The latest casualty in President Donald Trump鈥檚 war on diversity, equity and inclusion is a $1 billion federal grant program to train school counselors and thwart mass shootings.

The U.S. Department of Education notified grant recipients this week it was ending funds to train and hire K-12 school mental health professionals included in a 2022 law that passed with bipartisan support following the mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas, which led to the deaths of 19 elementary school students and two teachers. 

The grants, which were included in a bipartisan gun control law approved by then-President Joe Biden, don鈥檛 align with the Trump administration鈥檚 goals, according to sent to grant recipients Tuesday evening and obtained by 麻豆精品. Grantees include local school districts, state education agencies and colleges tasked with training some 14,000 mental health professionals and placing them in K-12 schools in virtually every state. 

鈥淭hose receiving these notices reflect the prior Administration鈥檚 priorities and policy preferences and conflict with those of the current administration,鈥� Murray Bessette, a senior advisor in the Education Department鈥檚 Office of Planning, Evaluation and Policy Development, wrote in the letter. Affected programs, Bessette wrote, 鈥渧iolate the letter or purpose鈥� of federal civil rights laws, run counter to the department鈥檚 priority on 鈥渆xcellence in education鈥� and 鈥渦ndermine the well-being of the students these programs are intended to help.鈥�

Proponents of the grant program said they were caught off guard by the move, especially since , have attributed the unprecedented surge in school shootings to a student mental health crisis.

鈥淓nding these mental health investments will hurt students and families and make our schools less safe,鈥� Mary Wall, who was the Education Department鈥檚 deputy assistant secretary for P-12 education during the Biden administration, told 麻豆精品. 鈥淚t鈥檚 not an exaggeration to say that mental health supports save lives.鈥�

An Education Department spokesperson confirmed it would not renew $1 billion in grants, a move that appears to impact the entirety of the largest-ever federal effort to train school mental health professionals included in the 2022 Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. The law also created the first significant federal gun control measures in decades, including background checks on firearm purchases for anyone younger than 21 years old. 

Spokesperson Madi Biedermann said in a statement the grants didn鈥檛 live up to their goal of improving schools鈥� mental health support services 鈥� and suggested the cuts were part of a broader Trump administration effort to derail programs that support diversity, equity and inclusion in education. 

鈥淯nder the deeply flawed priorities of the Biden Administration, grant recipients used the funding to implement race-based actions like recruiting quotas in ways that have nothing to do with mental health and could hurt the very students the grants are supposed to help,鈥� Biedermann said. 

Biedermann鈥檚 statement echoed by conservative pundit Christoper Rufo, who turned to X this week to accuse the Biden administration of using the grants 鈥渢o advance left-wing racialism and discrimination.鈥� 

鈥淣o more slush fund for activists under the guise of mental health,鈥� wrote Rufo, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Rufo didn鈥檛 immediately respond to a request for comment from 麻豆精品. 

Wall said the Education Department during the Biden administration 鈥渙ffered a voluntary competitive priority鈥� to applicants who worked to ensure mental health professionals reflected the school communities they serve, but rejected the idea that the grants were a DEI initiative. Instead of creating a plan to support students鈥� well-being, she said the Trump administration has sought to 鈥渞ob school districts who have made important groundwork to have clinical services available to children and interrupt them midstream.鈥�

鈥淲e in no way required any of this to be focused on race or gender or sexuality or anything,鈥� Wall said. 鈥淲e were deliberately looking to set these up to be long-lasting, high-impact programs, where we would get the maximum amount of benefit.鈥�

Sen. Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut who introduced the 2022 law, accused the Trump administration Thursday of killing the grant program “in order to fund a giant tax cut for the crazy wealthy.鈥�

鈥淚 thought we had a bipartisan consensus around trying to support kids with really serious traumas and mental illnesses with support services in our schools,鈥� Murphy said in a statement to 麻豆精品. 鈥淏ut there鈥檚 not consensus on anything that helps people in this administration.鈥�

Lauren Levin, the chief advocacy officer at the nonprofit Sandy Hook Promise, said the cuts hinder students鈥� access to those services in schools that are already under-resourced. Though the has been long debated, student rates of depression, anxiety and loneliness. 

Nationally, there is an average of about , significantly lower than the 250-to-1 recommended by the American School Counselor Association. School psychologists are , with a national average of 1 for every 1,127 K-12 students, according to the American Psychological Association.  

鈥淎fter school shootings, we hear a lot of important conversations about the mental health needs and gaps in this country for youth,鈥� including from Republican lawmakers, Levin told 麻豆精品. 鈥淚n many of these cases with these grants, it means children who are currently receiving mental health services in schools are going to stop getting that help.鈥�

In the first few months of the Trump administration, several federal initiatives designed to prevent mass school shootings have faced a similar fate. A 26-person committee of violence prevention experts 鈥� also approved as part of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Axe 鈥� was gutted. 

Levin said Sandy Hook Promise, founded after the 2012 mass shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, has also begun to track cuts to grants authorized under the federal Trump approved that law in 2018 in response to the high school shooting in Parkland, Florida, which resulted in the deaths of 17 people. So far, Levin said they鈥檝e documented cuts to about a dozen grant recipients totaling nearly $20 million, including funding designed to help schools address social isolation among students and prevent bullying.  

鈥淥ne of the reasons that students or any of these shooters are not getting the help that they need is that we have a gap in access to mental health care,鈥� said Levin, who noted that schools are among the most consistent places for young people to get help. 

鈥淚f someone is showing signs of wanting to hurt themselves or others, if they are socially isolated, if we see changes in behavior and if there is a school counselor, that school can be their lifeline,鈥� Levin said. 鈥淭hat could make all the difference.鈥� 

was originally reported by Nadra Nittle of .

For almost three hours, last month in which senators pressed her on everything from to transgender athletes. But none from either party asked her about

That鈥檚 a glaring oversight, according to some leaders working to reduce , while others say that fears about the so dominated the hearing that there was little time to question McMahon about the full spectrum of education topics. , it鈥檚 unclear how McMahon will address the , but her previous comments on gun control and the White House鈥檚 actions on the issue so far suggest to prevention advocates that this administration won鈥檛 make it a priority 鈥� potentially endangering youth, domestic violence victims and other vulnerable groups.

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鈥淭丑别 No. 1 concern amongst American families is making sure we have safe classrooms,鈥� said Keri Rodrigues, president of the National Parents Union, a nonprofit organization working to improve educational outcomes and policies for children and families. 鈥淐an we keep our children alive in America’s classrooms? The idea that we would not even ask the next U.S. secretary of education about what she plans to do to keep our classrooms safer is ridiculous.鈥�

Rodrigues, who was in the room during the Senate confirmation hearing in February, said that President Donald Trump鈥檚 plans to dismantle the Department of Education make it imperative to know McMahon鈥檚 approach to school gun violence. On Tuesday, , nearly half of its staff, heightening concerns about its potential demise. Twenty-one attorneys general in Democratic-led states sued the Trump administration over the layoffs on Thursday, arguing that eliminating the staffers was 鈥渋llegal and unconstitutional.鈥�

Gun violence is the leading cause of death for children and teens, based on data from the Centers for Disease for Control and Prevention, and disproportionately kills youth of color. School shootings have steadily increased over time, with recorded this year, according to the K-12 Shooting Database, which tracks gun violence incidents on campuses.

McMahon should have been asked 鈥渉ow she plans to be able to address these very real and very serious issues without having a U.S. Department of Education that is working with states and working with districts,鈥� Rodrigues said.

The Department of Education did not respond by publication time to The 19th鈥檚 request for comment about McMahon鈥檚 plans on gun violence.

During her 2017 confirmation hearing, former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, a Trump nominee, suggested that guns might protect students from grizzly bears, leading to widespread ridicule. Last year, , or Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPO), that allow guns to be confiscated from individuals considered a threat to themselves or others.

ERPO, she wrote, 鈥渃ould easily be used to REMOVE Firearms from Law-Abiding Citizens. Chicago and NYC have some of the strictest 鈥榞un laws鈥� in the country and yet they also have some of the highest gun violence. Recently 9 people were killed in 24 hours in Chicago. A pregnant mom was seriously injured and her 11-year-old son who was trying to protect her was killed.鈥�

McMahon argued that it would have been more effective to keep the convicted felon who shot the mother and son in prison than risk removing firearms from individuals without criminal records. Her views appear to align with those of the president, who on directing the attorney general to review all regulations and policies created during President Joe Biden鈥檚 administration that purportedly infringe on the public鈥檚 rights to bear arms and to devise a plan to counteract such restrictions.

鈥淭his administration has made it pretty clear that it is not looking to prioritize gun violence prevention, whether that’s in the nominees that it has put forward, including the education secretary, or the executive order on the Second Amendment that came out of the White House,鈥� said Nina Vinik, founder and president of Project Unloaded, a Gen Z-focused gun violence prevention group. 鈥淭丑别 administration is looking to roll back the progress that’s been made over the last decade or more to reduce gun violence.鈥�

Noah Lumbantobing, former director of communications for March for Our Lives (MFOL), a student-led gun violence prevention organization, said he suspects Trump鈥檚 administration will reverse the policies the group supports to retaliate against the Biden administration.

鈥淚t’s so clearly about vengeance and not at all about children’s safety, so that’s scary,鈥澛爏aid Lumbantobing, who transitioned out of MFOL on Wednesday to step into a new role in the gun safety movement. 鈥淲e still don’t know what’s going to be on the chopping block, but we have no doubt that he’s going to undo a lot of the things that we spent a lot of time fighting for, and even more importantly, things that have saved lives.鈥�

In 2024, gun violence incidents on campuses dropped to 331 from 349 the prior year, according to the K-12 School Shooting Database. Lumbantobing attributes the decrease in shootings to the 鈥渃ommon-sense life-saving solutions鈥� the Biden administration adopted. That includes an executive order Biden issued that expanded the definition of a gun dealer since some gun sellers were not only going undetected but also neglecting to perform background checks on customers.

鈥淣ow, they do have to do background checks and to act responsibly,鈥� Lumbantobing said. 鈥淭hat’s going to get undone. So there’s a lot of danger here, both in undoing some of the laws and also just selectively not enforcing laws that are on the books. It’s going to kill children, and it’s just for partisan gain.鈥�

He also has concerns about how relaxing gun restrictions will affect victims of domestic violence, a problem the Biden administration addressed, in part, through tougher background checks.

鈥淭丑别 tightened loopholes for dating partners to not be able to obtain firearms and potentially harm or kill their partners,鈥� Lumbantobing said of the federal law passed in 2022 that provides states with funding to develop red flag laws and other interventions. If the Department of Justice “chooses not to enforce the laws on the books, no one’s looking out for victims of domestic abuse,鈥� he added.

At least 110 domestic violence-related shootings have occurred at schools from 1966 to the present, the K-12 School Shooting Database reports. The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act routes resources to intervention programs to reduce gun crimes, but Lumbantobing said he isn鈥檛 sure if that will happen under the Trump administration. He does give Trump credit, however, for supporting a ban on bump stocks, gun accessories that essentially turn semi-automatic rifles into automatic weapons. In 2017, during Trump’s first term, a gunman used bump stocks to kill 60 people and wound hundreds of others at a Las Vegas music festival.

鈥淪o there’s some hope that we have that he’ll not be as constrained by GOP orthodoxy there, but it’s not looking good,鈥� Lumbantobing said. 鈥淗e moves with the wind.鈥�

That the Trump administration has chosen not to continue the Office of Gun Violence Prevention established during Biden鈥檚 tenure has also worried gun control supporters. Although Trump did not formally eliminate the office, he has yet to hire personnel to maintain it, Lumbantobing said. The office no longer has a functioning website either.

鈥淲hat’s so dangerous is that we may not notice it today or tomorrow, but in a year, two years, whenever the next mass shooting happens, I think we’ll be able to look and see it’s because Trump stopped enforcing the law,鈥� Lumbantobing said.

The Office of Gun Violence Prevention represented a bipartisan approach to gun safety because it allowed the White House to focus on prevention in a holistic way that drew on government resources but did not require the creation of any new laws, Lumbantobing said.

鈥淗ow do we fix this 鈥� within the constraints that we have? They made massive progress on that,鈥� he said. 鈥淕etting rid of that office is a refutation of that very premise, and I think it is a real dangerous one. If you can’t agree with us that children dying is a bad thing, boy, are we in trouble.鈥�

Several states, including California, Massachusetts, Maryland and Wisconsin, have opened 鈥� or passed legislation to open 鈥� their own offices of gun violence prevention, suggesting that states and not the federal government will take the lead on curbing gun violence prevention during the Trump administration.

鈥淚 think we’re going to continue to see a world where gun safety exists in some places and not others,鈥� Lumbantobing said. 鈥淭hat’s not the America that young people deserve.鈥�

Although he would have liked to see senators ask McMahon more questions about school shootings during her confirmation hearing, he said their focus on the potential abolishment of the Department of Education was appropriate. Getting rid of that federal agency would be an attack on gun safety because of the work it does to reduce school shootings.

鈥淭丑别 Department of Education has a critical role in that work and could have a bigger role,鈥� Lumbantobing said. 鈥淛ust last year, we worked with Secretary [Miguel] Cardona to do a safe storage campaign to encourage parents. We understand that people are going to own guns. There’s nothing wrong with that if you own a legally obtained firearm. But it’s important that folks store those firearms safely because, otherwise, they show up in places we don’t want, in school shootings, in instances of domestic violence or interpersonal violence, even amongst young people or kids shooting themselves accidentally.鈥�

While March for Our Lives collaborated with Cardona on a safe storage campaign, Lumbantobing does not anticipate engaging in such work with McMahon.

