adults are barred from purchasing handguns but may purchase certain long guns, such as shotguns, if they possess a hunting license (a regulation the court upheld in the same opinion). But shotguns are not as ideal for self-defense as certain semi-automatic rifles, the court said.

“Semi-automatic rifles are able to defeat modern body armor, have a much longer range than shotguns and are more effective in protecting roaming kids on large homesteads, are much more precise and capable at preventing collateral damage, and are typically easier for small young adults to use and handle,” the 9th Circuit court said. “Thus, we hold that California’s ban is a severe burden on the core Second Amendment right of self-defense in the home.”

The dissenting judge highlighted evidence that “young adults are disproportionately more likely to commit violent crimes in general and gun violence specifically than older adults.”

“The state legislature manifestly was entitled to have considered the disproportionate commission of violent gun crimes by young adults, the fact that most mass shooters purchase weapons legally, and the fact that semi-automatic weapons have been the weapons of choice in many of the deadliest shootings in recent history, as eminently reasonable bases to curtail the ability of young adults to purchase or receive transfer of semi-automatic rifles,” the judge said.

The case attracted friend-of-the-court briefs from most of the same gun-control groups that filed in the New York case in the Supreme Court, as well as briefs from both the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association.

The NEA brief says that the challengers’ “expansive conception” of the right of young adults to bear arms “would inhibit the ability of state and local legislatures and school boards around the country to grapple with how to best protect students from the threat of gun violence.”

Sanchez-Gomez of the Giffords Center, whose group filed a brief supporting the California limits, said the 9th Circuit majoritywas “callous and ignored social-science research about the ability of young adults to reason through the consequences of their actions.”

The state was likely to ask the 9th Circuit for a rehearing before a larger panel of judges, she said.

A version of this article appeared in the June 08, 2022 edition of Education Week as As Nation Reels From School Shooting, Supreme Court to Rule on Wider Right to Carry Guns

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Disaster Health
v.1(2); Apr-Dec 2013

The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting as tipping point

James m shultz.

1 Center for Disaster & Extreme Event Preparedness (DEEP Center); University of Miami Miller School of Medicine; Miami, FL USA

Glenn W Muschert

2 Department of Sociology and Gerontology; Miami University; Oxford, OH USA

Alison Dingwall

3 Social, Behavioral, and Linguistic Sciences Department; The MITRE Corporation; McLean, VA USA

Alyssa M Cohen

4 Cooper City, FL USA

Among rampage shooting massacres, the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting on December 14, 2012 galvanized public attention. In this Commentary we examine the features of this episode of gun violence that has sparked strong reactions and energized discourse that may ultimately lead toward constructive solutions to diminish high rates of firearm deaths and injuries in the United States.

Introduction

On December 14, 2012, Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut became the unlikely scene of the second-deadliest school-based shooting massacre in US history. 1 , 2 Twenty first-grade school children and six school staff were gunned down in the space of 12 min. The rampage was cut short by the rapid deployment of law enforcement personnel whose arrival on-scene prompted the shooter, Adam Lanza, to drop his assault rifle and commit suicide with a handgun. 1

In the aftermath, the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting has been described as a “tipping point” (a direct reference to Malcolm Gladwell’s formulation of this concept 3 , 4 ) in a national discussion regarding a broad array of potential solutions to curb gun violence. 5 In this commentary, we examine several interrelated features that contribute to Sandy Hook’s potential for catalyzing the national conversation on firearm homicides. We will describe how the prominence of this mass shooting is related to: 1) the rarity and extremity of this event; 2) the strong identification of the American population with the affected community of Newtown; 3) the active involvement of high-visibility leaders of influence (and “connectors” 3 , 4 ) in maintaining the salience of the gun violence issue; 4) the multiple tiers of psychological impact, ultimately extending nationwide; 5) the evolution of the media “framing” of the incident as the extensive coverage unfolded; and 6) the proliferation of social media communications about the shooting, providing an inclusive platform for broad public discourse ( Table 1 ).

Sandy Hook Rampage Shooting: Rare and Extreme Event

Sandy Hook stands out because of the large number of deaths in a single incident; the nihilistic nature of this intentional, premeditated act; and the characteristics of the victims: young, innocent, defenseless children and the heroic teachers and school staff who died shielding them. 1 , 2 The Newtown shooting was immediately labeled as a “fundamentally different” episode of gun violence. 6 , 7

Indeed, while firearm deaths are common, rampage school shooting deaths are sporadic and few. 2 Today in the United States, midnight to midnight, more than 85 persons will die by firearm. 2 , 8 More than half of these deaths will be self-inflicted suicides and more than 40% will be homicides. The “counter” resets every midnight and the death toll repeats each day.

