How School Shootings Are Changing the Design of American Classrooms

[Uzi2]

Lol. It's not "my rationale." It's experience trying to deal with this very issue for many years in more than one town.

But you feel free to join me. I welcome your help..

So, you're a continuous failure?

You're obviously doing something wrong if you can't convince people to commit to putting a simple "deadbolt" on the inside of a door.
I think you're just afraid of saying to those people: Look, if we eliminate X number of staff and their bennies, the cost is more than covered.

Tell me that you've suggested that and I'll call you a liar all day.

 

[Uzi2]

Have you seen all the news stories lately about the school districts crying about laying off bunches of staff they hired with COVID money, even though they weren’t supposed to do that, now that the COVID money has dried up?

They are screaming about lack of staff and class size now. No way they are budgeting spending on lock sets for all the necessary doors as @Picton said.

Wait till all the illegal ESL kids are plugged into those classes.

Yes, they (the school staff), the opportunistic thieves that they are, stole every penny they could that Covid funds had to offer and then some.....now it's time to come back to reality and the hard choices that reality requires.

It's never been about protecting kids with them, it's always about lining their wallets.

 

[Rob Boudrie]

Schools are already built of masonry. Most of the work is already done. You just need a secure door, without a window that has multiple swing bolt locations that can't be figured out from the outside. If doors are out-swing and equipped with safety hinges, then they can't be kicked in.

This is a mixed bag, as it pushes against windows in every door to make it more difficult to hide sexual abuse of students. I know of a Papist church that replaced all the classroom doors with ones having huge (about 30"x30") for exactly this reason.

 

[Picton]

This is a mixed bag, as it pushes against windows in every door to make it more difficult to hide sexual abuse of students. I know of a Papist church that replaced all the classroom doors with ones havinf huge (about 30"x30") for exactly this reason.

Fire codes require windows in the doors. Not sure how big they have to be.

We get yelled at every year for covering them up.

 

[Uzi2]

You should be showing up at Public Comment during your town's next school committee meeting and telling them all this. You're not wrong, but my prediction is you'll get nowhere. I never said it's a bad idea. I said your town is not going to want to spend money on it.

My hallway has eleven classroom doors. There are six hallways in my building, plus about twenty additional doors on each of three floors. That's 126 classroom doors, and that's just in one building. And minus offices, utility rooms, etc; all should be hardened similarly to be effective. I'm not counting connecting doors, and many of those have zero deadbolts right now.

I have no idea how much it costs to buy an institutional lockset and have it installed, but I'd assume it's at least $100 per door (I can see it being double or triple that, but I don't really have a clue). For easy math, we'll say $100. That's $12,600 minimum for my building, and a couple hundred thousand overall for the whole district. Minimum.

That's not chump change, especially considering what you'd hear from the school committee:

1. The chances of a school shooting are tiny; that's too much to spend.
2. Each door already has a deadbolt. Why add another?
3. We're laying off staff already this year. There's no excess money.

By all means, search for grants. But be aware that many school systems (and almost all towns) pay someone to search for grants; they're probably better at it than you are.

Maybe your comrades should be petitioning the feds for some of this money.

"Of the nearly $3 billion in humanitarian aid that the United States has given Afghanistan since the 2021 military withdraw, at least $11 million—and likely a lot more—has gone to the Taliban, according to a new federal audit that reveals the U.S. “has continued to be the largest international donor supporting the Afghan people since the former Afghan government collapsed and the Taliban returned to power in August 2021.” The terrorist group has taken the millions in humanitarian and development assistance intended to help the people of Afghanistan in the form of taxes, fees, import duties, permit charges, licenses, or public utility services. The Taliban has probably received a much bigger chunk of the humanitarian assistance because the parties involved in the cash giveaway, including federal agencies, the famously corrupt United Nations and handpicked nonprofits, do not bother keeping track.
**********************************************************************************************************************************


But far be it from the lefty teachers' unions and school officials to attempt to bite the hand that feeds them.

 

[dcmdon]

Thanks Picton and Rob. I had never considered the fact that windows might be required by code/law in classroom doors.

 

[MaverickNH]

Because it costs money. End of story.

I've been talking to administrators and school committees about this very topic for twenty years. As soon as something costs more, they shut down.

A lot of teachers I know say they keep door chocks stashed in their personal bag to wedge doors shut - against policy.