鈥淪he has expressed no interest in that,鈥� he said. 鈥淲e would love to, but she won’t. Trump has come out and said that he wants to be the very best friend possible to the NRA [National Rifle Association], so we know how she’ll approach it, whether she takes an ax to the Department of Education or just starts to unwind some of the pivotal policies that the Department of Ed pushes to keep kids safe.鈥�

Trump鈥檚 Cabinet picks are not the only concern of gun violence prevention groups. They also fear the impact of the 鈥� recent decision that rescinded the federal restriction on 18-to-20-year-olds buying handguns. More than one mass school shooter has fallen into this age group. In 2022, an . Four years before that, a 19-year-old fatally shot 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. In 2012, a 20-year-old shooter struck down 26 people at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.

鈥淔or the Fifth Circuit to say that trying to address the scourge of gun violence and its impact on young people with reasonable age restriction on handgun purchases is not permissible under the Second Amendment is potentially a real setback in terms of trying to address youth gun violence in this country鈥� Vinik said.

Without being able to rely on government intervention or cooperation, gun prevention advocates are coming up with their own solutions to address youth gun violence. Project Unloaded, for example, hopes to shift the culture around gun use by providing young people with facts and figures about the drawbacks of firearms, including increased risk of homicide, suicide and accidents.

鈥淲hen we give them that information in a way that’s really engaging and accessible, they do increase their awareness of what those risks are, and it does lead them, in many cases, to shift away from a desire to use guns in the future,鈥� Vinik said.

Since young people often learn about guns online, particularly on social media or through gaming platforms, Project Unloaded recently launched a campaign called 鈥溾�� that involves a collaboration with about a dozen gamers who are also content creators on Tiktok, YouTube and Instagram. The campaign, Vinik said, aims to instill this message into youth: 鈥淧lay hard when you’re in a video game, but in real life, at home, in your community, you’re safer without guns.鈥�

Inhale. Exhale. 

If you鈥檙e reading this, that means you鈥檝e made it through 2024. (Congrats!) But don鈥檛 get too comfortable, because in 2025, the student safety and well-being beat is in for some major changes.

With Donald Trump鈥檚 second inauguration just weeks away, I figured I鈥檇 take a moment to highlight the defining developments in the School (in)Security universe over the last year 鈥� and how the landscape could evolve over the next 365 days.

1. The first-of-its-kind sentencing of a school shooter鈥檚 parents

Michigan parents Jennifer and James Crumbley became the first in U.S. history to be sentenced on criminal charges stemming from a mass school shooting perpetuated by their child. Each was sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison for involuntary manslaughter. 

• Prosecutors accused the Crumbleys of ignoring warning signs that their son had a desire for violence when they gave him the gun he used to kill four classmates and injure seven others. | 
• In Georgia, the father of a 14-year-old accused of carrying out a mass shooting that left four dead was arrested on murder charges. Authorities alleged the father 鈥渒nowingly allowed鈥� the teenager to possess the gun that was used to carry out the attack. 
• Parents not liable in Santa Fe: The parents of a former student accused of killing 10 people at his Texas high school in 2018 were sued for negligence, but a jury found them not responsible. |  
• The big picture: I wrote a deep dive into the history of holding parents accountable for their kids鈥� bad behavior 鈥� and why the Crumbley case was unprecedented. | 

2. An Apology from Big Tech 鈥� and a failed bid for new online safety rules

Amid heightened concerns over social media鈥檚 impact on youth mental health, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg did something this year that perhaps nobody saw coming: He apologized. | 

• The apology to parents who say their kids suffered, or died, because of their social media use came during a heated Senate hearing where lawmakers accused Big Tech of failing to prevent youth suicides and child sexual exploitation. It was part of a larger panic over teens鈥� TikTok addictions. | 
• Despite the outcry, a federal effort to implement new online safety rules for children has faltered again. And again. And again. | , , 

3. Did somebody say TikTok?

The Supreme Court is set to hear 11th-hour arguments about whether the government鈥檚 effort to ban the Chinese social media app violates the First Amendment. Justices will hear the case Jan. 10, nine days before the prohibition is set to go into effect. | 

• Claiming it posed a surveillance threat from the Chinese government, President Joe Biden signed a law in April to ban the enormously popular video-streaming app in the U.S. unless parent company ByteDance relinquished ownership. | 

4. Scrutiny of AI鈥檚 role in student well-being

Try going 10 seconds without reading something about artificial intelligence. I dare you. As emerging AI tools promise 鈥� or threaten 鈥� to disrupt K-12 education as we know it, they鈥檝e also been oversold, misused and unevenly supervised. 

• The Federal Trade Commission reached a settlement with Evolv Technology, the maker of an AI-powered security screening system used in some 800 schools, after accusing the company of making false claims about its ability to detect weapons and keep kids safe. | 
• Joanna Smith-Griffin, the founder and former CEO of the once-celebrated education technology company AllHere, was indicted on charges she defrauded investors of nearly $10 million as the maker of AI chatbots for schools fell into bankruptcy. | 
  • Why you should care: AllHere had only a few customers, court records reveal, before it was hired to build a buzzy, $6 million chatbot for the Los Angeles school district. A former-employee-turned-whistleblower told me the overwhelmed startup took shortcuts that put students鈥� privacy at risk. | 
• In a first-of-its-kind criminal case, two teenage boys were arrested in Florida and accused of creating AI-generated nude images of middle school classmates without their consent. | 
• 鈥楧istrust, detection & discipline鈥�: As students increasingly turned to generative AI like ChatGPT for help with assignments, educators said they lacked clear instructions on how to thwart tech-assisted cheating. | 

5. School-based police officers under fire

The Department of Justice released a scathing report on the police response to the 2022 school shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. 鈥淐ascading failures鈥� defined a slow police response, the report stated, and officers acted with 鈥渘o urgency鈥� to confront the gunman. | 

• A harrowing investigation found that predatory school resource officers have routinely used their position and authority to meet and groom students. | 
• Impact, baby! In response to the article, the department issued guidance urging that school police be trained on setting appropriate boundaries with children. | 

6. A small school cybersecurity grant program attracted massive interest

As schools and libraries nationwide fell victim to a surge of cyberattacks, the Federal Communications Commission rolled out a $200 million pilot program in a bid to stop the hackers. Illuminating the scale of the problem, demand far exceeded the available federal funds: The commission received more than 2,700 applications for some $3.7 billion in requests. | 

7. The Trump effect comes back into focus

• After Trump faced backlash for his family separation immigration policy in his first term, the president-elect has floated the idea of deporting all members of mixed-status families 鈥� a policy with the potential to affect millions of households with at least one U.S.-born child. |   
• The incoming president has pledged to impose wide-ranging restrictions on transgender students and roll back Biden-era civil rights protections. | 

Emotional Support

Editor Bev Weintraub鈥檚 party animal Marz rang in the new year with something a little stronger than catnip.

By Marissa Yelenick

Active shooter drills in Maryland schools will be different next school year under a new set of state guidelines meant to limit the impact those drills have on the mental health of students.

The  are designed to prohibit trauma-inducing elements like imitation of gunfire or explosions. They also require school systems to notify parents in advance when students will be practicing what to do in the event of an active shooter in their buildings.

The new guidelines were released by the Maryland Center for School Safety this fall, ordered by a new  requiring the center to draft new parameters and create a new process for collecting and analyzing data on their effectiveness. The center will also look into the psychological impact the shooter drills have on staff, parents and students.

Parts of the guidelines 鈥� including bans on gunfire and the requirement to notify parents 鈥� have already gone into effect because they are explicit in state law. The full set of guidelines will be put into effect at the beginning of the academic year in 2025.

鈥淭丑别 mental health crisis that we see in our young people is undeniable,鈥� said Del. Jared Solomon (D-Montgomery), who sponsored the measure in the House earlier this year. 鈥淎s we normalize having to deal with school shootings, we are creating more anxiety and more issues among young people.鈥�

While schools have long practiced safety drills, active shooter drills are relatively new, following the 1999 shooting at Columbine High School, according to the guidelines.

While school systems have made an effort to keep students safe by implementing active shooter drills, concerns have been raised  about the impact these drills have on student鈥檚 mental health. This led to the April passage of the Maryland bill, as well as  signed by President Joe Biden to increase federal guidance on the subject.

Maryland鈥檚 new guidelines, released in October, call for unified terminology between districts to discourage miscommunication between the school system and the relevant public. They intend to increase communication between staff and students to create an open dialogue where everyone feels comfortable raising concerns, as well as creating a diverse planning team who will work on planning the drills and doing a post-analysis of how it went and any shortcomings it faced.

The guidelines emphasize that active shooter drills are not a one-size-fits-all matter, and should be adjusted to fit the age group.

鈥淭丑别se are going to be part of a young person鈥檚 life for the foreseeable future, but that doesn鈥檛 mean that you can鈥檛 do them in a way that is both trauma-informed and age appropriate,鈥� Solomon said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 really important that the way school systems do these types of events reflects a care and age appropriateness of the grades that are being impacted.鈥�

The guidelines also recommend that a mechanism be established to pause or stop the drill when necessary, for schools to notify parents before and after all drills to increase trust and communication, and to allow students and staff who feel uncomfortable to opt-out of the drills.

The lead sponsors of the bill, Solomon and Sen. Cheryl Kagan (D-Montgomery), felt that the impact guns have on today鈥檚 children needs to be mitigated as much as possible, and worked to balance a focus on their safety while prioritizing their mental health.

鈥淭丑别 law that Del. Solomon and I sponsored and passed tried to walk the fine line of thoughtful preparation that isn鈥檛 traumatic,鈥� Kagan said. 鈥淎nd we also had to consider parents and community members who are understandably alarmed and concerned when they see the impact of these drills 鈥� Our concern was that [the drills] were not being strategic in how they were handled, and were actually causing trauma for those involved.鈥�

One active shooter drill that occurred in Solomon鈥檚 district served as a driving force for his involvement.

鈥淔amilies were literally getting texts from their kids saying, 鈥業 don鈥檛 know if I鈥檒l ever see you again,鈥� and it was a drill. They didn鈥檛 know,鈥� said Solomon. 鈥淭丑别re was no requirement prior to this for a school or a school system to notify families before or after.鈥�

Additional motivation for the bill included shared experiences from other parents Solomon spoke to, he said. Many shared their frustrations at the lack of foresight they had into when the drills would be taking place and what would happen during them, which prevented parents from having appropriate conversations with their children to prepare them.

Starting in January, schools will distribute a new survey made by the National Center for School Mental Health to gather feedback from staff, parents and students on how effective the drills are, and the mental impact they have on all involved.

鈥淭丑别 goal is not to create fear but to instill confidence and preparedness,鈥� said the guidelines from the Maryland Center for School Safety. 鈥淏y working together as a community, schools can foster safe and supportive learning environments.鈥�

This was originally published on .

Frank remembers wondering if he would ever see his family again; whether he told them he loved them when he left for Columbine High School that morning. Patricia remembers her staff at Marshall County High School tending to 20 injured students. Greg remembers the piercing shotgun blasts at West-Liberty Salem High School and his kids running through muddy ditches in search of safety. These memories will always haunt us, but they also fuel our determination that no other school should endure what ours have.

When the news crews leave and the attention fades, the real recovery work begins. It鈥檚 a long road that we鈥檝e walked ourselves and now guide others down. After a school experiences a shooting 鈥� 鈥� we call their principals and offer our experience and understanding in the immediate aftermath and beyond. 

After years of talking through tragedies affecting vastly different communities, we know which supports are critical to prevent and recover from shootings, and which fall short. On Sept. 23, we on “The Long-Term Effects of Gun Violence on Schools, Young People and their Communities” and urged members of Congress to significantly increase funding in three critical areas. 

First, they need to expand and extend Project SERV grants. At West-Liberty Salem High School, these funds were a lifeline, allowing Greg to hire Deputy J, a school resource officer, and Mrs. Leichty, a mental health clinician. Deputy J has become the heart of the school community. He coaches high school football, reads to young students at our co-located elementary school and shares lunch with kids in the cafeteria. All the while, he provides a crucial sense of safety and security. 

Mrs. Leichty works alongside the high school counselor helping students grapple with sleepless nights, falling grades and intrusive thoughts in the aftermath of trauma. But SERV grants run out long before the need for these staff members does. Every year, Greg must piece together funds to keep them employed, knowing students still desperately need their support.

Second, Congress must invest in educators through programs like Title II. Teachers are on the front lines 鈥� not just for academic growth, but for identifying and addressing students’ emotional needs. They need training and resources to take on this enormous responsibility. Moreover, a staggering 86% of K-12 public schools reported they had challenges in hiring teachers last school year. And Title II, which provides funding for professional development and teacher preparation, is key to making sure each classroom is headed by a talented and caring person. Unfortunately, the House has proposed . The nation is already losing too many excellent educators and can’t afford to leave those who stay behind ill equipped to handle the challenges they face.

Third, Congress must address the critical shortage of mental health staff. Many communities, particularly in rural areas, lack qualified counselors to prevent violence and help in the aftermath of traumatic events, and community mental health providers often have months-long waiting lists. These challenges limit a counselor鈥檚 ability to provide student services and leave many children without the support they need. More funding is urgently needed to hire additional counselors and mental health staff to make sure all students get the care they deserve.

Schools are uniquely positioned to provide mental health support, but they need help to meet the growing demand. While the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act infused much-needed resources into an underfunded system, the scale of the crisis demands so much more.

Beyond federal funding, Congress can act on three other critical pieces of legislation. The would establish vital grants and require federal agencies to develop evidence-based practices that promote mental health and resiliency among educators responsible for students鈥� well-being. The would use competitive grants to bring licensed professionals directly into schools dealing with traumatic experiences, grief, bereavement, risk of suicide and violence.

The third bill, which is being written by Sen. Ron Wyden, is particularly important to schools like Columbine that have become common swatting targets. The act would address the growing crisis of fake threats by requiring the Department of Justice to aid law enforcement agencies in identifying likely swatting calls, creating a national 鈥渄o not swat鈥� registry modeled after the Seattle police department鈥檚 successful and providing grants to 911 services to update their caller ID technology.