Providing a counterpoint, our research indicates that shooting deaths that occur in school settings represent only 0.12% of national firearm homicides and most of these incidents are “targeted” shootings in which the perpetrator intentionally seeks out and kills one or more specific individuals. 2 School-based “rampage” or mass murder shooting incidents, as exemplified by Columbine High School, Virginia Tech University, or Sandy Hook Elementary School, account for only about one-eighth of school shooting episodes and 0.04% of national firearm homicides. 2 , 9

Despite the reality that the United States has the highest firearm suicide, homicide, and total firearm mortality rates in the developed world, 2 most days the public is oblivious to the steady daily drumbeat of gun deaths. However, on December 14, 2012, the shooting massacre in Newtown abruptly brought the nation to alert attention on this issue. Indicative of the “tipping point” nature of Sandy Hook, Slate.com initiated, and continuously maintains, a website displaying a running tally of United States gun deaths post-Newtown. 10 In the aftermath, as the focus remained riveted on the 28 deaths in Newtown on that day (20 children, 6 school staff, the shooter’s mother, and the shooter), the number of firearm deaths across America has steadily accumulated and has surpassed 27,477 fatalities in ten months as this commentary goes to press. Sandy Hook was rare, extreme, and got the nation talking.

Public Identification with Newtown, Connecticut

The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting occurred in the self-described “scenic small town” of Newtown, Connecticut. 11 As a quintessentially safe community (the violent crime rate at 0.47 crimes/1,000 residents–is one-eighth of the US average), 12 Newtown attracts an inflow of new residents who transplant their families in order to avail themselves of the fine schools and wholesome milieu. Given this exemplary community identity, the brutal events of December 14, 2012 are all the more incongruous. In part, the forceful and immediate public reaction may have been triggered by the powerful identification with the desirable qualities of the community where the shooting occurred. Many Americans live in communities like Newtown; many more aspire to do so.

In the public’s mind, mass violence came to be associated with distressed inner city neighborhoods, not places like Newtown. Sociologist J. William Spencer 10 described the evolution of the public framing of youth violence as follows: From the 1980s to the mid-1990s, widespread concerns led to predictions of the emergence of a generation of young “superpredators” who would transform urban, impoverished neighborhoods into war zones. Youth violence was understood as endemic not only to the schools but to the surrounding poverty-stricken environs. In other words, schools were interpreted as violent because they were located in violent neighborhoods. Unspoken, but by extension, this also meant that schools in the suburbs should be relatively exempt from violence.

Contrary to forecasts, the rate of urban violence actually started to decline in the early 1990s. The trend continues to this day. Nevertheless, there remains relatively high fear about school violence, but with an important distinction. In the late 1990s, a rash of school shootings in such geographically dispersed small towns and rural locales as Bethel, AK (1997); Pearl, MS (1997); Paducah, KY (1997); Jonesboro, AR (1998); Edinboro, PA (1998); and Springfield, OR (1998), jolted the public’s concern from an exclusive focus on violent urban youth to accommodate the reality of shooting rampages occurring in rural and suburban schools. These events became amalgamated as a unified phenomenon with the 1999 Columbine High School shootings in Colorado. 14 The feared 1980s urban youth superpredator never materialized; instead, the school shooter emerged as the late-1990s exemplar of youth violence. The enduring legacy of the Columbine shooters was that they became the “poster children” for young violent offenders in schools, the contemporary superpredators, if you will. 15 The Columbine shooting was the supreme “tipping point” school shooting of its time and America has existed in the “post-Columbine era” thereafter. 16

On the theme of public identification with Newtown, while many Americans may have dismissed the pertinence of school shootings occurring in urban distressed neighborhoods - or even in rural locales - using “them-not-us” logic, the relevancy of Columbine in 1999 and Sandy Hook in 2012 is undeniable. Mainstream America has been confronted with the reality that school shootings are not a problem that happens to other people; such attacks can happen in any school. The risk is shared universally. 17

Involvement from Influence Leaders at the Highest Levels

The Sandy Hook massacre commanded attention from the very top. Just hours after the shooting, Newtown First Selectman E. Patricia Llodra, the town’s highest-ranking official, appeared before the news cameras, quickly followed by the arrival of Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy. However it was President Barack Obama who elevated the Sandy Hook chronicle to national priority status. In fact, a distinguishing feature of Sandy Hook was the direct and personal involvement of a sitting President.

Two days following the shooting on December 16, 2012, the President arrived in Newtown to meet with the victims’ family members. At the close of a nationally broadcasted ecumenical prayer service, the President called upon the entire nation to provide solace and support for the grieving Newtown community.

The President empaneled a group of national experts as members of the Gun Violence Task Force who were asked to identify a comprehensive portfolio of possible remedies to address the nation’s public health crisis of gun violence – within four weeks. On January 16, 2013, the President addressed the nation, presenting the wide-ranging options generated by the Task Force and signing a set of 23 Gun Violence Reduction Executive Actions on camera. 18 , 19 Concurrently, the White House website launched a page of resources under the banner, “Now is the Time: The President’s Plan to Protect Our Children and Our Communities by Reducing Gun Violence.” 20

On February 12, 2013, two months after the Newtown massacre, President Obama delivered his State of the Union address, with family members of the Newtown victims seated in the galleries. In his remarks, the President spoke directly to the “tipping point” nature of Newtown when he said, “I know this is not the first time this country has debated how to reduce gun violence, but this time is different .” 21 Taking a page from the Malcolm Gladwell (author of The Tipping Point ) playbook, the President facilitated the direct participation of victims’ family members, as “connectors,” to lobby Congressional leaders and the general public in support of proposed legislation for diminishing the rate and consequences of firearm violence in the United States.