I put a deadbolt on my office door in any company I worked at - also against policy. A concrete block to smash a window if needed and knotted rope for egress as well, useful in any number of situations.

 

[Picton]

A lot of teachers I know say they keep door chocks stashed in their personal bag to wedge doors shut - against policy.

I put a deadbolt on my office door in any company I worked at - also against policy. A concrete block to smash a window if needed and knotted rope for egress as well, useful in any number of situations.

"Policy" changes all the time. We're into ALICE now, so egress is now GTG. So is throwing shit at the attacker; "shelter in place" has not been A Thing at my school since about 2015 or so.

The issue is that although TTPs for dealing with school shooters change frequently (and we get trained every year), the architecture doesn't. Because money for retrofits is always in short supply. Literally any construction project in a school seems to cost an amazing amount, and my town ain't got all that much surplus.

Blood from a stone. It's difficult to ask property owners to pony up more scratch when they only built a new school within the last ten years, especially when those ten years have featured epic inflation.

 

[MaverickNH]

"Policy" changes all the time. We're into ALICE now, so egress is now GTG. So is throwing shit at the attacker; "shelter in place" has not been A Thing at my school since about 2015 or so.

The issue is that although TTPs for dealing with school shooters change frequently (and we get trained every year), the architecture doesn't. Because money for retrofits is always in short supply. Literally any construction project in a school seems to cost an amazing amount, and my town ain't got all that much surplus.

Blood from a stone. It's difficult to ask property owners to pony up more scratch when they only built a new school within the last ten years, especially when those ten years have featured epic inflation.

Yeah, money would best be spent on almost anything else, given the rarity of school shootings. Let teachers/staff carry and make it known they do - problem ‘mostly’ solved. Some nutcases will still slip through, but the numbers will go down from rare to vanishingly small. Not that the gun-haters will let up…

 

[Qwikdraw45]

Do you think it's the students asking to turn their schools into prisons?

"Sheep pens". Baaaaa, baaaa. FIFY.

 

[oldguy68]

Are there fire extinguishers in every class room? Those will temporarily blind an attacker. Let teachers carry a large bear type canister of mace.
Have them do more drills and let the kids know it's ok to fight an attacker in school!

It's not getting better, it's only going to get worse. Until they take more serious and drastic measures in regards to school safety.

 

[Uzi2]

A lot of teachers I know say they keep door chocks stashed in their personal bag to wedge doors shut - against policy.

I put a deadbolt on my office door in any company I worked at - also against policy. A concrete block to smash a window if needed and knotted rope for egress as well, useful in any number of situations.

You can't wedge a door from the inside that opens outward into a corridor.

They may be able to wedge an "inter classroom door" from one side, but classroom to corridor is not happening.

 

[Picton]

Are there fire extinguishers in every class room?

No.

Let teachers carry a large bear type canister of mace.

Not gonna happen. Liability.

Teachers can carry guns in schools with a letter from the building principal. That's good enough.

Have them do more drills and let the kids know it's ok to fight an attacker in school!

In most schools these days, they do. ALICE involves fighting back, and kids drill it several times a year in any school that bothers to comply with DESE. That's not every school, though.

It's not getting better, it's only going to get worse. Until they take more serious and drastic measures in regards to school safety.

Again, the bugbear is money. Real money, not $10k from the local nonprofit. I've tried many times to squeeze money out of school committees for things more worthwhile than deadbolts, and undergone years of disappointment. Feel free to try.

You can't wedge a door that opens outward into a corridor.

They may be able to wedge an "inter classroom door" from one side, but classroom to corridor is not happening.

Many open inward, but wedging is just one method. There are others. Again, ALICE covers this and we have to take annual training on it. Most involve these,

and schools all have them. But barricades are faster and work better.

 

[SHOCKNAWE]

Former Uvalde school police chief charged with 10 counts of 'abandoning and endangering' Robb Elementary survivors

Former Uvalde School District Police Chief Pete Arredondo was charged with 10 counts of abandoning and endangering a child.

abcnews.go.com

Good news

 

[dcmdon]

I really think ALICE is being done in many places just to frighten people into supporting more gun control.

Then there is the problem with the fact that the vast majority of school shooters are students or ex-students. By training kids, you are also training the murderers.

 

[Picton]

I really think ALICE is being done in many places just to frighten people into supporting more gun control.

Then there is the problem with the fact that the vast majority of school shooters are students or ex-students. By training kids, you are also training the murderers.