These bills represent concrete steps toward creating safer, more resilient school communities. Their implementation, combined with proper funding, would provide schools with the comprehensive support system needed to prevent tragedies and ensure proper care for students and staff alike.

As the budget discussions resume after the election, we call on the nation’s leaders to summon the courage and compassion needed to protect America’s children. Our experiences have shown us the way forward. We ask only that those in power have the strength to follow it.

The presidential election hasn鈥檛 focused much on education 鈥� but the nation got to witness an in-depth debate this week on the partisan responses to school shootings. 

Democratic VP candidate Tim Walz, who said his 17-year-old son witnessed a shooting last year, focused on limiting guns used to perpetrate mass attacks. JD Vance highlighted how schools could better defend against their bullets. Heightened physical security, Vance said during the Tuesday evening vice presidential debate on CBS, is the key response to school shootings. 

鈥淲e have to make the doors lock better, we have to make the doors stronger, we鈥檝e got to make the windows stronger and, of course, we need to increase school resource officers,鈥� he said. 

Yet, while school shootings have reached record levels in recent years, so too have the number of campuses that deploy various forms of campus hardening, including locks, perimeter fencing and armed police. 

The market for school-hardening products is fast and growing: AI-enabled notification systems, panic buttons, bulletproof windows, bulletproof marker boards, bulletproof shields, bulletproof blankets and even bulletproof hoodies with a guarantee: 鈥淚f you get shot (God forbid) with our hoodies on, we鈥檒l send you .鈥�

I made this handy chart 鈥� based on 鈥� to show how school security measures have changed in the last two(ish) decades (1999-2000 and 2021-22). 

According to the latest data, 45% of campuses 鈥� and 63% of high schools 鈥� had sworn police officers. That tally doesn鈥檛 include non-sworn security personnel. Random contraband sweeps are conducted in more than half of high schools. 

Nearly all schools 鈥� 97% 鈥� control access to buildings with locks and monitors, and a similar number require visitors to sign in and wear badges. Security cameras have been installed to monitor 93% of schools. 

The feds have since expanded the types of hardening measures they track. According to the most recent data, 76% of schools have locks on classroom doors and 43% have silent alarms directly connected to the police. during last month鈥檚 mass shooting at Georgia鈥檚 Apalachee High School. 

Though there are a handful of cases where school police and other security prevented or mitigated mass shootings, research suggests they鈥檙e ineffective at preventing attacks overall and . Armed guards were stationed on campus during a quarter of school shootings over a 30-year period.  

Vance said during the debate that 90% of 鈥済un violence in this country is committed with illegally obtained firearms,鈥� likely of federal prison inmates who possessed guns during their offenses. Yet of mass shooters obtain their weapons legally. School shootings 鈥� the topic at Tuesday鈥檚 debate 鈥� are by aggrieved students who get guns from their parents. 

In the news

High schools have become a 鈥渃esspool of sexually explicit deepfakes鈥� as AI-generated images of child sexual abuse flood the internet. |

Hoax threats of shootings and bombings have caused disruptions in schools nationwide, a majority of which have been spread by teens on TikTok and Instagram. |

A new California law to standardize active-shooter drills bans simulated gunfire after the use of a masked man with a fake gun stirred controversy. |

• President Biden signed an executive order last week that seeks to ensure active-shooter drills are effective without traumatizing students. | 麻豆精品

Indicted New York City Mayor Eric Adams is in no shortage of controversy. Add this to the list: The school district is piloting school bus surveillance cameras from a company run by a former high-ranking administration official. |

As a ransomware group takes credit for a cyberattack on the Providence, Rhode Island, school district, school officials have kept quiet. |

District leaders can assess their schools鈥� cybersecurity vulnerability with a new resource guide from the Education Department and Federal Communications Commission. |

A Florida father notified the police after his 10-year-old son threatened on Snapchat to shoot up a high school. |

ICYMI @The74

• Feds Zero in on Maker of LAUSD鈥檚 Failed AI Chatbot, Hint at Criminal Charges

• Under Tennessee鈥檚 Stricter School Library Law, Some Books Quietly Disappear

• Study Finds COVID Harmed Cognitive Skills of Students 鈥� and Teachers

Emotional support

We could all just use a nap. 

Former Uvalde schools police Chief Pete Arredondo asked a state district court on Friday to quash ten felony charges of child endangerment for his response to the 2022 Robb Elementary School shooting.

Arredondo is one of two law enforcement officers who face criminal charges for their response to Texas鈥� deadliest school shooting, which left nineteen children and two teachers dead on May 22, 2022. An indictment handed down in June by a Uvalde County grand jury called Arredondo the incident commander and accused him of to ten children by delaying law enforcement鈥檚 response to the active shooter and not responding as trained.

In their motion to toss out the indictment, Arredondo鈥檚 lawyers say school districts and their employees don鈥檛 have a duty to protect students from third-party threats. The lawyers also point out that the children were already in danger when Arredondo responded.

鈥淭丑别 indictment does not allege that Mr. Arredondo engaged in any conduct that placed a child in imminent danger of death, bodily injury, or physical or mental impairment,鈥� the filing states. 鈥淭o the contrary, the language in the indictment itself makes clear that when Mr. Arredondo responded as part of his official duties, an active shooter incident was already in progress.鈥�

Arredondo that he did not think he was the incident commander and that he did not give any orders. Nearly 400 local, state and federal law enforcement officers descended upon the school but failed to act decisively, instead waiting for more than an hour to confront the gunman.

Border Patrol agents ultimately decided to breach the classroom and killed the shooter.

Since the school shooting, families of Uvalde victims have called on local and state elected officials to hold officers accountable for their failures in leadership. Many said they were disappointed that the grand jury indicted only two officers.

In addition to Arredondo, former district officer Adrian Gonzales was indicted on 29 counts of child endangerment. Gonzales violating school district policy or state law. Both officers were released from Uvalde County Jail on bond.

Uvalde District Attorney Christina Mitchell did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

As The Texas Tribune’s signature event of the year, brings Texans closer to politics, policy and the day鈥檚 news from Texas and beyond. Browse on-demand recordings and catch up on the biggest headlines from Festival events at the Tribune鈥檚 .

This article originally appeared in at . The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.

In a video posted to YouTube, 24-year-old school shooting survivor David Hogg points to a whiteboard and outlines a five-step plan to reshape America.聽

Ever since Hogg survived the 2018 Valentine鈥檚 Day shooting at his Parkland, Florida, high school, which killed 17 of his classmates and educators, he鈥檚 become a national leader in the push for gun control and a formidable up-and-comer in Democratic politics. His latest effort is , a political action committee formed in 2023 that has raised nearly $8.5 million in the past year to elect Gen Z and millennial progressives to state and national office. 

The PAC aims to find young Democrats running for office, flood their campaigns with cash, offer strategic advice, provide a team of volunteers and work with the candidates to build a winning platform.

The strategy, Hogg explains in the YouTube advertisement designed to attract donors, has already met with success in Texas: 鈥淲e just did this, electing the youngest person to the Texas state Senate, Molly Cook,鈥� the state鈥檚 first openly LGBTQ+ senator. Leading up to the May election, Hogg鈥檚 PAC bolstered Cook鈥檚 campaign with $300,000 in financial backing, money used to blanket her district with mailings and digital ads.  

鈥淲ith Molly, we found in our poll that she was behind by 2%, so we came in and we found that she was ahead by 5 after we informed voters about her background,鈥� Hogg says, adding that his team knocked on the doors of more than 1,000 potential voters. 鈥淲e got her on MSNBC as well and worked with her on her messaging and the result is that she ended up winning by 62 votes.鈥� 

As Hogg works to 鈥渆lect a ton more Mollys around the country,鈥� an analysis by 麻豆精品 of Federal Election Commission filings and the PAC鈥檚 digital ads offers insight into how he has leveraged the trauma and lessons learned from surviving one of America鈥檚 deadliest school shootings to build out a well-connected, generously funded operation to influence elections. 

The urgency of his key issue remains unabated: were killed and at least nine others injured Wednesday in a shooting at a Georgia high school. During a presidential campaign stop Wednesday afternoon in New Hampshire, Vice President Kamala Harris called the shooting outside Atlanta “a senseless tragedy, on top of so many senseless tragedies.”

“It’s just outrageous that everyday in our country 鈥� in the United States of America 鈥� that parents have to send their children to school worried about whether or not their child will come home alive. It’s senseless,” Harris said. “We’ve got to stop it.”

Leaders We Deserve has pumped millions of dollars 鈥� and resources from Democratic power players 鈥� into the campaigns of young candidates who support progressive causes like gun control, reproductive rights and protecting public school funding. Its efforts going into November will almost certainly be strengthened by Harris鈥檚 presence atop the ticket, an event that has .

Joining forces with Hogg, a recent Harvard graduate, is Kevin Lata, the former campaign manager of U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost, a Democrat from Florida who, at 27, is the first member of Gen Z to serve in Congress. Hogg and Lata didn鈥檛 respond to interview requests.

鈥淎s a generation, we鈥檝e collectively been told to run, hide and fight over and over during active shooting drills, and our generation has learned that along with our ABCs,鈥� Hogg says in one ad. 鈥淚 think it鈥檚 time that we repurpose the meaning of that. We need to start running for office. We need to stop hiding from the responsibility that we have to protect future generations.鈥�

Cook has received the largest share of direct campaign cash from Leaders We Deserve, according to the PAC鈥檚 most recent federal financial disclosures, which cover the period from June 2023 to the end of July 2024. In that time, the group has helped finance the campaigns of 16 candidates, primarily at the state level, including in Pennsylvania, Alabama, Florida and Ohio. 

Funding has gone to the Georgia House race of a seventh-grade math teacher in Atlanta, a former Miss Texas vying for a state House seat on a gun control platform, a 28-year-old in Pennsylvania whose run for the state House is centered on , and a 28-year-old mother running for a House seat in Tennessee after the state .

鈥楶ain into purpose鈥�

Though young candidates are underrepresented in public office across the country, and they tend to face steeper financial barriers than those from older generations, FEC data 鈥� and Hogg鈥檚 five-step plan 鈥� show the PAC offers more than money to its endorsed candidates. It has ties to some of the major players in Democratic campaign operations. 

Its 59-person advisory board encompasses education leaders, gun control proponents, youth activists and two former law enforcement officers 鈥� 鈥� who defended the U.S. Capitol during the January 6, 2021, attack by a mob of Donald Trump supporters. Democratic politicians, half of them 35 or younger, make up the largest share of advisors. 

Among the more seasoned advisors is Arne Duncan, the former education secretary for President Barack Obama. Duncan now has his own group 鈥� Chicago CRED 鈥� which provides job training and other resources in a bid to stem gun violence in his hometown. 

Duncan told 麻豆精品 that he and Hogg communicate regularly to discuss their shared goal of thwarting gun violence. Duncan said that his 鈥済eneration has failed鈥� to confront the issue in a meaningful way, leaving young people 鈥� including the ones Hogg is working to elect 鈥� to devise solutions. 

鈥淚 hate the leadership that David has had to provide on this issue. I hate the trauma that he and his classmates and his school and his community have been through,鈥� Duncan said. 鈥淏ut I so appreciate him turning that pain into purpose and really fighting to change things.鈥� 

Hogg鈥� who co-founded the gun control group in the Parkland shooting鈥檚 immediate aftermath and has campaigned in previous elections for candidates who support new gun laws鈥� has garnered financial support for his political committee from marquee donors. The bulk of donations 鈥� more than $4.3 million 鈥� come from undisclosed individuals contributing less than $200, but the largest single contribution of $300,000 is from Ron Conway. The Silicon Valley venture capitalist and gun control proponent served on the advisory board of , which has sought to reduce campus gun violence in the wake of the 2012 mass shooting at the Newtown, Connecticut, elementary school. 

Other prominent donors include reproductive rights activist Phoebe Gates, the daughter of Microsoft founder and philanthropist Bill Gates, who gave $75,000, and actress Kate Capshaw and her husband, the director Steven Spielberg, who donated a combined $25,000. 

That support, federal election data shows, has translated into significant spending, with nearly $3 million going to advertising via text messaging, digital ads and campaign mailers. Nearly $1 million 鈥� the PAC鈥檚 second-largest expense 鈥� was used to purchase lists with the contact information of potential voters. 

The PAC鈥檚 expenditures also reflect the web of influential players working behind the scenes. Leaders We Deserve paid nearly $130,000 in legal fees to the Elias Law Group, the firm of Democratic election lawyer Marc Elias, who and is now assisting with the party鈥檚 vote recount strategy for November. Other top payments were to prominent political fundraisers and strategists, including The Hooligans Agency, with using Hollywood tactics to make viral political ads.

PACs like Leaders We Deserve have faced criticism for injecting smaller races with big money from interest groups and out-of-state donors. Leaders We Deserve has found its greatest success raising money from donors in California, Maryland, Massachusetts and New York, federal data shows. The group hasn鈥檛 contributed to candidates in any of those states. 

Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers and a Leaders We Deserve advisory board member, said the PAC offers Hogg a strategic advantage.

鈥淗e did this in a way so that he wasn鈥檛 constrained by party,鈥� Weingarten said. 鈥淗e understands and knits together policy and politics.鈥� 

鈥楢 big barrier鈥�

Even with its list of established connections, Leaders We Deserve faces headwinds in driving change. 

Young people are 鈥渧astly underrepresented on the ballot鈥� and run for public office at much lower rates than older adults, according to from the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning Engagement, or CIRCLE,  a nonpartisan youth-focused research organization at Tufts University.

As of 2021, millennials 鈥� those born between 1981 and 1996 鈥� made up a quarter of the voting population yet  of lawmakers in Congress. Researchers found that financial insecurity and structural inequities 鈥� not apathy 鈥� were behind the divide. 