Pervasive Psychological Impact in Relation to Levels of Exposure

School massacres not only kill and injure, they also psychologically traumatize. The expansive nationwide “psychological footprint” of Newtown is a unique characteristic of this event. 23 The deadliest school shooting in the US occurred at Virginia Tech in 2007. 24 In the immediate aftermath, Norris 25 reviewed the literature on the psychological impact of mass shootings on survivors, families, and communities. Among persons who directly experienced or witnessed a mass shooting incident, the prevalence of a post-event diagnosis of psychological disorder (PTSD was most commonly studied) was 10–36%. Norris noted that even higher proportions of the exposed population experienced distress and “subthreshold PTSD.” Compared with direct exposure to a broad spectrum of natural and human-generated disaster events, 26 , 27 the psychological consequences of onsite exposure to a mass shooting incident is on the “severe” end of the continuum. This finding was underscored by the fact that almost all direct victims or witnesses reported psychological symptoms.

Mass shooting events have served as the basis for pioneering studies that examined the proximity of exposure to the shooting event in relation to psychological outcomes. Pynoos and colleagues studied a sniper attack at an elementary school playground that occurred while some of the children were outside for recess. 28 - 30 Following a dose-response pattern, children who were on the playground had higher rates and greater severity of PTSD symptoms compared with children who were inside the school during the shooting episode and children who were not on school premises during the shooting were minimally affected. Similarly, for Newtown, we can identify multiple “tiers” of exposure intensity.

Population Exposure Model

The manner in which a highly-focalized act of mass violence such as the Sandy Hook mass shooting becomes amplified to create community-wide, or even nationwide, psychological consequences has been intuitively formulated with the “Population Exposure Model” (PEM) developed by Deborah DeWolfe for the Department of Health and Human Services. 31 , 32 Simply stated, “The model’s underlying principle is that the individuals who are most personally, physically, and psychologically exposed to trauma and the disaster scene are likely to be affected the most.” 31 Applying the PEM, we provide a detailed presentation of the widespread and pervasive psychological effects specific to the Newtown shooting in narrative ( Box 1 ) and graphic ( Fig. 1 ) 32 formats to both describe and display the event’s psychological “ripple effects.”

Box 1. Population Exposure Model (PEM) applied to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting massacre

The widespread and pervasive psychological consequences emanating from the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting can be described in terms of the PEM. We will review the tiers of persons affected by the shooting massacre, beginning from the center (most intense exposure) and extending outward. In the absence of knowledge of the specific exposures, and the precise degree of social connection for each individual, this classification presents an approximation of the psychological “reach” of this event.

Deceased victims killed in the attack . The killings form the basis for most of the psychological trauma and the starting point for defining psychological effects. The shooter, Mr. Lanza, lived with his mother at her home. After killing his mother, Nancy Lanza, in her bed, Mr. Lanza drove five miles across town to Sandy Hook Elementary School where his shooting rampage claimed the lives of 26 victims. Shooting victims at the school were 20 first-grade children (all children in one classroom except for a single survivor and additional children in a second classroom) and six school staff (Principal Dawn Hochsprung, school psychologist Mary Sherlach, first grade teachers Victoria Leigh Soto and Lauren Rousseau (substitute), and teacher’s aides Anne Marie Murphy and Rachel D’Avino). As Police entered the school, responding to an “active shooter” scenario, the perpetrator committed suicide. Adding the out-of-school matricide of Nancy Lanza and the in-school suicide of the shooter, Adam Lanza, to the 26 shooting victims on school premises, there were 28 total deaths.

Because these 28 individuals were killed, they are not depicted on the PEM diagram of survivors, but their deaths largely define where others appear on the continuum of multiple “tiers.”

Tier 1. Directly-threatened and intensely-exposed survivors. Primary family members of the deceased victims. The most intensely exposed survivors included the two wounded school staff, the surviving children who were in the two classrooms where classmates and teachers were killed, and the bereaved primary family members of the victims who were killed. Two teachers were wounded and survived the attack. Having been directly accosted by the shooter, and having sustained firearm injury, these two school staff members could be considered to be among the most intensely exposed survivors.

Primary family members of the deceased victims . In addition to Nancy Lanza’s surviving son (brother of the shooter), more than 150 primary family members of the 26 who were killed at the school (parents and siblings of the 20 slain children; parents, siblings, spouses, and children of the six slain staff members) are dealing with bereavement, the “fact of loss through death.” Because of the unpredicted, unanticipated, premature, and “unthinkable” nature of these deaths, exacerbated by the fact that these killings were intentional, premeditated acts of murder, it is likely that many first-line relatives will experience varying combinations of traumatic bereavement, complicated grief, depression, and in substantial proportion, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or major depression.