At my school, most of the reason they’re doing ALICE is because teachers and parents told them to find some replacement for “shelter in place.”

We are aware we might be “training future shooters,” but that risk is minimal. Who cares if they know we barricade the doors? It won’t help them defeat the barricade.

 

[MaverickNH]

View: https://youtu.be/-gD6WEc242w?si=huKqLtwaUO2jRYGt


My Bedford, NH school system installed an $800k integrated “Active Threat System” with button-activated alarms, lights and cameras over the summer. They did some advance training with students last year and will do some live drills with them this week. Presumably, there’s a direct link to the local PD too.

Anyone intending a mass killing would likely know about it and plan accordingly, targeting times when most are not inside classrooms. To that end, such a system funnels mass killing attempts towards less defendable scenarios. But not every potential mass killer is tactically smart and plans do go wrong, so I figure this system can still help by faster communication of an active event within the school and to the PD. I’d think part of the instruction is what to do if the alarms go off and you’re in the hallways, cafeteria, auditorium, etc. People dashing out every exit is kind of the opposite of a lockdown, but people streaming into classrooms is probably a bad idea too.

I’ll make a point of talking with some SROs when I’m working with the PD in the upcoming town elections that precede the November elections to see what they’re thinking. It’s one thing for the FD to respond to a Fire Alarm and another for the PD to respond to an Active Threat Alarm. I’m sure they’ve considered an attacker pulling a Fire Alarm to get the classrooms opened up and everyone in the hall. What a sh*t show to would be for the FD to be responding when the Active Threat System gets activated…

 

[Picton]

I’d think part of the instruction is what to do if the alarms go off and you’re in the hallways, cafeteria, auditorium, etc. People dashing out every exit is kind of the opposite of a lockdown, but people streaming into classrooms is probably a bad idea too.

I've sat through almost 20 years' worth of active-shooter training in schools, and that gets brought up literally every single year. It's been a concern for teachers, admins, and CoPs literally since Columbine: what do you do if you're outside of a classroom when shit goes down?

There are answers, but none of them are all that good. They amount to, "You've got the rest of your life to find a safe place."

A lot about surviving a shooting incident is just sheer dumb luck. We don't like to admit that, but it's true. I think there are probably good reasons why so FEW school shooters choose to start their rampages during lunch or passing periods, but I don't know enough to claim I know what those reasons are.

Suffice it to say almost all shooters have chosen times when classes were in session.

I’ll make a point of talking with some SROs when I’m working with the PD in the upcoming town elections that precede the November elections to see what they’re thinking. It’s one thing for the FD to respond to a Fire Alarm and another for the PD to respond to an Active Threat Alarm. I’m sure they’ve considered an attacker pulling a Fire Alarm to get the classrooms opened up and everyone in the hall. What a sh*t show to would be for the FD to be responding when the Active Threat System gets activated…

Be prepared to receive a polite non-answer. Because...

1. They're not all that interested in you knowing what they're thinking, because they're cops and you're not, peasant.
2. You're not a teacher nor a school administrator, and your need-to-know is not as great as theirs. Those people will go through training, which will give them a more precise answer than you (a normal, everyday citizen) will get.
3. Yes. They most certainly have considered the PD/FD concern you bring up. Both CoPs and the local Fire Chief talk to us about that very issue every single year. The polite non-answer you get will reflect that, and not go into much more detail than that.

The town where I work is tiny, mismanaged, underbudgeted, and generally shittier than most towns... and even here, the CoP and FD Chief are extremely well-trained and informed about what the local SOPs are for school shootings. Most towns hereabouts are on the same page, because they'll all be responding to each others' crises.

 

[MaverickNH]

Could Panic Buttons Save Lives in a School Shooting? More Schools Think So

There's legislative momentum to require panic alarm systems in schools. But many districts are installing the systems without a mandate.

www.edweek.org

Buttons teachers/staff wear on lanyards along with their ID badges - not a bad idea. Use 3x for non-active threat emergency and 8+ times for active threat. That’s reasonable psychology - if there’s no shooting, most can control button presses to 3-7 times, while “just keep pressing it” 8+ times is a panic reaction. Those systems gotta cost $millions.