While more than 20% of young adults 18 to 25 said they would consider seeking public office 鈥� and an increasing number of them have followed through in the past decade 鈥� the encouragement they receive varies widely by race and gender. Younger candidates are more diverse than those from older generations, but while Black and Latino youth are more likely than their white counterparts to consider an election bid, they are less likely to actually run. 

The data drives home why groups like Leaders We Deserve are critical to improving civic engagement among young people, said Sara Suzuki, a senior researcher at CIRCLE.

鈥淭hat gap between interest and actually running can be filled by organizations like Leaders We Deserve and other organizations across the spectrum because financial support is a big barrier,鈥� Suzuki said, adding that the PAC鈥檚 explicit encouragement of young candidates could lead more of them to enter politics. 

Getting the necessary votes is another story. Suzuki said it鈥檚 plausible that a candidate鈥檚 age is one of the factors that young people consider at the ballot box, but that they are primarily driven by specific issues rather than individual candidates or parties. 

鈥淭丑别y really vote as a way to make change happen on issues that they care about,鈥� she said, 鈥渁nd those issues tend to be economic issues like cost of living, climate change is a big youth issue, gun violence and abortion.鈥� 

鈥楲eaders for 2050鈥�

The PAC鈥檚 went to the congressional campaign of Sarah McBride, a Democratic state senator in Delaware since 2021 who has been on transgender rights. If elected, the 34-year-old would be the first openly transgender member of Congress. 

鈥淓veryone deserves to feel safe in their community, whether you are walking alone at night or going to school during the day,鈥� McBride notes on her campaign website. 鈥淭丑别 truth is, when it comes to guns, our country has lost its common sense.鈥� 

The PAC鈥檚  鈥渇irst elected candidate,鈥� according to Hogg, was Nadarius Clark, the youngest member of the Virginia House of Delegates. Clark got $100,000 in support and beat his Republican opponent by 800 votes in 2023. Leaders We Deserve and the ideologically aligned nonprofit were Clark鈥檚 top campaign contributors, show.

The PAC stands to see another victory, where Bryce Berry 鈥� the 22-year-old Atlanta middle school math teacher 鈥� faces an incumbent from Democrat to Republican last year in order to support private school vouchers. The heavily Democratic district has never elected a Republican to the state House. 

Leaders We Deserve has also been handed defeats, including its failure last fall to help elect a 26-year-old transgender woman to the Alabama House of Representatives. The PAC spent $124,325 on the race, one that Hogg acknowledged would be tough. 

But the group is looking well beyond 2024鈥檚 high-stakes election cycle, a strategy that Duncan, the former education secretary, said is critical to the Democratic Party鈥檚 future. The state lawmakers elected today, he said, are one step closer to becoming the national leaders of tomorrow. 

鈥淭hat鈥檚 what David鈥檚 play is about,鈥� Duncan said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 not about, 鈥榃e鈥檙e going to change the entire world tomorrow,鈥� but it鈥檚, 鈥楥an we plant a whole bunch of amazing seeds, nurture them, develop them, support them and see what happens.鈥欌�� 

It鈥檚 a political mindset that the group hopes will propel progressive leaders beyond their Republican rivals.

鈥淲hile MAGA plans for 2025,鈥� one of the PACs ads states in reference to Trump鈥檚 ties to the to remake the federal government, 鈥渨e鈥檙e building leaders for 2050.鈥�

Similar actions swept the country: Dozens of districts cut ties with the police, satisfying advocates who argued the officers did more harm than good. But the decision in this suburban Washington, D.C., school system was short lived. A year later, in April 2022, the district and the police department to bring back the officers.

The reversal, which followed multiple campus safety incidents including , came amid a national shift in the sentiment around school safety. As students returned to classrooms following pandemic-induced campus closures, educators reported that children brought with them that put teachers and other youth at risk.  

, however, complicate that narrative: In the immediate aftermath of the pandemic, the latest figures from 2022 show, campus violence continued a decades-long plunge.聽

In a national survey of youth ages 12 to 18, students reported that they were the victims of campus violence 鈥� including rape, robbery and assault 鈥� at a rate of 15.6 incidents per 1,000 students in 2022, the first year that students nationwide returned to in-person learning. That鈥檚 a decline from pre-pandemic levels: In 2018, for example, students reported a campus violence victimization rate of 24 incidents per 1,000. A decade ago, the rate was nearly double that.

The data, which reflect as well, were detailed in a new report by the U.S. Departments of Education and Justice, which includes information on a host of indicators related to campus safety and security. In total, the figures suggest that campus violence has decreased since the pandemic with one notable exception. School shootings, while statistically rare compared to other forms of campus disorder, were once again at an all-time high.

School safety expert Deborah Temkin Cahill, the chief research officer at the nonprofit , said the data are part of a larger, promising trajectory. In the last decade, school violence has declined precipitously, she said, as schools 鈥渄ouble down on their efforts to improve school climate and to implement social-emotional learning.鈥� During the pandemic, student well-being became a key focus for educators nationally. 

鈥淭hat emphasis was not necessarily a priority for schools in the previous days when much of the focus was on improving reading and math scores,鈥� she said while adding that the latest figures should be interpreted with caution. With just one year of data from when students were back in classrooms full scale, she said it鈥檚 too early to reach definitive conclusions about the pandemic鈥檚 effects. 

鈥淲e don鈥檛 know if those trends are an anomaly or if they are going to continue over time,鈥� she told 麻豆精品. 鈥淪o we are really going to want to keep track of what those look like in future data collections.鈥�

These 10 charts show how violence in schools 鈥� with a few important caveats 鈥� has continued a decade-long decline, one that counters widely held perceptions about a post-COVID bump in campus disorder. 

Violence against students has plummeted 

In the last decade, schools nationally have seen marked declines in campus violence 鈥� according to students themselves. In 2022, students ages 12 to 18 reported that they were the victims of violence at school at a rate of 15.6 incidents per 1,000 students.

In fact, the federal data suggest that 2022 was the safest year for students in the last decade. Leading up to the pandemic, in 2018, the nation鈥檚 students were the victims of violence at school at a rate of 24 per 1,000 students.

The data suggest that the decline in school violence can be attributed in large part to a drop in simple assaults, which include campus fights and account for the majority of student victimizations. Excluding simple assault, students were the victims of violent incidents at a rate of 3.3 per 1,000 in 2022, relatively unchanged from a decade ago and a slight drop from pre-pandemic levels.

Data from 2016 were excluded from the charts above because the methodology used that year wasn鈥檛 directly comparable to that used in other studies. 

Temkin Cahill noted a new youth survey administered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that students鈥� mental health challenges that surged since the pandemic have begun to wane but remain elevated from pre-pandemic levels. 

She said there鈥檚 an important distinction between 鈥渂ehaviors that may be the result of heightened emotional needs and ones that are truly violent or school safety related.鈥� 

鈥淎 kid acting out in school may not rise to the level that one would perceive as violence but it may still be causing a disruption in school,鈥� she said. 鈥淚 think that鈥檚 where we鈥檙e getting these anecdotal narratives of kids being much more on edge, in part because they have heightened emotional needs.鈥� 

Student bullying has grown less frequent 鈥� with a caveat 

In the years leading up to the pandemic, and immediately after school closures ended, reported rates of school bullying have remained relatively consistent. In 2018-19, 20% of students ages 12 to 18 reported being bullied at school, similar to the 19.2% of young people who reported the abuse in the 2021-22 academic year.

Compared to a decade ago, bullying is down significantly: 27.8% of students said they were victims in 2010-11. 

Computers have taken on a bigger role in the way students learn 鈥� and how they harass their peers. While bullying has declined overall, the prevalence of cyberbullying has grown, the data show. 

Among the students who reported experiencing bullying in 2021-22, three-quarters of those incidents took place inside classrooms or in school hallways while about a fifth occurred online or via text messaging. That鈥檚 of cyberbullying incidents reported in 2014-15. 

Temkin Cahill said the shift highlights how the pandemic, which forced students to spend more time online than ever before, 鈥渉as fundamentally changed the ways that our youth are interacting with one another.鈥�

School-based thefts are down

Thefts reported in schools have also been on the decline over the last decade. Such incidents were 鈥� perhaps predictably 鈥� at a low point during COVID-era school closures. Still, in 2024 after students returned in person, student thefts were below those in the years leading up to the pandemic. 

In 2022, students reported thefts at school at a rate of 6.1 incidents per 1,000 students 鈥� a slight decline from 9.4 in 2019 and 8.9 in 2018. 

The data show a marked shift from a decade ago, when 23.6 students per 1,000 reported that they had been the victims of theft on campus in 2012. 

The reduction in reported student criminality, Temkin Cahill theorized, could be influenced at least in part by another lingering pandemic byproduct: The heightened number of parents who work from home. 

鈥淭丑别re is a link between delinquency and youth engaging in violent behavior and the presence of an adult at home when they return home from school,鈥� she told 麻豆精品. 鈥淭hat has been a significant preventative factor for engaging in gang behaviors, etc.鈥�

Indeed, gangs have lost steam

The federal data suggest an ongoing decline in student-reported gang activity inside schools over the last decade, a trend that has continued since the pandemic. 

During the 2021-22 school year, 5.5% of students said they observed the presence of gangs in their schools, a slight drop from 2018-19 when 9% of students observed gang activity at school. Since 2000, student gang reports peaked in 2004-05, when nearly a quarter of young people said the crews had a presence in their schools. 

Violent teacher injuries were way down last year

In the pandemic鈥檚 wake, teachers for their physical safety. Although the latest federal data don鈥檛 offer new data on the number of teachers who were injured on the job, privately collected data on educator insurance claims offer new insight.

During the 2023-24 school year, the number of educators who filed health insurance claims after getting injured by a student behaving violently fell significantly. 

That year, the company identified 868 insurance claims from educators who reported injuries on the job after getting assaulted by one of their students. The data were collected from about 2,000 schools nationally that serve some 1.25 million students, according to the company. Compared to a year earlier, such insurance claims were down 39%. 

In the two years immediately after the pandemic, the number of insurance claims was relatively consistent with those prior to the public health emergency, according to the data, which Gallagher Bassett provided to 麻豆精品. 

In the two years preceding the pandemic, however, the incurred costs of student-on-teacher injuries surged, from about $6 million during the 2018-19 academic year to $9.7 million in 2022-23. 

Greg McKenna, the national practice leader focused on the public sector for Gallagher Bassett, told 麻豆精品 the data suggest that violent incidents were more severe immediately after the pandemic than those in previous years. During the 2023-24 school year, the incurred costs tanked, dropping below pre-pandemic levels to about $4.9 million.

鈥淲e鈥檙e happy to report that we鈥檙e seeing a downturn,鈥� McKenna said about the most recent decline. 鈥淧erhaps we did reach a bit of a high water mark in 鈥�22-23 and we鈥檙e hoping that this is a continued downward trend as we go in through 鈥�24 and beyond.鈥� 

Campus weapons possession is down

The latest federal data suggest that fewer kids are bringing guns, knives and other weapons to class. In a 2021 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention survey, 3.1% of students reported bringing a weapon to school at least once in the previous 30 days, a slight decline from a decade earlier: In 2011, 5.4% of students said they came to school with a weapon. The latest figures represent a slight increase from 2019, when 2.8% reported bringing a weapon to school. 

Students鈥� access to a loaded gun without adult permission has similarly waned 鈥� dropping from 6.7% in 2007 to 2.7% in 2021. 

David Riedman, the founder of the K-12 School Shooting Database, said the latest figures should be taken with a degree of caution. For starters, the survey was released in 2021 when some campuses remained closed from the pandemic. He also questioned the accuracy and methodology of the survey. 

Still, even if just a small percentage of high schoolers report bringing guns to school, the tally suggests that hundreds of thousands of kids nationally who are regularly coming to school armed. 

鈥淚t鈥檚 not nothing,鈥� he told 麻豆精品, adding that his own analysis of available datasets on campus weapons possessions 鈥� including news reports 鈥� suggest the number has shot up in recent years. 

鈥淚 think that kids are carrying guns in school more frequently than they have at any other time in recent history鈥� under a fear that they could become victims of violence at school, he said. During the pandemic, the country saw record and . 鈥淚t鈥檚 a way to feel that they can protect themselves which, interestingly, is the same way that guns are marketed to adults.鈥� 

Despite all the progress, student gun deaths and injuries at school remain at record highs.

In recent years, the number of students who have been killed or wounded by school shootings has surged, reaching all-time highs that persisted once COVID-era campus closures came to an end. In 2022, 23 students were wounded and 29 were killed in active shootings, where gunmen fire indiscriminately at people on a large scale. 

Active shooting injuries and deaths in 2022 were the second highest on record, trailing only 2018, the year of high-profile school shootings in Parkland, Florida, and Santa Fe, Texas. That year, 52 students and adults were injured and 29 were killed. 

Research by the nonprofit Everytown for Gun Safety show that reported campus gunfire incidents 鈥� a far broader range than the active shootings tracked in the federal data 鈥� peaked in the immediate aftermath of COVID, reaching a record high of 192 incident since the group began to track them in 2013. Though the numbers have come down since then, 2023-24 had the second-highest number of reported K-12 gunfire incidents on record at 144. 

Reidman, who was one of the authors of the Everytown report, said the spike in gunfire incidents is being driven primarily by 鈥渇ights that are escalating into shootings.鈥� 

鈥淔or somebody to fire shots during a fight, it means that they need to be carrying a gun with them all day,鈥� he said. 鈥淭丑别 chances that the kid is carrying a gun for the first time on the day that a fight happens seems pretty low to me, which must mean that there are a lot of kids who are habitually carrying guns in schools every day.鈥� 

Students’ perception of safety has remained consistent. 