Surviving children in the classrooms where killings occurred. Among the children, the lone survivor in Ms. Rousseau’s class was spared death by lying perfectly still in the pile of fallen classmates until the shooter exited the classroom. A cluster of children escaped from Ms. Soto’s class, running past the shooter as their teacher was gunned down attempting to physically shield her students who burst out of the closet where they were hidden. These were the most intensely exposed children on that day.

Tier 2: Surviving school children and staff who were in the school (but not in the line of fire) during the shooting and their primary family members. At the next level of exposure intensity are the remainder of the surviving school children, teachers, and staff who were in the school during the incident but not in the classrooms where the killings took place. Nevertheless, the remainder of the 400 children who attended school that day - and all school administrators, teachers, and staff - were exposed to the grotesque carnage in the hallways and classrooms, the pandemonium, and the frantic efforts to hide and escape from the line of deadly fire. They experienced various gradations of exposure as they co-habited the school premises with the shooter who was methodically stalking and killing.

Also included here would be the primary family members of these children and staff members who waited with extreme distress to see who would emerge alive. Parents and close relatives of the 400 children and dozens of staff members who ultimately emerged alive maintained an anguishing vigil until their families were reunited. The hours of uncertainty, without proof of life, prior to reunification were agonizing and potentially traumatizing. Media coverage focused on the visibly distressed parents hovering at the periphery of the school, talking animatedly on their cell phones, and bunched in small groups for mutual support. Mixed with relief and gratitude, a powerful variation of survivor guilt played out for families whose children survived. Parents whose children, once released, sprinted toward their waiting embrace came together to support families less fortunate whose child was shot dead in a classroom just yards away from where there children had been spared.

Tier 3: Bereaved extended family members. Intensely-involved emergency responders. The third level of exposure intensity merges two categories of persons, the extended family members of those who were killed and the frontline responders. With more than 150 primary family members acutely bereaved by the shooting, the inclusion of extended family members (grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, other household members) certainly amplifies this number to more than 1,000.

The most dedicated, involved – and exposed – professionals who were on scene in their respective roles included the Newtown community government leaders; law enforcement, fire/rescue, and emergency medical services professionals who entered the school; medical examiners and their staff; and service providers who provided death notification and psychosocial support for the bereaved families. Hundreds of Newtown and State of Connecticut first responders arrived at the Sandy Hook Elementary School scene. As a small community, some of these personnel were part-time responders from a variety of professions. For all, the slaughter they witnessed had to be very troubling.

Tier 4: Care providers. Media personnel. Psychological impact was also felt by the mental health providers, clergy, chaplains, and spiritual leaders. School district personnel were tasked with providing support to Sandy Hook Elementary School students and staff who were relocated to continue their education in other schools. Media personnel were camped out in Newtown for weeks, witnessing and absorbing the effects of the shooting on the community.

Tier 5: Community of Newtown. Persons involved off-scene in the response. Stakeholders on issues of violence and mental health. Expanding beyond those with direct ties to Sandy Hook Elementary School, the entire community of Newtown has been forever affected. A strong, cohesive community, they were showcased in their grief and heroism in the nationally televised prayer service and with grassroots organizations such as the Sandy Hook Promise ( www.sandyhookpromise.org/ ), the community has determined to be known for its indomitable resilience.

Also potentially affected psychologically, though at a more peripheral level, were government officials involved in response off-scene, public health professionals dealing with firearm violence, US stakeholders on issues of violence and mental health, and groups that identify professionally with the target victims such as teachers who work in school systems that regularly experience high risks for interpersonal violence.

Tier 6: The Nation at large. The Newtown shooting was extensively televised and promulgated explosively through traditional and social media. The event, unfolding during the year-end family holiday season, was riveting for the nation at large and provoked strong emotional reaction in addition to energized rhetoric, debate, and dialog.

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Figure 1. Population Exposure Model. 31 , 32

The PEM diagram consists of a set of concentric circles expanding outward from the point of maximum impact, inside the Sandy Hook Elementary School, the epicenter of the event. 32 In the PEM diagram the degree of exposure is portrayed using a color gradient. The inner rings, representing intense exposure are presented in shades of bright red and orange. Expanding from the center is a sequence of progressively larger rings, representing increasingly larger numbers of affected persons, but with diminishing intensities of exposure. Also to portray decreasing severity of exposure, the colors of the largest and most populated rings are portrayed in “cooler” shades of green and blue.

From the PEM model, it is apparent that while the physical harm was concentrated and confined inside a single building, the Sandy Hook Elementary School, the psychological impact radiated outward to the farthest reaches of the nation.