I don’t get the “silently” part below - might be an error in reporting. When you suspend an Active Threat, it seems you’d want to err on the alarm-side of alerts. But I guess some schools have so many lockdowns it’s numbing…

”…Texas will be one of three states—along with New Jersey and Florida—to require that every public school be equipped with a panic alarm system that allows school personnel to call police immediately and silently, without picking up a phone to dial 911…

Those systems can come in the form of an app on staff members’ phones or, increasingly, a button that teachers wear around their necks along with their ID badges. The systems have options to call for help, often from within the school, when a student has a medical problem or to trigger a school-wide lockdown and police response when there’s an active shooter…

With the Centegix system, staff can push the button three times to signal “I need help,” indicating a lower-level problem that doesn’t require a lockdown or police response. In that situation, a designated team of school staff is notified...

To trigger a campus-wide alert and call to police, staff have to push the button eight or more times in succession.“

BTW, my group does Active Shooter drills with local PDs, so we get a little tighter with them than your average parent might. We might not have a “need to know” but that cop/citizen barrier is a bit lower.

 

[Picton]

I don’t get the “silently” part below - might be an error in reporting. When you suspend an Active Threat, it seems you’d want to err on the alarm-side of alerts. But I guess some schools have so many lockdowns it’s numbing…

”…Texas will be one of three states—along with New Jersey and Florida—to require that every public school be equipped with a panic alarm system that allows school personnel to call police immediately and silently, without picking up a phone to dial 911…

I've never heard of these systems, but I imagine they're thinking of an ESP huddled in a library closet with a shooter roaming around in the stacks outside. The ESP won't want to make any noise (lest the shooter realize she's there), but will want the coppers to know it's time to show up and do some door-kickin?

BTW, my group does Active Shooter drills with local PDs, so we get a little tighter with them than your average parent might. We might not have a “need to know” but that cop/citizen barrier is a bit lower.

By all means, ask.

But be prepared for a polite non-answer. The CoP gets these questions routinely, and probably learns to tailor different replies for different audiences. You'll get the "reply for people who seem well-informed, but don't work in the schools." That's going to be a different response than the "reply for people who clearly have no clue what they're talking about, and don't work in the schools."

 

[Fixxah]

It takes a staggering level of stupidity to believe that eliminating guns from law abiding citizens will stop murderers

If it saves one life...

 

[robjax]

”…Texas will be one of three states—along with New Jersey and Florida—to require that every public school be equipped with a panic alarm system that allows school personnel to call police immediately and silently, without picking up a phone to dial 911…

What good is any system when a teacher decides to have a smoke or grab their cell phone from the car and decides to circumvent the security protocols designed specifically to keep unwanted would be intruders out of the building at the exact time a psycho nut job decides to enter the building to do unspeakable harm to children with firearms purchased with money provided by high level “democrat” government individuals who planned the attack that are specifically looking to abolish the second amendment and confiscate and ban all privately owned firearms in the United States?

Asking for a friend….

 

[Dennis in MA]

Ah yes. This is this generation's "THE RUSSKIES ARE ATTACKING, GET UNDER YOUR DESK" air raid drills.

Like getting under your desk was going to protect you from radiation.

More importantly, the ODDS of it happening is so infinitesimally small as to not even consider it on a system-wide level.

It's analogous to an ADULT bringing their baseball glove to a Red Sox game. . . . in case a fly ball comes at them. Strangely, the same people don't wear a helmet and cup, which would be more useful. But I digress.

 

[hennypenny]

Beef up schools? Why not? Keeping the shooters outside and away from the victims doesn't seem too far-fetched. What's stopping it? Cost? Maybe Congress can spend a little less on bullshit and instead put it towards studying and funding school building fortification. Seems a more effective solution than disarming the law-abiding.

 

[MaverickNH]

By all means, ask.

But be prepared for a polite non-answer. The CoP gets these questions routinely, and probably learns to tailor different replies for different audiences. You'll get the "reply for people who seem well-informed, but don't work in the schools." That's going to be a different response than the "reply for people who clearly have no clue what they're talking about, and don't work in the schools."

Yeah, I hear you. When we're doing active shooter drills with them, I usually pull our new guys a distance back when they huddle up. I get that glance from the training lead that says, now we're going to talk about stuff not for your ears - "don't make the mistake of not shooting first", etc.

I had posted some years back (thread deleted) about some SoNH PD members who had started a civilian training company. In their opening class, they started joking about some extra-judicial punishment dealt out to scumbags. I spoke with them afterwards and mentioned they might hold that part back and got snark, so mentioned that in my NES review - you don't have to be a cop-hater to disapprove of discussing wanton head-busting in public courses. Not wise on their part.