Despite the progress in recent years 鈥� including the decline in student victimization rates, reports of campus gang activity and bullying 鈥� students鈥� perception of safety has hardly budged over the last decade. The number of students who said they skipped school due to fears of violence has also held relatively consistent. 

During the 2021-22 school year, fewer than 5% of students said they were afraid of being attacked at school or avoided educational activities outright due to fears that someone might harm them. That rate is similar to the number from a decade ago, and a slight decline from academic years leading up to 鈥� and during 鈥� COVID. 

鈥淭丑别 COVID years really were an anomaly and understanding the trends over that full course of time is really important,鈥� Temkin Cahill said of the latest school safety data. 鈥淲e see that the 2022 data really are a continuation of the trend we saw in prior years. We will really only understand the effects of the pandemic once we collect a couple more years of data.鈥� 

There were more weapons brought into Washington鈥檚 schools during the last school year than the year before.

That鈥檚 according to a from the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, which found an 11.6% increase in weapons on school grounds in the 2022-2023 school year compared to 2021-2022.

During the 2022-2023 school year, 2,275 weapon incidents were reported by Washington鈥檚 public and private schools. Of those, 316 involved possession of a firearm. All of the gun incidents were reported at public schools. Most other reports involved knives, daggers or 鈥渙ther weapons.鈥�

However, the presence of guns specifically increased, 236 incidents involving firearms during the 2021-2022 school year, according to last year鈥檚 report from the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction.

鈥淚 wish I could say I was really shocked by this increase, but sadly I鈥檓 not that shocked,鈥� said Johnny Lupinacci, an associate professor at Washington State University who studies the intersection of schools and social justice.

While national data on the 2022-2023 school year is not yet available, show that, among states, Washington had the 11th highest rate of students bringing firearms to school.

Nationwide, the number of guns showing up in schools is soaring. found 1 in 47 school-age children, or about 1.1 million students, attended a school where at least one gun was found and reported on by the media in the 2022-2023 school year 鈥� and the actual number of guns in schools may be much higher.

Washington has enacted some of the most restrictive gun laws in the country and

Lupinacci praised the state鈥檚 strict gun laws and said his 鈥済ut reaction鈥� to seeing increasing numbers of guns in schools is to make it even harder to obtain a firearm. He said getting a gun remains just 鈥渇ar too easy,鈥� even in some of the most restrictive jurisdictions.

possession of firearms and other dangerous weapons on school grounds, except for security and law enforcement. The law also requires the expulsion of students found in possession of a firearm anywhere on school grounds, although superintendents can modify expulsions on a case-by-case basis.

Lupinacci said students primarily bring weapons into schools because they feel unsafe and believe 鈥渢he only way they could be safe is to somehow arm themselves.鈥�

for American children and teens, according to U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data for 2022, analyzed by Everytown for Gun Safety, a group that advocates for stricter gun laws.

Despite the increase in weapons in Washington鈥檚 schools, expulsions due to weapon incidents were down 49%. Schools chose to suspend students instead: Compared to the 2021-2022 school year, there was a 12% increase in suspensions in 2022-2023.

Lupinacci said 鈥渮ero tolerance鈥� policies around weapons in schools are important, particularly with firearms, and praised Washington鈥檚 schools for reducing expulsions and increasing suspensions, calling the schools鈥� response empathetic but firm.

He also said the solution to reducing weapons in schools involves a 鈥渓arger discussion鈥� about reducing child poverty, increasing school funding and dealing with rising mental health issues among America鈥檚 youth.

鈥淥ur public school systems can and ought to be that safety net in our communities,鈥� Lupinacci said. 鈥淲hat we see is when we don鈥檛 take care of our community, kids experience school in a way where it feels dangerous or unsafe.鈥�

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Washington State Standard maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Bill Lucia for questions: info@washingtonstatestandard.com. Follow Washington State Standard on and .

鈥淚 stopped maybe a couple of weeks ago,鈥� Juarez said last month. 鈥淚 see the stuff that’s happening. I do see the news and I see what happens on the bus and then around here as well. So I don’t feel it’s safe for them to go by themselves, walking or on the bus.鈥�

Before the increasing reports of violence and drug abuse on LAUSD campuses, she would allow her two older children in 9th and 10th grade to regularly ride the bus to and from the 32nd Street School near University Park in East Los Angeles.

Juarez’s concerns were not out of the ordinary. In February, shootings occurred overnight near a LA school campus, resulting in the deaths of two teenagers. Last month were arrested for bringing guns to school.

An LA Unified spokesperson declined to be interviewed, instead referring a reporter to  from the recent school board meeting where the issue was discussed during the Safe School Task Force annual update.

The presentation, delivered by Andres Chait, LAUSD Chief of School Operations, outlined 14 recommendations, including installing vape and weapons detection systems, developing and implementing peer counseling, and installing gates and security cameras in all schools. 

The increasing violence around the district has made some parents question whether LA Unified schools are safe 鈥� and if the school board made the right decision to after the murder of George Floyd. 

鈥淭丑别y cut it without really thinking through who it was going to impact and without inclusion of the parent voice,鈥� said Evelyn Aleman, Founder of a parents group.鈥� They had activists, because activists are able to mobilize and come to the school board meetings and ways that Latino and indigenous immigrant parents cannot鈥hat’s a significant voice, which is 74% of the student population was left out of that conversation.鈥� 

The funding was reallocated towards programs in schools with the highest number of Black students, including the hiring of more social workers, and counselors, targeting schools with high rates of suspension, chronic absenteeism and low academic student achievement.  麻豆精品 previously did a story on the impact of the programs.

Pedro Noguera, Dean of the USC Rossier School of Educations said while police presence can deter some incidents, more cops are not a long term solution. 

“Campus Police are most effective at deterring individuals who don’t belong on campus from coming on campus. If that’s an issue鈥�, they should consider deploying police to schools,鈥� said Noguera. 鈥淏ut if the issue is preventing fights, they need trusted adults who kids will talk to鈥�  you just have to be really careful because once you bring the police into the picture you significantly increase the likelihood of arrest.鈥�  

LAUSD school police carry guns and handcuffs and have the authority to make arrests, a district spokesman said.

LAUSD district 7 board member Tanya Ortiz Franklin, an advocate for restorative measures, believes the best way to keep students safe starts by  teaching young children social-emotional skills to navigate conflict and  de-escalating potentially violent situations.

鈥淚 know that鈥� (there is a) sort of myth or misconception that we swing from punitive to permissive.鈥� Franklin said. 鈥淚鈥檓 not going to let kids run all over the place鈥e still have to keep our hands to ourselves, we still have to be safe and use our words. But I’m going to show you how to do that, teach you and give you a second chance.鈥�

For Aleman and other parents the progress is too slow. According to an LAUSD published in September 2023, incidents of fighting and physical aggression increased by over 40% between the 2021-22 and 2022-23 school years. More  than  600 fights and other physical aggression incidents were reported just 30 days into the 2023-24 school year. 

“I think it’s wishful thinking, and it doesn’t address the urgency of the situation, which is safety,” Aleman said in response to the district’s restorative plan to ensure safe schools. “This requires an immediate response, and it’s not just the school police鈥︹�擝ut from LAUSD, everybody has to step up鈥�. This is unacceptable. outside the school. That shouldn’t be happening.”

UVALDE 鈥� U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said some victims of the 2022 Uvalde school shooting would have survived if Texas law enforcement officers 鈥� who waited more than an hour to confront the gunman 鈥� had followed “generally accepted practices.”

Those assertions came Thursday after the U.S. Justice Department into the hundreds of Texas law enforcement officers鈥� fumbled response to the 2022 Robb Elementary School shooting, finding 鈥渃ascading failures of leadership, decision-making, tactics, policy and training.鈥�

The long-anticipated 575-page report detailed the many catastrophic errors of the May 24, 2022 response, but concluded the most significant was that officers should have immediately recognized that it was an active shooter situation and confronted the gunman, who was with victims in two adjoining classrooms.

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Garland called the response 鈥渁 failure that should not have happened鈥� and said he apologized to the relatives of the 21 killed and the 17 injured in the deadliest school shooting in Texas history.

鈥淭丑别ir loved ones deserved better,鈥� Garland said.

The report noted that since the 1999 Columbine High School shooting, American law enforcement officers have been trained to prioritize stopping the shooter while everything else, including officer safety, is secondary.

鈥淭丑别se efforts must be undertaken regardless of the equipment and personnel available,鈥� the report found. 鈥淭his did not occur during the Robb Elementary shooting response.鈥�

Instead, officers wrongly treated the situation as a barricaded suspect, even as children and teachers . The report noted 鈥渕ultiple stimuli indicating that there was an active threat,鈥� including that an Uvalde school police officer early on told other law enforcement that his wife, a teacher in Room 112, was shot. It took 77 minutes for officers to confront the shooter. died that day and 17 others were injured in one of the country鈥檚 worst school shootings.

The report also found failures in leadership, command and coordination, noting that as more officers, including supervisors from other agencies, descended on the school, no one set up an incident command structure or took charge of the scene.

Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta condemned the medical response, saying that after police breached the classroom and killed the gunman, dead victims were placed on ambulances and children with bullet wounds were put on school buses.

Gupta also criticized misinformation and conflicting accounts that officials disseminated to Uvalde residents and reporters after the shooting.

Supervisors from the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District, the Uvalde Police Department, the Uvalde County Sheriff鈥檚 Office, and the Texas Department of Public Safety 鈥渄emonstrated no urgency鈥� in taking control of the incident, which exacerbated the communication problems and overall confusion.

Some failures may have been partly a result of policy and training deficiencies, the report found, noting that the school district police department suggested wrongly in prior training that active shooter situations can transition into hostage or barricaded incidents. DPS lacked an active shooter policy, as did the county sheriff鈥檚 office and U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the parent agency of the 149 Border Patrol agents who responded.

The report also found that key officers, including Uvalde Police Department Acting Chief Mariano Pargas who arrived within minutes of the shooting, had no active shooter or incident command training.

The vast majority of 380 officers from more than a dozen local, state and federal agencies who responded to the school had never trained together, 鈥渃ontributing to difficulties in coordination and communication.鈥� The report said the 鈥渓ack of pre-planning hampered even well-prepared agencies from functioning at their best.鈥�

Among its recommendations, the report said that officers should 鈥渘ever鈥� treat an active shooter with access to victims as a barricaded suspect. Law enforcement training academies must ensure active shooter training instructs how officers should distinguish between active threats and barricaded or hostage situations. And officers should be prepared to approach the threat using just the tools they have with them, which is often a standard firearm, the report noted.

The federal review by the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services was announced just five days after the shooting. It was led by Orange County Sheriff John Mina, the incident commander during the 2016 Pulse Nightclub massacre in Orlando. In that incident, officers waited three hours to take down the shooter who had barricaded himself with victims in a bathroom.

A Justice Department and National Policing Institute review of that Florida law enforcement response was far less critical than the Uvalde report. It found that Florida officers mostly followed best practices, although it stated the law enforcement agencies in Orlando should update their training and policies.

In the Uvalde review, the federal team reviewed more than 14,100 pieces of data and documentation, including policies, training logs, body camera footage, audio recordings, interview transcripts and photographs. The team visited Uvalde nine times, spending 54 days there, and conducted more than 260 interviews with people from more than 30 organizations and agencies, including law enforcement officers, school staff, medical personnel, survivors and victims鈥� families.

The Uvalde report鈥檚 release comes two months after ProPublica, the Texas Tribune and PBS鈥� Frontline published into the response after gaining access to a trove of investigative materials, including more than 150 interviews with officers and dozens of body cameras. The material showed that the children at Robb Elementary followed active shooter protocols, while many of the officers did not. It detailed how officers treated the situation as a barricaded suspect rather than an active threat even as evidence mounted quickly that children and teachers were injured and with the shooter.

The investigation also analyzed the active shooter training of the local and state police officers who responded prior to the gunman being stopped, finding some had not taken any active shooter training based on their state records. Of those who had, they most commonly only received the training once during their careers and hadn鈥檛 taken it in four years or longer.

The Tribune also revealed that to confront the gunman because he had a deadly AR-15 rifle. With the Washington Post, ProPublica and the Tribune found that and that two children and a teacher were still alive when they were rescued more than an hour later, but then died.

The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at .

There were a record 188 school shootings resulting in injuries or deaths in the 2021-22 school year, according to the latest available data included in . That鈥檚 twice as many shootings on campus than the previous record 鈥� set just one year earlier. 

The annual report, in its 25th iteration, leverages data from across federal agencies, including the Justice Department, to provide the public and policymakers with comprehensive insight into the safety conditions of the country鈥檚 school campuses, including cyberbullying and weapons possession. The new data offer fresh fodder in the ongoing political debate about how to thwart gun violence in schools. 

In some ways, the policy outcomes from such attacks are apparent in the data itself. As high-profile shootings and other campus safety incidents drive divisive discussions about gun control and policing, they鈥檝e also led to a surge in 鈥� and near-universal adoption of 鈥� numerous physical security measures. By 2019-20, 97% of public schools controlled access to their campuses, 91% used surveillance cameras and 77% required district employees to wear badges. The number of campuses with security staff ballooned from 43% in 2010 to 65% by 2020. 

The spike in parental concerns over school safety seen in the aftermath of high-profile school shootings in Parkland, Florida, in 2018 and last year in Uvalde, Texas, dipped slightly this year, . Among surveyed parents, 38% reported that they fear for their child鈥檚 safety, down from 44% in 2022. Still, the percentage of people who fear for their children鈥檚 safety is still among the highest it鈥檚 been since Gallup began to poll parents on the topic in 1977. Gallup鈥檚 historical high, at 55%, was measured shortly after the 1999 Columbine High School shooting in suburban Denver. 