Extensive Media Exposure and Media Framing of Sandy Hook

The media focus was instrumental in elevating the profile of the Sandy Hook shooting to “tipping point” status. School shootings are highly “mass-mediated” events. Mass media provide the conduits for propelling the story to the public. Although extremely rare, rampage shootings are closely watched and loom large as examples in the public consciousness of larger social issues, such as school and gun violence. Indeed, the development of the social discourse and problem awareness surrounding the issue of school shootings cannot be seen apart from media processes. Mass media portrayals serve as an integral and inseparable part of the events themselves. 33 , 34

When a Columbine- or Sandy Hook-style incident takes place, the intensity and constancy of the mass media bombardment contributes to the public’s widely held misperception that school shooting massacres are high-frequency, high-probability events. Despite the fact that very few persons, schools, and towns will ever experience school rampage incidents, these intermittent events but well-publicized events exert a high degree of leverage on the public’s perception of the problem. 14 , 15 This is an example of a cognitive bias called the availability bias . People tend to unconsciously rely on the sheer volume of available event information to help them made judgments about event frequency; well-publicized events are incorrectly judged to occur more frequently than events that are not as well-publicized. 42

The misguided notion that school shooting massacres are likely to occur in many communities across America is an example of how the availability bias can lead to a seemingly media-driven distortion of risk. Gun deaths are indeed common but not mass shooting episodes. Consider that 30 gun homicides occur every day, equivalent to more than 11,000 per year. 2 Compare this “11,000” figure to the average annual number of school shooting deaths: 16 per year - and most are “targeted” shootings. The average number of school rampage shooting deaths is just 6 per year. 2

As one indicator of the disproportionate news coverage accorded to school mass shootings, Slate.com’s continuous tally of gun deaths post-Newtown (mentioned earlier) has exceeded 27,477 fatalities over ten months. 10 Yet only 9,388 (34.2%) of these deaths have been mentioned in any form of coverage, and usually just once while the remaining two-thirds of firearm deaths have not received a jot of media publicity. 10 Clearly the mass murder of children and staff at Sandy Hook Elementary School is extraordinarily compelling, and the symbolic and visceral reality of these deaths should never be discounted. However, operating from a public health vantage, we point out that the prominent media play given to shooting massacres may obscure the fact that most gun deaths are suicides and single-victim homicides. 2 While Sandy Hook, as “tipping point,” vaults the issue of gun violence to the forefront, the development of a comprehensive set of remedies to address the total population burden of gun violence will not be optimally served by a singular focus on mitigating mass shootings.

Proliferation of Social Media Communications

The four deadliest school shootings in United States history occurred in distinctly different eras of mass media evolution. The story of the 1966 Texas Tower sniper was conveyed to the public through the traditional channels of network television, radio, and print media. The 1999 Columbine High School shooting took place as 24-h cable television and Internet news sources were gaining popularity but these modalities maintained the conventional top-down, “few-to-many” model of news delivery. At the time of the 2007 Virginia Tech University shooting, the use of social networking sites was an emerging trend but effective applications of social media in emergencies was yet to be developed. In contrast, by the time of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, social media had expanded to become a dominant force for citizen communications about the event.

The proliferation of social media sites has lowered the technological threshold for citizen participation in the digital sphere, thus catapulting many times more participants into the public discourse on current events. The Pew Internet and American Life Project 35 indicated that 65% of United States adult Internet users were participating in one or more forms of Internet social networking services 36 (SNSs; e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram) in 2011, with 89% of the age 18–29 demographic using SNSs in 2012.

The availability and adoption of social media has transformed information sharing from a “one-to-many” format to a “many-to-many” conversation. SNSs provide a vast and inclusive platform for immediate, multi-directional communication and social connection. SNS users can convey their own story about the event and share their personal thoughts, feelings and perspectives. This creates a wealth of information and data that can be analyzed to understand the salient themes, reactions, and sentiments related to the event.

Based on the fact that online and SNS technology provides an ideologically neutral context for networking and communications, and a mechanism to instantly spread news reports worldwide, researchers are beginning to explore the role that online and social media play in events such as Sandy Hook. 37 Rampage school shootings provide an interesting case to examine this approach, given the small number of incidents relative to the impact of these events and large amounts of data generated.

Not all internet and SNS users engage with online and social media the same way or for the same purpose. For instance, Hoffman and Novak have developed a framework which categorizes four objectives for social media use - create, connect, consume, and control – the “4 C’s.” 38 With traditional top-down news delivery, a few producers “create” information for the many to “consume,” but social media engages all “4 C’s” in a complex dance of multi-way interactions. Not only is information shared quickly, but social media also brings people together. It allows people to be connected instantly while simultaneously creating, consuming, and controlling the media event.

To better understand the conversations happening in online and social media sites and how these conversations travel, researchers have developed new tools and technologies for collecting and analyzing the data generated. Using these tools, it is possible to sort and analyze the Tweets of interest related to the Newtown shooting. Using a word cloud to represent Twitter data, in which prominent hash tags are depicted in larger font, Figure 2 illustrates relevant hash tags related to the word “gun” for the month of December 2012, thus highlighting the emphasis social media placed on the Newtown shooting (#newtown) and a National call to action (#demandaplan and #guncontrol).

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Figure 2. Relevant Twitter hash tags related to the word “gun” for the month of December 2012.