There's that grey-zone that sometimes helps and sometimes hurts in keeping civil society in check - a lot of balancing going on there. We're part of that grey zone - in the black zone in many people's eyes.

 

[MaverickNH]

Dang - 600+ posts on the Bedford, NH Active Alert System in a day! Many whining about the expense (go to the town/school budget meetings) and some more fun control, blah, blah... Probably AI bots writing many - research finds almost all AI systems pick up gun control narratives as they predominate the news.

WMUR-TV

All six schools in the district are installing an “Active Threat System,” similar to a fire alarm system.

www.facebook.com

 

[Toast]

Ah yes. This is this generation's "THE RUSSKIES ARE ATTACKING, GET UNDER YOUR DESK" air raid drills.

Like getting under your desk was going to protect you from radiation.

Well, no.

The problem is everyone made fun of the drill because the conceit was that the bomb was going off overhead.

If you were in or near a targeted zone (say, Somerville with the target being Boston Common and a strategic size weapon), the drills were pointless.

If you were outside the targeted zone (say, Waltham with the target being Boston Common and a similar size weapon), duck-and-cover was the right move to protect from shrapnel damage from the windows and other loose items.

Those drills were developed by people who actually dropped nukes on two cities (or near exposed soldiers during tests) and they work for a number of scenarios. Yeah, if you're in one of the ones where they don't work, you're screwed. But, had they been needed, they would have helped avoid large numbers of injuries.

Sure, if it's "everyone firing off everything", well, you're all screwed. But, if it's a bunch of Houthis with a single off-books Russian tactical weapon rolled over the southern border, it would work today. But, (a) we can't admit that threat is viable and (b) no one in .gov has the balls to stand up to the ridicule that the 11:30pm talk shows would lay down.

You can run some interesting scenarios here: NUKEMAP by Alex Wellerstein

 

[peterk123]

So what changed since the 50s?

Divorce rates
Unwed mothers
Change in demographics
Social media
Video games

Put it all together and what does it sum up to? Failure of the parental unit. So if you want to fix this, start here.

Problem is there is no way to fix it. We are in such a huge downward spiral it's not even funny. You literally need to go back to the old west days. Everyone gets a gun. Let god sort out the rest. Something to be said for a well armed society. It would a be a few years of chaos, but I think things would get sorted out quick. People would certainly be more polite to one another.

So I vote for the exact opposite of what the article posed for a solution. Guns for everyone.

 

[MaverickNH]

https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/05/us/timeline-georgia-high-school-shooting/index.html

I guess the "panic button" helped in the 9/4/24 Georgia mass killing. In TX, 2% (300) of 15,000 alerts were for "threats" in 2023. There were 23 incidents of shootings in TX schools in 2023 - probably many more gun threats reported. Apparently, 90%+ of gun threats reported are not credible - false accusations and such. The false alert rate is going to wear thin.

"Authorities got the first calls of an active shooter on campus at 10:20 a.m., after someone pressed a wearable panic button issued just a week earlier to teachers, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation director and the Barrow County sheriff later would say.

Within minutes, school resource officers confronted the shooter.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/20/us/panic-buttons-schools-us-states/index.html

{i}"While panic button systems are often installed to protect staff and students from potential gun violence, the systems have more often been used in cases of medical emergencies, according to Centegix.

The company released a report in January showing of about 15,000 alerts sent within Texas schools, 98% were for “everyday incidents related to health and behavioral emergencies.” The report cites incidents of cardiac arrest and seizures on campus, where a panic button was used to quickly get help."[/i]

 

[spt_1955]

This. It ain't. It's ignorant adults who don't know what they don't know.

I'm in a building less than a decade old, meaning it was designed well after school shootings were A Thing. I remember the principal during the planning phases telling us each classroom would be equipped with bulletproof glass. I called bullshit on that one, and it soon turned out that she didn't know the difference between "safety glass" and "bulletproof glass."

The people making these decisions aren't trained in ballistics, and by and large they aren't equipped to think in terms of security other than in the most rudimentary way. If they're training school administrators in the meaning of hardened targets, I've not seen any evidence of that.

When they opened the new Elementary school in my South Shore town 15 years ago I went to the open house and stood there with all the parents looking at the round cafeteria with wall to ceiling windows fronting the main road through town and we all said "WTF are they thinking ???" while all the teachers walked around telling us how the openness and light energized the kids.