For the purpose of the federal report, 鈥渟chool shootings鈥� include 鈥渁ll incidents in which a gun is brandished or fired or a bullet hits school property for any reason, regardless of the number of victims鈥� and motive, including planned attacks, accidents and domestic violence. The methodology and collection methods used by the Education Department differ from those of other groups and media outlets that track school shootings. For example, the lists 250 school shootings in 2021 and 305 in 2022. , which only includes incidents where someone is struck by a bullet, counts 35 school shootings in 2021 and 51 in 2022. 

The federal report doesn鈥檛 include school-shooting data from the 2022-23 academic year. 

While the federal data on school gun violence incidents 鈥渋s of course extremely striking,鈥� it is just 鈥渙ne piece in the puzzle of our understanding of school shootings,鈥� V茅ronique Irwin, an associate education research analyst with the National Center for Education Statistics, said on a press call Tuesday. 鈥淚t鈥檚 important for us to examine other dimensions as well.鈥� 

Despite the recent uptick in campus firearm incidents, the number of violent deaths of students in schools hasn鈥檛 followed a similar trendline and remains rare, the new federal report reveals. Nor have 鈥渁ctive shootings,鈥� a specific subset of campus gun violence, like the Parkland and Uvalde attacks, where an individual is 鈥渁ctively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area.鈥� Fourteen people were wounded or killed in active school shootings in 2021, the report revealed, compared to a high of 81 in 2018. 

Between 2000 and 2021, there were 46 active shooting incidents, resulting in 108 deaths and 168 injuries. Of the 47 people who carried out the active shootings, all but one was male. 

Beyond school shootings, the new federal report offers a mixed bag on various campus safety metrics, and at times that have sounded the alarm about an uptick in student misbehavior since the pandemic. 

Between the 2009-10 school year and 2019-20, the number of students who reported campus bullying decreased from 23% to 15% and reported gang activities dropped by more than half. School fights, weapons possession and alcohol use also declined. For some metrics, the most recent data are from 2019 and don鈥檛 capture the disruptive nature of COVID campus closures. Data captured after the pandemic began should be interpreted with these destabilizing forces in mind. 

Educators also experienced improved safety conditions in schools between 2011 and 2021, the report suggests. Six percent of teachers reported that a student had threatened to injure them in 2020-21, a decrease from 10 percent a decade earlier. Similar declines were observed in the number of teachers who fell victim to attacks. 

Still, the research revealed that educators have observed an uptick in disrespect from students, verbal abuse and overall classroom disorder. 

Almost a year after Texas鈥� deadliest school shooting, state lawmakers ordered school districts to secure schools with armed officers and to train more staff to identify students who may need mental health support under legislation set to become law in September.

The new school safety law will grant the Texas Education Agency more authority to make sure schools have robust safety plans to respond to an active shooter 鈥� something about half of all Texas school districts lacked, according to a . Meanwhile, another law will allow schools to use school safety funds to employ unlicensed chaplains for mental health roles, a move some critics could allow religious activists to recruit in schools and further polarize school communities.

The renewed emphasis on school safety came in response to the shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde last year. But despite the new measures, state lawmakers didn鈥檛 listen to Uvalde parents鈥� calls to pass legislation that would鈥檝e raised the minimum age to buy an AR-style rifle from 18 to 21.

All in all, experts say many of the changes will bolster school safety but some requirements, such as for armed officers, may be challenging for public schools to implement by the upcoming school year with limited funding and staffing constraints. The legislation does not punish schools for not having an armed guard at every school.

Here鈥檚 what you need to know about the changes lawmakers made to school safety in Texas.

What prompted these new laws?

Over a year ago, a teenage gunman entered Uvalde鈥檚 Robb Elementary School and killed 19 children and two teachers in what became Texas鈥� deadliest school shooting. Seventeen people were also injured.

Law enforcement didn鈥檛 breach the classrooms the gunman had taken over for more than an hour amid lapses in communication and leadership, according to investigations by state officials and journalists. A state also found 鈥渟ystemic failures鈥� and missed warning signs that the gunman may have been planning a violent attack.

In response, state leaders called for boosting schools鈥� physical security measures to protect them against intruders and addressing student mental health.

Not long after the shooting, some Texas officials, including U.S. Sen. , , though some law enforcement leaders at the time noted it would be challenging to fully staff and pay for such a proposal.

What actions did state leaders take after the Uvalde shooting?

About a month after the shooting in Uvalde, Gov. and state leaders toward school safety initiatives, including silent panic alert technology that was mandated by the TEA to quickly alert police whenever there鈥檚 an intruder in a school.

Abbott also appointed a , a new TEA position, to serve schools and the Legislature as a security expert. He also ordered to see how effective schools are at detecting and stopping intruders.

In February, Abbott made school safety for the regular legislative session, calling on state lawmakers to provide additional funding for school safety and mental health and to 鈥渦se the newly created Chief of School Safety and Security to ensure compliance with all mandated school safety standards.鈥�

What school safety changes did the Texas Legislature make?

Heeding Abbott鈥檚 call, state lawmakers passed . The broad legislation expands and reinforces several existing school safety efforts, like requiring mental health training for more school staff, and outlines more ways schools can use funding for school safety. The law will go into effect in September, but lawmakers gave schools some flexibility to meet the requirements for armed guards and staff mental health training.

Despite the renewed focus on school safety, state lawmakers largely ignored calls from Uvalde parents for more gun regulations. During this year鈥檚 regular session, the families pushed for a bill that would鈥檝e raised the minimum age to buy an AR-style weapon from 18 to 21. The bill saw some traction in the Legislature, but it along with several other proposed firearm safety measures.

HB 3 also creates a new within the TEA to be led by Abbott鈥檚 appointed chief of school safety and security. That department will be tasked with monitoring school districts鈥� compliance with safety requirements, including the intruder detection audits ordered by Abbott. If a district fails to submit school safety information or address any concerns, the new law gives the commissioner of education the power to appoint a conservator to oversee the district鈥檚 school board and superintendent and correct the issues. The law says this corrective action would not apply to school districts that fail to have an armed officer at every school.

How will schools and the state work together to secure campuses?

The legislation also requires more cooperation between the TEA and the , a research center at Texas State University tasked with collecting and sharing school safety information from schools and law enforcement.

The TEA and the center must work together to assess the security of school campuses at least once every four years, and set facility standards for districts at least once every five years. The legislation also directs the TEA commissioner to develop guidelines for districts to notify parents of 鈥渧iolent activity鈥� that takes place or is investigated at the district, and orders the Texas School Safety Center to provide schools with resources they can hand over to parents on how to safely store their firearms.

In addition, school districts must provide the Texas Department of Public Safety and local emergency responders with maps of each school and let them conduct a walkthrough of school buildings. In counties with a population of less than 350,000 inhabitants, sheriffs must also conduct semiannual school safety meetings with local law enforcement officers, emergency responders and school leaders.

The legislation raises the amount districts receive each year for school safety expenses to $10 per student 鈥� an increase of $0.28 鈥� and provides them with an additional $15,000 per campus.

Lawmakers also allocated $1.1 billion in the state budget for the TEA to award grants to help school districts pay for some school safety requirements, like silent panic alerts. School districts will first be able to apply for funds to help them meet minimum safety standards, according to the TEA. In a second cycle, grants will be offered to school districts so they can meet other identified safety needs, the agency said.

The new funding will likely not cover all the costs of implementing the new requirements, according to education associations and school safety experts. Placing an armed officer or guard at every school campus will be particularly expensive, they said.

鈥淓veryone wants to do everything possible to keep students safe, but we are very concerned about our schools鈥� ability to meet all of the new requirements given the limited resources that are available,鈥� said Brian Whitley, a spokesperson for the Texas Public Charter Schools Association. He noted that charter schools are particularly worried because they can鈥檛 levy taxes to help pay for school security upgrades, unlike traditional public school districts.

Will there be an armed police officer at every school?

The legislation directs school districts to have at least one armed officer at each campus during regular school hours. The officer must be a commissioned peace officer from the district鈥檚 own police department, a school resource officer from another law enforcement agency or a peace officer hired as a security officer.

Many school districts already hire some , but they may have to resort to alternatives, such as arming school staff or hiring private security officers, to guard all school campuses.

Jacksonville Independent School District Police Chief Bill Avera said his district has officers stationed at each of its schools. But Avera, who also serves as vice president of the Texas School Police Chiefs Association and as a member of the Texas School Safety Center鈥檚 board of directors, acknowledged other school districts could face challenges doing so.

In addition to paying for an officer鈥檚 salaries and benefits, school districts sometimes also have to take care of equipment costs, like paying for uniforms, gear and patrol vehicles, Avera said.

The Texas Association of School Boards estimates the cost of hiring a police officer for districts could range from $80,000 to $100,000 per year, said Joy Baskin, the associate executive director of policy and legal services for TASB.

And the pool for eligible officers is competitive amid a nationwide shortage of law enforcement job candidates, Avera said. His district, for example, has relied on retired police officers to staff its schools, he said.

鈥淚t takes a minute nowadays to hire a police officer,鈥� he said. 鈥淭丑别re’s a lot of background work. There’s a lot of things that have to be reviewed and checked on to ensure that [officers] are qualified, and so it鈥檒l be interesting with all the school districts looking for officers at basically the same time.鈥�

Texas has more than a thousand traditional public school districts and almost 200 charter school operators or districts.

What happens if school districts can鈥檛 staff their schools with police officers?

The legislation doesn鈥檛 outline penalties for school districts that don鈥檛 meet the armed officer requirement, Baskin said.

If school districts can鈥檛 staff schools with armed peace officers because of financial or staffing constraints, the legislation allows for a school board to claim a 鈥済ood cause exception.鈥� Each school board will determine what these exceptions will look like locally and must outline an 鈥渁lternative security standard with which the district is able to comply,鈥� the TEA told The Texas Tribune.

According to the law, alternative plans can include allowing trained staff members to be armed. A new option in the school safety law approved this year is for districts to contract with a licensed private security firm that has personnel licensed to be armed, Avera said.

Districts can arm their staff members through the state-run school marshal program, which requires 80 hours of training and certification by the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement, or by setting their own policies 鈥� known as 鈥淕uardian Plans鈥� 鈥� to designate specific individuals to carry firearms.

In from the Texas School Safety Center, 41% of the state鈥檚 more than one thousand school districts reported contracting school resource officers from other law enforcement agencies and 32% employed their own police officers, but about 70% of districts said they hired only between 1 and 5 police officers. About half of districts reported using non-law enforcement security personnel, including 27.4% under Guardian Plans and 6% under the school marshal program.

In a about charter school districts, 30.2% of almost 200 charter school operators in the state reported using non-law enforcement security personnel, including 24.2% who hired private security.

Arming school staff could be less expensive than hiring police officers but still requires vetting and training under the school marshals program. The state pays for school marshal training, but that training is not always widely available, so school districts may still incur travel costs for their staff to be trained, said Craig Bessent, a school marshal in Wylie Independent School District, where he also serves as assistant superintendent of school operations.

鈥淚 wish we would have had more legislative help on that but we didn鈥檛, so we’ll just see how it plays out,鈥� said Bessent, who is also chair of the Texas School Safety Center鈥檚 board of directors.

In addition, finding school employees who want to be armed might be hard. In the past, they have been reluctant to do so. About a month after the Uvalde shooting, showed that Texas teachers do not want to take a gun to school.

Given these constraints, Bessent said school districts are 鈥渟crambling鈥� to figure out how to follow the legislation before it is expected to go into effect in September.

The TEA said it plans to provide additional guidance, including webinars with an overview of HB 3 and school safety-related funding, within the next few weeks.

Districts will likely work to meet the requirements as soon as possible, Baskin said, but it may take some time.

鈥淚 think many districts will want to stay as closely aligned to the statute as possible. In part because they do want to provide the best possible safety for students, but also in part because they would not want to be out of sync with the legal requirements if there were an emergency event,鈥� she said.

State Rep. , the Republican from Lubbock who authored the bill, did not respond to a request for comment on the rollout of the requirement.

What are the rules around guns on campuses?

Schools are generally considered gun-free zones under federal and state laws except in certain circumstances, including in the case of police officers, school marshals and individuals authorized by the school district to carry guns.

A 1990 federal law bans firearms on school property or within 1,000 feet of public and private schools, but the law makes exceptions for law enforcement and individuals licensed to carry. Other in federal law include if the gun is not loaded and is locked away or if the individual has been authorized to carry a gun by the district.

Texas also generally bans guns where school-sponsored activities take place, unless an individual is exempted. HB 3 clarifies that individuals allowed to carry firearms at schools but who aren鈥檛 law enforcement officers can鈥檛 carry out routine law enforcement duties unless there is an emergency that poses a serious threat of injury or death.

How will new Texas laws address student mental health?

Every school staff member who regularly interacts with students will be required to take evidence-based mental health training designed to help school staff identify signs that a student may need mental health support, which Avera said can be crucial to preventing violence.

The legislation allows school districts to stagger the training of staff to meet the requirement by the 2028-2029 school year, but Baskin said districts may work to complete the requirement sooner amid a renewed focus on student mental health, also spurred by the pandemic.

School districts can be reimbursed by TEA for the costs of providing this training to employees, according to legislation, but schools and mental health advocates did not get a dedicated funding stream for mental health. Many that meeting the other school safety requirements will take up most of the available funding.

The Legislature also this session that gives schools the option to use school safety funds to pay for unlicensed chaplains to work in mental health roles. Volunteer chaplains will also be allowed in schools. Policies for chaplains in schools will be up to local school boards. Parental consent is required for school-related mental health services, including chaplains, the TEA said.

And lawmakers to the Texas Child Health Access Through Telemedicine program, which connects school districts with mental health professionals who can help identify student behavioral needs and help provide access to those services. The program is expected to receive $140 million for the next two years.

Disclosure: Texas Association of School Boards and Texas Public Charter Schools Association have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete .

This article originally appeared in  at, a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at .