An unpublished analysis performed by one of this article’s authors revealed that, on the day of the shooting, and the following week (December 14–21, 2012). there were three million Tweets worldwide containing the keywords: “school shooting,” “newtown,” or “sandyhook” (or the corresponding hashtags: #schoolshooting, #newtown, #sandyhook) as shown in Figure 3 . One million of these Tweets originated from a media source, whereas 2 million Tweets originated from non-media sources. The geographic view of these Tweets shows an intense concentration of Tweets from inside Newtown and surrounding Fairfield County, with elevated levels for the entire State of Connecticut. Yet the expansive national and global diffusion of Tweets on this incident highlights that online and social media have the power not only to disseminate information, but also to connect individuals instantly and without physical – or geographical – limitations.

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Figure 3. Tweets from December 13, 2012–February 20, 2013. “School Shooting,” “Gun,” “Newtown.” Non-media only.

While the volume of Tweets related to the Newtown shooting dropped slightly over time, the public renewed social media conversations at times when President Obama made public statements about the event and demanded a call to action. The spikes in Figure 4 represent an increase in the volume of Tweets with hash tags “schoolshooting,” “gun,” and “mental health” correlating with significant events. To be expected, these hash tags caused a spike on the day of the event, December 14, 2012. Of interest, the spikes returned on January 16, 2013 when the Obama administration unveiled their new gun control polices, 43 and then again following President Obama’s State of the Union address. 21

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Figure 4. Twitter coverage: 09/2012–02/2013. “School Shooting,” “Gun,” “Mental Health.”

Concluding Discussion

When multiple concurrent events vie for attention, each with powerful public health, public safety, and public policy implications, how does a single incident emerge that compels and commands the focus of the American public? How does an event achieve “the moment of critical mass?” 3 We have examined the case of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, a singular event, just 12 min in duration, that became instantly iconic in the history of gun violence in the United States. The memory of Sandy Hook has been reactivated with each subsequent episode of firearm violence including the rampant, multiple-victim shooting escapades in Chicago (the nation’s new “murder capital”) 39 and the Washington Naval Yard shooting 40 on September 16, 2013. Sandy Hook also provided the “what-if” counterpoint during the reporting of the Decatur, Georgia school shooting threat that was thwarted by the stunning courage of Antoinette Tuff, as she talked down the would-be killer. 41

We have described six hallmarks of the Sandy Hook shooting massacre that coalesced into a riveting story and a call for action. The event was random and extreme. Americans identified closely with Newtown. A sitting President made this rampage shooting his personal mission. Powerful psychological reactions spread nationwide. The mass media “framing” brought unrelenting focus to this episode. Social media messaging reverberated throughout the digital sphere, keeping individuals engaged in multi-way conversation. Collectively, these elements created a “tipping point” moment.

However, a call to action neither guarantees immediate change nor necessarily predicts the direction that change may take. As a tipping point, Newtown has acted as a fulcrum for action. Yet the leverage for action has been applied in opposite directions by competing factions. The most significant federal legislation brought forward as a direct result of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting was a bill to require background checks prior to authorizing a gun purchase. Family members of the Newtown victims were in Washington to actively lobby in favor of this legislation. Despite public acclaim and broad consensus for this legislation, with as many as 90% of Americans endorsing background checks, the bill went down to defeat in the Senate by a vote of 54–46 on April 17, 2013. 44 Meanwhile, action was also taking place at the state level. By June 2013, six months after the shooting, 86 state gun laws had been passed post-Newtown. 45 At least five states, including Connecticut where the shooting occurred, enacted tougher gun control legislation, but more than one dozen states loosened their gun laws. 46 As one of the most extreme examples of the contentiousness of the issues raised by Sandy Hook, The Second Amendment Foundation, a gun owners’ rights organization based in Washington just announced plans to declare the one-year anniversary of the Newtown shooting, December 14, 2013, “Guns Save Lives Day,” drawing swift reaction from the community that will be mourning its losses on that day. 47

From a balanced perspective, hopefully, going forward, the momentum of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting will be channeled into an earnest search, and dedicated research, to identify a set of acceptable solutions to diminish the population burden, and the individualized horror, of gun violence in America.

Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest

No potential conflicts of interest were disclosed.

The Many Ways We Have Failed Young People Amid the Gun Violence Crisis

McAbee is a poet, essayist, and theologian, whose work has appeared in TIME, The New York Times, The Hudson Review, The Sun (US), and a variety of other publications. He has spoken widely in university and congregational settings throughout the US and the UK. He works as Professor of Religion and the Arts at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee.

O n Thursday, Nov. 9, 2023 Jillian Ludwig’s family returned home to New Jersey from Nashville. They’d traveled to Tennessee two days earlier, after Jillian, a freshman music business major, was found unconscious from a bullet wound , around 3:30pm at the Edgehill Community Garden, less than half a mile from the university and only two blocks from Nashville’s famed Music Row.

In my 12 and a half years as a professor at Belmont, our community, like so many others, has been wounded time and again by our nation’s and our state’s gun violence crisis. The Covenant School shooting in March 2023 impacted us deeply. Some in our community are members of the Covenant Presbyterian congregation, at least one faculty member had a child at the school on the day of the shooting, and many, like myself, are close friends with Covenant School families, whose lives have been irreparably changed.

