Attention toward school violence heightens after Columbine

The discussion on school safety has been ongoing for decades, beginning with school shootings as early as the late 1960s.

However, it was ultimately the 1999 Columbine High School shooting that brought the issue to national attention. In response to the tragic event, schools began directing resources and energy to decreasing the possibility of similar events in the future.

At first, efforts centered on physical barriers; schools across the country installed security cameras and metal detectors, required students to carry IDs, hired police, banned backpacks and implemented zero-tolerance policies toward violence.

By 2002, the United States Secret Service had completed project Safe School Initiative, a study of more than 30 school shooting incidents.

The Secret Service concluded that schools had placed false hope in physical security, when attention should be directed to behaviors of students before an attack occurs.

“In the case of Columbine, there was very clear evidence of disturbed thinking and plans being made, yet no one came forth to report the warning signs,” Las Virgenes Unified School District Superintendent Dan Stepenosky said.

Stepenosky’s doctorate dissertation focused on school shootings, including Columbine, and how to adapt lessons learned from these situations to create a safer campus environment.

“It’s not about gates, guns and guards,” Stepenosky said. “It’s about the connection between people … that act as a safety net for warning signs. That includes teachers, aides, cafeteria workers, nurses, counselors, principals, neighbors, friends, brothers and sisters.”

This shift in thinking has since become apparent in the academic community. Government funding spent on physical security barriers from the Department of Education’s Safe and Drug-Free Schools program was cut by a third from 1999 to 2008. Meanwhile, funding for school counseling grant programs increased from $20 million to $52 million.

“While it is easy to see these shooters as plain evil, normally they grew up as good kids who went wrong,” psychology teacher Dr. Jeff Appell said. “The majority of them could be saved if they sought help before acting out and learned to express their rage through words rather than actions.”

Appell believes that many potential shooters are victims of bullying who allow their unresolved pain to turn into rage and revenge.

“Biologically, many of these youth have ‘hotspots,’ which are impaired frontal lobes,” Appell said. “This causes an increase in impulsivity and a lack in judgment.”