The Florida law led to unprecedented growth in school-based policing, though it鈥檚 part of a trend that鈥檚 played out again and again over the last several decades. In the immediate aftermath of tragic school massacres, which are statistically rare but growing more common, lawmakers have repeatedly bolstered funding for campus cops. Federal officials have spent since 1998. This spring, Texas became the following the May 2022 shooting in Uvalde, which led to the deaths of 19 elementary school children and two teachers.

Yet in Florida, former school-based officer Scot Peterson, who was stationed at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School with a handgun and a bulletproof vest, was for failing to confront the teenage gunman armed with an AR-15 style assault rifle. Instead, he took cover outside as the sound of gunshots poured from the building for four minutes. In Uvalde, 375 officers from 23 law enforcement agencies responded to the elementary school but waited more than an hour to confront and kill the 18-year-old shooter. 

Police inaction in both cases has raised a similar question: Once a bad guy with a gun pops off his first shot inside a school, what level of responsibility do armed police officers have to stop them? 

In a first-of-its-kind trial to examine a school resource officer鈥檚 alleged criminal liability for failing to intervene, Peterson faced seven counts of child neglect, three counts of culpable negligence and one perjury charge. On June 29, , an outcome that experts predicted but said could in Uvalde, where officers鈥� inaction sparked outrage and is still under investigation. 

The Parkland verdict raises big questions about the role that police play in schools nationally 鈥� and challenges the very reason that so many were stationed at campuses in the first place. 

For Peterson, who claimed he waited outside the school because he couldn鈥檛 tell where the sounds of gunshots were coming from, the verdict reaffirmed his position that he had done nothing wrong and that the charges against him were politically motivated scapegoating. 

鈥淲e鈥檝e got our life back after four and a half years,鈥� Peterson while standing next to his wife. 鈥淚t鈥檚 been an emotional roller coaster for so long.鈥� 

The comment infuriated the parents of children who died while Peterson stood just 75 feet away from the building and who will never get their lives back. To them and others who have sought greater accountability from the since-fired officer, the verdict set a bad precedent. 

鈥淔or the first time in our nation鈥檚 history, prosecutors in this case have tried to hold an armed school resource officer responsible for not doing his job,鈥� Broward State Attorney Harold Pryor said in a statement after the verdict. 鈥淲e did so because we think it鈥檚 important not only to our community, but to the country as a whole.鈥�

As head of the leading professional organization for school-based police officers, Mo Canady is the first person to defend the presence and value of having cops in schools. In an interview with 麻豆精品, Canady gave a sharp critique of Peterson鈥檚 inaction. Peterson, and all officers, 鈥渉ave a duty to protect whether you think of it in terms of being charged criminally or not,鈥� said Canady, executive director of the National Association of School Resource Officers. 

鈥淲hen we became police officers and you raised your right hand, you swore an oath to protect and serve,鈥� Canady said. 鈥淧art of that is having to deal with violent situations and potential deadly conflict.鈥�

鈥楶olice are not the military鈥� 

鈥淭o protect and serve鈥� has been a calling card for law enforcement , yet courts on multiple occasions have made clear the slogan isn鈥檛 legally binding. This precedent foreshadowed the uphill challenge for prosecutors in Florida. 

Police are routinely charged 鈥� and on occasion found guilty 鈥� for police misconduct including excessive use of force. Charges for failing to act, however, are far less common. And in the cases that do exist, courts have . 

In 1981, the District of Columbia Court of Appeals held that police have a general duty to provide public services but 鈥渘o specific legal duty exists鈥� to protect specific individuals. In , from 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court held that police in Colorado could not be sued for failing to protect a woman whose husband violated a protective order to kidnap and kill their three children. 

To justify child neglect charges in the Peterson trial, prosecutors argued that the school-based officer was a 鈥渃aregiver鈥� under Florida law responsible for the welfare of students at the school where he was assigned. Indeed, since their introduction in schools, police officers have been cast in the role of having close protective relationships with students in a way that鈥檚 different from how officers typically interact with people on the streets. That persona is often invoked to make officers鈥� presence in schools more palatable. In the Parkland case, jurors had to determine whether Peterson had caregiver status legally and if that created a duty to risk his own life. 

Eugene O鈥橠onnell, a former New York City police officer and a professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, called the charges against Peterson 鈥減reposterous,鈥� arguing that officers should not be legally required to put themselves into situations where they could be killed. 

鈥淭丑别 police really don’t sign up for that 鈥� they really don鈥檛,鈥� O鈥橠onnell said. 鈥淪ome will rise to the occasion, but the police are not the military, the police are civilians with guns who have very, very basic rudimentary peacekeeping skills.鈥�

In an email, Mark Eiglarsh, Peterson鈥檚 criminal defense attorney, maintained that his client couldn鈥檛 identify the specific locations of gunshots, and that other responding officers believed the blasts were coming from a football field hundreds of yards away. Reverberations and echoes off the concrete buildings, he said, 鈥渕ade knowing where the shooter was virtually impossible.鈥� 

鈥淗opefully, prosecutors will choose not to pursue baseless and meritless charges like this ever again,鈥� he said. 鈥淭丑别y put this 32-year veteran deputy through hell, solely motivated by politics.鈥� 

Eiglarsh refuted a 鈥渇alse narrative鈥� that Peterson 鈥渃hose to cower and 鈥榙o nothing鈥� instead of confronting the killer,鈥� noting that he called officers for backup and scanned the area to determine the shooter鈥檚 location. 

Samuel Walker, a national expert on police misconduct and professor emeritus of criminal justice at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, believes that Peterson should have been convicted, and not just because he was assigned to protect students.

鈥淗e failed to act 鈥� he failed to act in an emergency situation where his action could have helped save a bunch of lives,鈥� said Walker, who added that officers should be held accountable for failing to keep people safe, even if it means risking their own lives. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 true of all officers who are just working a regular police department job. Yes, it鈥檚 a high-risk situation.鈥� 

In civil court, officers are often shielded by qualified immunity, which protects officers from liability for mistakes made on the job. In 2020, a by 15 Marjory Stoneman students who survived the massacre and argued that Peterson鈥檚 failure to act violated their constitutional rights. But other civil suits remain and attorney David Brill, who represents shooting victims鈥� families, seeks to dispel Peterson鈥檚 claims that he couldn鈥檛 determine the direction of gunshots. Brill has asked a judge to approve a recorded sound test at the site of the shooting by firing blanks from an AR-15-style rifle. 

鈥淲e don’t want to leave anything to chance for Peterson to escape justice in our civil case like he escaped justice in the criminal case,鈥� Brill told The Associated Press. 

Peterson鈥檚 civil defense attorney Michael Piper, who acknowledged some 50 civil suits against his client, declined to comment. 

Harold Jordan, the nationwide education equity coordinator at the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania, said the real breakdown was in school and law enforcement officials鈥� failure to take preventative actions after multiple warnings suggested the gunman, now serving a life sentence, had weapons and could become violent. 

鈥淚 can’t think of any major studies that show that stationing police in schools prevents someone with high-capacity weaponry from causing carnage,鈥� he said. 鈥淭丑别re’s definitely no evidence that adding more police to schools is going to prevent that from happening when you’re dealing with a school shooter who knows something about the school and is packing a doggone arsenal. That’s the situation that we’re in.鈥�

Shootings bolster school policing 

Though officers have been stationed in schools , their presence has grown significantly in the last 25 years in response to mass school shootings. Since then, heated debates have explored the officers鈥� roles, responsibilities and efficacy.

Emerging research has begun to offer insight into officers鈥� ability to keep kids safe. A found that the introduction of school-based officers has led to a reduction in reported incidents of certain kinds of violence like fights. Yet they led to an increase in reported incidents of gun-related violence, a finding the authors conclude suggests that campus police 鈥渄o not prevent gun-related incidents.鈥� However, report co-author Shawn Bushway acknowledged that campus police could improve the reporting and detection of campus gun violence. 

Ultimately, officials鈥� decisions to place police in schools after mass shootings may not be driven by evidence, said Bushway, an adjunct policy researcher at the RAND Corporation and a professor at the University at Albany – State University of New York

鈥淭丑别 evidence is that cops in schools make people feel safer and, you know, that鈥檚 part of the battle, right?鈥� Bushway said. 鈥淲e show that there鈥檚 an increase in firearm offenses but we don鈥檛 know whether that鈥檚 because they鈥檙e more likely to ferret them out or because somehow kids are more likely to bring guns to school if there鈥檚 a cop involved.鈥�

A similar report, by researchers with the nonprofit Violence Project, found that officers may be ineffective at preventing bloodshed during school shootings. Researchers analyzed 133 school shootings over four decades and found that fatalities were three times higher in attacks where an armed guard was present compared to those that unfolded without a security presence. Because the perpetrators of mass shootings are often suicidal, researchers believe shooters may be drawn to locations with armed security. 

鈥淲hen that鈥檚 the case, having an armed person is not a deterrent 鈥� that person may actually be part of their plan,鈥� said David Riedman, creator of the , which tracks firearm incidents in schools. 鈥淩eally, all of this is just a Band-Aid to the bigger problem, which is access to firearms and people that are able to get them who are interested and willing to commit violence.鈥�

Though Peterson escaped criminal liability, for the last several decades school-based police have been trained to confront shooters 鈥� even at the cost of their own lives. Such standards grew out of the 1999 Columbine mass school shooting in suburban Denver, with the realization that every second counts during a mass shooting, most of which are carried out in a matter of minutes. 

Though experts said the trial against Peterson may dissuade some people from pursuing jobs as school-based cops, Canady of the National Association of School Resource Officers said that most officers will rush to danger to keep students safe.

鈥淚 don鈥檛 think most officers are going to have it in their head that, 鈥楬ey, if I don鈥檛 respond, I may be criminally liable,鈥� 鈥� he said. 鈥淚 think what they鈥檙e going to have in their head is, 鈥楽omebody鈥檚 killing kids in my school and I鈥檝e got to stop it.鈥� ”聽

As another school year defined by mass shootings ends in America, Republican-led state legislatures passed measures this session to fortify schools, create guidelines for active shooter drills and safety officer responses, and allow teachers to be armed.

Firearm restrictions, however, were a nonstarter in red states trying to curb school shootings.

The legislation pushed by GOP lawmakers in states such as Georgia, Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and Utah this year often ran contrary to the advice of gun safety advocates and national education experts, who remain concerned that having more guns in schools only further endangers children and educators.

But the Republican lawmakers interviewed by Stateline say the solution to preventing school shootings is not banning certain weapons or taking away guns from potentially dangerous people, but rather empowering schools to more quickly respond to an active shooter.

A little over a week after three children and three adults were killed in a Nashville elementary school in late March, the Republican-controlled Tennessee legislature passed a wide-reaching school safety bill that did not include firearm restrictions.

The requires schools to keep exterior doors locked when students are present, mandates newly built public schools to install classroom door locks and requires private schools also to conduct active shooter drills, among other elements. (The Nashville shooter, who attacked a private school, shattered a pair of locked glass doors to get inside.)

The bill passed with bipartisan support in April, with only a handful of Democrats voting against it. Republican Gov. Bill Lee signed the measure. In May, he signed that includes $230 million for all schools to have a school resource officer and allows schools to make security upgrades.

With armed personnel and properly secured school buildings, children in Tennessee will be safer, said Republican state Rep. Mark White, one of the bill鈥檚 sponsors and a former elementary school principal.

鈥淚 take it very seriously,鈥� he said. 鈥淲hen you鈥檙e in the building with kids all day long, you fall in love with them, and you want to protect them.鈥�

Hoping for a deterrent

Ensuring schools have armed personnel has been a common thread in the Republican-backed school safety laws this year.

Last month, a little over a year after a gunman killed 19 students and two teachers at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, Republicans there passed that requires an armed security guard at every school and compels school districts to adopt active shooter plans.

In Mississippi, teachers can now, with extensive training, carry guns in schools after the legislature passed a in March.

Republican state Sen. Jeff Tate, the legislation鈥檚 sponsor, argued that assailants target schools because there often is not armed security. He hopes his bill makes potential school shooters think twice.

鈥淲e need to make these people realize that, hey, look, there鈥檚 going to be a weapon if you go to the school,鈥� Tate said. 鈥淭hat would deter these school shootings.鈥�

Democratic state Sen. Rod Hickman, who voted against the measure because he thought it would make schools less safe, nonetheless wants to now focus on ensuring the state enforces robust training, not only for handling firearms but also to account for 鈥渋mplicit biases鈥� that might prompt armed school personnel to view people of color as a greater threat.

鈥淚 hope that the proper steps are taken to create this program,鈥� Hickman said, 鈥渂ut I ultimately don鈥檛 think this is the answer to protecting our students.鈥�

Schools in the vast rural areas of Missouri wouldn鈥檛 have time to wait for law enforcement to respond to an active shooter, said Republican state Rep. Christina Dinkins. School officials need to react immediately to save lives, she said.

While teachers and administrators already are allowed to carry firearms if they are a school鈥檚 designated school protection officer 鈥� a position earned through a permit and state-mandated training 鈥� Dinkins, after being approached by a school district administrator, offered legislation to expand that role to any school personnel. That could include janitors, she said, who have keys to all the doors and know the ins and outs of the buildings.

鈥淲e鈥檙e just providing them with other avenues to make sure our children are safe, which is the ultimate goal,鈥� Dinkins said. 鈥淵ou want the person who is most trained, most confident, most comfortable in that type of situation.鈥�

The state House passed her bill in March; the legislative session has since ended.

More firearms in schools

Julie Hutchinson, a social worker for the Clark County, Nevada, school district, responded to the October 2017 mass shooting on the Las Vegas strip, helping people who were looking for loved ones and information after a gunman opened fire. Sixty people died and 413 others were wounded.

Hutchinson has continued to deal with gun issues, whether it鈥檚 helping the school district confront students who bring weapons to school or talking with her own children concerning the increased violence.

Having more guns in schools won鈥檛 help, she said.