Gun violence has impacted the Belmont student body before. In 2018, for instance, 21-year-old Belmont student DeEbony Groves was killed in the racially motivated Waffle House Shooting, which claimed four lives. And while our campus has largely been spared direct violence over the years, it is not uncommon for Campus Security to send email messages regarding armed robberies or gunfire that have occurred on the outskirts of campus.

Like so many universities across the country, we’ve also lost students to suicide, part of our country’s mental health crisis and epidemic of loneliness. A number of those have involved guns—both on and off campus.

In Jillian’s case, she was shot in the head by a stray bullet, approximately an hour before she was discovered by a passerby. Once found, she was rushed to nearby Vanderbilt Hospital, where she succumbed to her injuries the following night. Shaquille Taylor, a 29-year-old Nashville resident, has been charged in the incident. Taylor was apparently firing at a car on the same block as the Community Garden, where Jillian was walking.

As my classes met the day after Jillian’s death, I asked students how they were processing this trauma. Many spoke about their fear. Some already worried about going out at night in Nashville, and now, since this tragedy occurred in broad daylight, even the daytime seems scary. One spoke of a deep grief, as their friend group included students who knew Jillian.

A number of students shared feeling dismay at their initial reaction of not having a reaction. They spoke of feeling that gun violence is such a part of our culture that even the death of someone a couple of blocks from their own campus did not feel shocking. This apathy unnerved them.

Read More: How Do We Respond to this Hell. In Nashville After the Shooting

One student spoke poignantly of having a feeling of failure. They said, “I feel like Nashville failed Jillian, failed her family. This family entrusted our city with their child, and we failed her. We failed them.”

For years, my own reaction to the gun violence in our culture was much like the students who came to fear their own apathy. It’s not that my heart wasn’t moved at hearing of the victims of gun violence, it’s that I couldn’t bring myself to find a way to act, a way to move forward.

The children and teachers at Sandy Hook, at Uvalde , the students and professors at Virginia Tech , the day-to-day violence of our culture, domestic abuse victims, robberies gone wrong—the overwhelming number of deaths from gun violence anesthetizes many of us and keeps us from turning our apathy into grief, our grief into action.

I continue to be struck by the words of the student who felt like we’d failed Jillian and her family. I asked that student, “Shouldn’t you feel safe here too? Haven’t we failed you? Haven’t we failed you all?”

As these students’ professor and the middle-aged parent of two small children, I can’t help but ask, how many ways have we failed the young people in our communities?

In the case of Jillian Ludwig and her family, our city, state, and country have failed on so many fronts. Taylor, the accused assailant, has a history of violent crime . In 2021, he shot into a vehicle which held a Mom and her two small children. Having been arrested for this crime, he was determined by three court-appointed doctors to be incompetent to stand trial, due to an intellectual disability and language impairment . By federal law, someone who cannot understand their crime cannot be tried, and based on Tennessee state law, there is an unreasonably high bar for someone to meet the standard of involuntary commitment to an institution. So, Taylor walked free for a crime eerily like the scenario that led to Jillian’s death.

As recently as September 2023, Taylor was arrested for being in possession of a stolen truck, one which had been carjacked at gun point by two assailants wearing ski masks. While there had not been sufficient evidence to link Taylor directly to the carjacking, he was arrested and released for possessing the stolen vehicle and missed his November 3rd court appearance.

Tennessee failed the Ludwig family—and Taylor, himself—by not providing adequate care for Taylor’s disability. Additionally, despite Taylor’s intellectual disability and criminal background, he is still legally allowed to possess a gun in the state of Tennessee, as we have no Extreme Risk Protection Order, or “red flag law” on the books.

In the weeks after the Covenant School shooting earlier this year, thousands upon thousands of Tennesseans marched and held vigils at our Capitol and across our state. A Fox News poll at the time showed that overwhelmingly, over 80% of US voters , across the political spectrum, support common sense gun safety measures aimed at curbing gun violence.

Despite pleas for change, our state legislature failed to take any action on gun safety measures during its regular session. In August 2023, Gov. Bill Lee called a special session of the legislature in order to address the gun safety crisis. This too was a debacle. Many of the mothers from the Covenant School were treated with contempt by Republican legislators. The Senate attempted to adjourn almost immediately. The House attempted to curb the free speech of protestors within the Capitol, and Gov. Lee failed to push through any effectual change.

Despite the claim by many religious people that this is a nation built on Christian values, we operate as a society without a meaningful social ethos. The fabric of our culture is being torn in myriad directions, and the job of mending it must be the responsibility of us all, particularly in areas where we have such broad popular consensus as gun safety reform.

So far, my university’s response has been primarily pastoral and rightly so. Our community is wounded. Our University President Rev. Dr. Greg Jones and his wife, Rev. Susan Pendleton Jones, have publicly attempted to create space for mourning and belonging for Belmont staff and students.

We have been told that Campus Security is liaising with Metro Police regarding the neighborhoods in our vicinity, but certainly this type of coordination was already occurring before Jillian lost her life to a bullet in the shadow of our university.

In the midst of this mourning, there are signs of hope and moral courage from my university’s leadership. One Belmont Board member, Kimberly Williams-Paisley, has been an outspoken advocate for gun safety reform, participating in a vigil with Covenant moms and publicly advocating for gun safety legislation. Another, Rev. Dr. Clay Stauffer , serves as Chair of the Advisory Board of Voices for a Safer Tennessee, a conservative-leaning, nonpartisan gun safety advocacy group, formed in the wake of the Covenant shooting. In addition to these, Belmont’s Board Chair, Milton Johnson has himself become an Advisory Board member at Voices for a Safer Tennessee. His active support of Voices for a Safer Tennessee holds much weight in our community and our region. These members’ leadership on this issue serves a sign of hope that our university will act with moral courage in the best interests of our staff and students in advocating for meaningful gun safety reform.

The needle for gun safety reform is moving slowly in Tennessee and throughout much of the country. But it is moving. With overwhelming electoral support across the political spectrum, I believe that we can see significant gun safety reform in our communities, but it will take active engagement from the overwhelming majority of Americans.

We must continue to pressure our elected officials to make common sense gun safety reform a reality. Continuing to fail has already been too costly for far too many families.

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School Shooting

I'm a Member of the "Mass Shooting Generation," and I'm Determined to Make a Change

Updated on 2/14/2019 at 6:20 PM

At 18, I don't really remember the Sept. 11 attacks. I was less than a year old, after all. I learned about it later in school, but when parents and teachers describe that day, they talk about how it was this horrific wake-up call — a day when innocence was broken and Americans' sense of safety was forever shaken. I might not remember that day, but as a member of the "mass shooting generation," I know that feeling well, so I wasn't surprised when I read an article that called school shootings my generation's 9/11 .

The lawn outside the US Capitol is covered with 7,000 pairs of empty shoes to memorialize the 7,000 children killed by gun violence since the Sandy Hook school shooting, in a display organized by the global advocacy group Avaaz, in Washington, DC, March 1

Shoes representing the 7,000 children killed by gun violence since the Sandy Hook school shooting are displayed in a silent protest at the US Capital in March 2018.

I have never known life free of gun violence. According to The Washington Post 's recent analysis, more than 4.1 million students like me endured at least one lockdown during the 2017-2018 school year . We practice drills that may keep us safe, knowing that a shooting could come at any moment. This fear isn't unfounded. We grew up knowing that movie theaters, schools, and even our homes could become the sites of horrible tragedies.

Gun violence is the second leading cause of death for American children overall. Among black children and teens, it is the leading cause of death. This is a uniquely American crisis. Young adults age 15 to 24 in the US are 23 times more likely to be killed by guns compared to other high-income countries.

It is an unbearable reality. And it's one many of us are determined to end. A recent survey said that 68 percent of young people say school shootings are the most important issue facing the United States . That shouldn't be shocking — we live in constant fear that our school or community may be next.

This reality has essentially forced many of us to get political. When you feel your very life is under threat for simply getting up and going to high school, it's hard to just sit on the sidelines. It's motivating us at school, at home, and, last November, at the ballot box. It's the reason young people doubled our 2014 midterm turnout in 2018.

Before the shooting in Parkland, FL, I'd been concerned about gun violence, but I didn't know how I could make a difference. After Parkland, I jumped into this movement by founding a Students Demand Action For Gun Sense in America chapter in my community. Weeks later, there was a shooting at Santa Fe High School, barely an hour from where I live just outside of Houston. The Santa Fe shooting happened just 24 hours after my school had gone through a lockdown — thankfully a false alarm — but further enforcing just how common all of this is and motivating me to stop this from becoming our new normal.

So many of my classmates got involved with Students Demand Action after the Santa Fe shooting. We've already gone to our statehouse to advocate for stronger gun laws, and we're just getting started.

My generation will have to live with the decisions made by our elected officials for decades to come. That's why we rallied to support candidates committed to gun safety last year. We successfully paved the way for progress, and now it's time to push Congress to pass bipartisan legislation introduced this month to require background checks on all gun sales . The proposal is supported by 85 percent of Americans , including 79 percent of Republicans. It's also long overdue.

The background check system was established over 25 years ago, and the world has changed a lot since then. Loopholes in the system have turned the internet into one big gun show, without requiring any checks to see if a buyer has a criminal history or is otherwise prohibited from owning guns.

The proposed legislation would close the background check loophole. This is a critical step to preventing gun violence in our schools and communities. You can contact your representatives and tell them to support this life-saving legislation by texting CHECKS to 644-33.

Every day at school, I worry about a shooting. We have to act now so that students who come after us don't have to live in this constant state of fear. Every student should get involved — before it's your community that's directly affected.

Annika Gallaway is a high school senior and leader of the Montgomery County Texas chapter of Students Demand Action.

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