鈥淚t would give a false sense of security,鈥� Hutchinson said. 鈥淚s it really going to matter when it comes down to the actual moment?鈥�

Many experts agree with her.

Two decades of association between having school resource officers or security professionals in the building and the prevention of school violence, said Justin Heinze, co-director of the National Center for School Safety, a training and technical assistance hub for implementing evidence-based safety programs in schools.

鈥淭丑别re is very, very little to next to no data that supports having firearms within schools are going to make those buildings safer,鈥� said Heinze, who also is an associate professor of public health at the University of Michigan.

He continued, 鈥淚 do have concerns about introducing even more firearms in the building because there is almost certainly going to be an increase in firearm-related injury.鈥�

As more students are exposed to school shootings and the overall number of shootings grows, there鈥檚 been a more urgent need for research regarding guns in schools, Heinze added.

Despite the high-profile nature of school shootings, schools are generally safe havens from gun violence, said Allison Anderman, senior counsel and director of local policy for the Giffords Law Center, a nonpartisan gun safety organization. This is largely because guns are mostly prohibited at schools, she said.

Arming teachers does not work, Anderman said.

鈥淭丑别 idea that someone who鈥檚 protecting students and trying to keep them safe and calm is going to go and rush out and shoot an active shooter is just, it鈥檚 so absurd,鈥� she said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 very difficult to stop a homicidal person with an AR-15 and several high-capacity magazines.鈥�

There are policies that can prevent school shootings, she said, including banning high-capacity magazines, implementing waiting periods of firearm purchases and expanding so-called red flag laws that take away firearms from people who may be a harm to themselves or others.

But that is a tough sell in some states.

Teachers need to be able to defend themselves and others in an active shooter situation, said Utah Republican state Rep. Karianne Lisonbee, who sponsored successful this session that will waive the permitting fee for school employees to carry a concealed weapon in schools.

鈥淚t鈥檚 really important that we maintain the availability for individuals who are the good guys who are trying to protect and defend their lives and the lives of others to be able to carry,鈥� she said. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 think it鈥檚 helpful to take guns away from everybody or to try to implement extreme gun control measures.鈥�

She also sponsored this session that empowered school resource officers to refer students to judges for violence and weapons offenses on campus. She supported another that created a state position in charge of setting standards for school resource officers. Republican Gov. Spencer Cox signed all three measures into law in March.

In Tennessee, the legislature is not done with addressing gun violence.

Lee, the GOP governor, called for a special session in August in hopes of implementing a red flag law. Gun safety experts argued the Nashville shooting may have been prevented if the state had a law that allowed a court to seize firearms from people who may harm themselves or others.

White and other Republican legislators will meet with the governor over the coming months to draft a bill that would prevent 鈥渋nnocent people鈥� from having their firearms confiscated under a red flag law, he said.

Gun rights advocates often argue red flag laws violate gun owners鈥� due process privileges, since judges in some states can temporarily sign off on an extreme risk protection order without hearing from the targeted individual in emergency situations. Gun safety advocates counter that those individuals can eventually present evidence in their defense.

鈥淲e can do what鈥檚 right for all people,鈥� White said. 鈥淣ot only protect our children and law-abiding gun owners, but also address those who have mental issues, or those who are just outright criminals. That鈥檚 the needle we have to thread right now.鈥�

is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Stateline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Scott Greenberger for questions: info@stateline.org. Follow Stateline on and .

As the co-founder of , an educational technology startup focused on improving the mental health outcomes of school communities, Thadani expanded the coaching and curriculum offered to all frontline members 鈥� from bus drivers to cafeteria workers to sanitation staff.

鈥淧art of Robin鈥檚 platform is coaching, developing connections, building resilience and really understanding the skillsets you need to deal with life’s challenges,鈥� Thadani told 麻豆精品. 鈥淪o if we’re going to do a great job with students, we have to do an unbelievable job with all the adults in their lives.鈥�

For Thadani, destigmatizing conversations around mental health hits home.

As a young parent, Thadani met a father from Newtown, Connecticut who opened up to him about losing his 7-year-old son in a school shooting.

That father was Mark Barden, the co-founder and CEO of the , a nonprofit organization dedicated to preventing gun violence in schools.

Touched by Barden鈥檚 passion to protect children, Thadani began volunteering for the organization 鈥� which later served as the catalyst for co-founding Robin.

鈥淎s I learned more about what they’re doing, I took a look at how mental health has affected my own family and close friends,鈥� Thadani said. 鈥淚 took that as a sign and inspiration to say I’m going to do something about it.鈥�

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

麻豆精品: I understand that your affiliation with Sandy Hook Promise played a large role in the creation of Robin. Walk me through how your volunteer work led to starting an educational technology startup.

I’m so proud and feel very fortunate to the team I met over at Sandy Hook Promise. It was a couple years ago and I just so happened to have a conversation with . I didn’t really know who he was at that very moment, but later found out as he shared his story with me that he鈥檚 not only a parent who lost his 7-year-old that day, but also happened to be one of the co-founders of Sandy Hook Promise. 

We took a liking to each other and had a lovely conversation. He shared some of his goals, ambitions, and the story of that day with me. As a young parent at the time, it really shook me to my core. I asked him how I can help and he shared with me some of the things that I could do. So I became a and started helping them in any way I could from volunteering to fundraising.

A lot of people talk about the gun violence prevention policy work they do, which is absolutely incredible, but a bulk of what they do that really makes a large impact is the mental health programs for kids. They have two very well known programs called and . When I learned more about these programs, and talked to Mark and Nicole and the rest of the team, I thought wow this is incredible and I wish this was everywhere. We started talking about how much of a challenge it is to reach every school in America and get this program out there. Sandy Hook Promise is a nonprofit doing wonderful things but they only have so much reach. 

As I learned more about what they’re doing, I took a look at how mental health has affected my own family and close friends. I took that as a sign and inspiration to say I’m going to do something about it. What I鈥檝e learned is that there aren鈥檛 a lot of preventive and proactive programs out there that are making an impact. So that鈥檚 just some of the genesis on why myself and Scott and now a larger team started Robin.

I understand that Robin extends resources to all frontline members of school communities, such as bus drivers, cafeteria workers and sanitation staff. Tell me more about this initiative.

As any young company, you can only do so much right out of the gates. We started creating this digital online curriculum for students starting with middle school and high school and then eventually elementary. As we were out there talking to principals and superintendents and counselors, I started learning that not only was there not much for educators but they also weren’t really thinking about it in a more broad frame.

As we started to talk to more people, we realized, wait a minute, it’s not just teachers who are interacting every day with students. It鈥檚 the cafeteria worker, it鈥檚 the bus driver, it鈥檚 the crossing guard. If you think about it, the bus driver is the first person to see our kids and the last person to drop them off. They have the potential to set the tone for the day based on how they鈥檙e doing.

With one school in upstate New York, we had the opportunity to talk to their leadership team at a conference. They talked about some of the challenges that their transportation team was facing. It’s tough being a driver and having a group of students screaming or yelling or being rambunctious on the bus. In addition to administrators, unions and parents that can be challenging at times. Who’s supporting and allowing them the space and opportunity to talk to someone? Part of Robin鈥檚 platform is coaching, developing connections, building resilience and really understanding the skillsets you need to deal with life’s challenges. So if we’re going to do a great job with students, we have to do an unbelievable job with all the adults in their lives.

So we began this journey to support all frontline members starting with this one school in upstate New York who gave us the opportunity to talk to their transportation team. We did a six part coaching series with all 18 of them and asked them about the challenges they face in day-to-day work. I’m proud to report that after we finished, everybody retained their jobs, came back to school and walked in with their heads held high. This is something we’re doing now all over the country, from upstate New York to South Carolina to our backyard here in New York City. We’re supporting school communities and I think this is really critical in order to create something sustainable and have long-term impact.

Oftentimes these frontline members of school communities come from diverse and low-income backgrounds. How does Robin ensure the coaching and resources provided to them are not only accessible but also culturally relevant?

It starts with where the content and curriculum comes from. Robin comes from a diverse set of coaches, teachers, counselors and social workers that are not only mental health experts but are also from those communities and have worked in those schools we serve. The largest community we serve is in our backyard in New York City 鈥� the Bronx. A lot of students and families in the Bronx come from lower income communities. They also happen to be from Black and Brown communities where a lot of them don’t speak English. So starting with some of the basics, we have all of our content up in Spanish with closed captions available. Especially for our older students, we make sure that when they see our content not only do they see someone that looks like them or has been through similar challenges, but also in a language they can understand. 

The other thing that Robin does is really listen to the school communities we serve. No school is, of course, the same, even within New York City. The school down the street might have a separate set of challenges, opportunities and needs then the next. I think part of the reason schools are not only coming to us but coming back to us is because we are a reflection of who they are. And again, while we can’t be everything to everyone, we are pulling from a lot of different types of communities and trying to really understand what those communities are asking for. In turn, we can address them with the right sets of curriculum or coaches that they not only want to hear from, but based on the data and some of our surveys and some of our processes, is the right fit for their particular community. So it’s a little bit of a combination of using technology and data and good old fashioned listening skills to really understand the communities we serve and what they’re particularly going through.

In the wake of the Nashville school shooting, what is something about gun violence prevention more school communities need to talk about?

I happened to be in Tennessee about an hour southeast of Nashville visiting one of the schools we work with when this occurred. So I’m with the superintendent of this district and we, of course, talked about it. There are signs out there for these particular students, whether they were posting on social media or showing signs that they were stressed or angry. These students or graduates had no outlet or connection and felt an element of loneliness. And again, these are all studies that have been proven and shown out there in terms of who decides to do these horrific things. 

I think one thing schools all ought to do is understand what those things are so they could be on the lookout. How can we all be armed with information and knowledge on how to notice these signs and then know what to do? How do we get involved sooner and understand what the challenges or issues that a particular student or set of students are facing right now? I think all schools want to do that but they don鈥檛 know how to do that. They’re not trained, for example, to know the science. They’re not trained in mental health first aid. 

You bring up a valuable point in regards to mental health training. Tell me more about why it鈥檚 important for school communities to destigmatize conversations around mental health.

When we heard back from schools, they鈥檙e looking for this training. Not specifically training tailored to know how to identify a school shooter. That is very targeted and there are things out there for that. But how to better understand when you see a student of yours that might be going through a mental health challenge and how to help that student in the moment 鈥� from a simple panic attack to an anxiety attack. We do a course around test anxiety. March was SATs and ACTs in a large part of the country, and many students, and parents frankly, get really anxious and nervous. 

There are things we could do to support them in advance of that. That’s sort of the preventative nature of what we’re talking about at Robin. How do we get ahead of these things because we don’t know what life’s challenges or what mental health challenges a student may or may not face. We do know that there are skill sets to put in place today at a young age, even starting in elementary school, that will give them the ability to use those skills if and when a challenge large or small arises.

How have conversations today around gun violence prevention and mental health shaped your own views on the matter?

I look at this from the lens of a parent first and foremost. That’s my number one job and my number one responsibility. It’s made me hyper aware of the possibility that this could happen anywhere and anytime. So what does that mean for young kids growing up? It means we need to make sure they鈥檙e okay talking about it. My daughter came home, she’s in second grade, and she had her first formal active shooter drill. For me, I’m 43 and I grew up in the 80s and 90s. We had fire drills and 鈥渟top, drop and roll鈥� and how to evacuate the building and things of that nature. But our kids are only going to know this world. Having an open conversation with them as a parent so they can understand why we do these things is important. Whether I like to or want to, this is what we have to do. 

It’s also made me want to change this. Whether it鈥檚 through Robin or through supporting Sandy Hook or through just me as an individual doing interviews and podcasts and having these conversations. I know people turn it into a political and divided commentary, but it shouldn’t be. We don’t have all the answers. I don’t have the magic answer in my pocket right now. I have elements of the answer that I think will help, but we need a lot of people to come to the table from all walks of life to solve this. Because you can’t tell me one person who doesn’t want to solve it. We need to come to the table and realize that our kids are literally dying through suicide, gun violence and other medical and mental health issues that lead to some scary things. 

Again, as a parent of young kids going through school for the next decade, this is something I always think about. I don’t necessarily think about it daily or act like this is the last time I鈥檒l see my kids. But for the parents who lost their child, that’s what happened to them. 

For now, I’m so proud of this generation of students and leaders that are bringing this to the forefront of their schools, principals, superintendents and mental health clubs. I do believe this is changing because of the students in this generation that are raising their hands and saying we need to solve this problem.

The outstanding performance of the Nashville Metro Police officers likely drastically reduced the number of casualties, but six killed instead of 15 or 20 doesn鈥檛 feel like a win. We must not lose sight of an underlying reality: By the time a gunfight breaks out at a school, many systems have already failed. Defeating a shooter at a school should be the very last line of defense. Politicians and educators should commend the heroism of the Nashville police without creating the impression that this response is the ideal outcome.

That鈥檚 because when it comes to schools, the most effective gunfight is the one that never happens.

People will continue to disagree about gun policy and how to balance Second Amendment rights with responsibilities. But even with that debate stalemated, there are active and passive measures schools can take, because school shootings are rarely random. 

shows that in more than 3 out of 4 school shootings, there are warning signs ahead of time 鈥� the shooter signals or directly tells others of an intent to do harm or threatens the target. It鈥檚 too soon to know exactly what transpired in Nashville and why, but the parents of the shooter were concerned enough to try to limit their access to firearms. The Parkland shooter was pretty clear about what he had in mind. The parents of the Oxford, Michigan, high school shooter are for their lack of action in the lead-up to that incident.

Most school shootings are not attacks by outsiders. Rather, they are perpetrated by students or people known to students. Sometimes it’s a domestic situation that spills over into a school. That鈥檚 why the first line of defense is a healthy school culture where students have adults they trust and can share concerns with. Just as elite military units soak up intelligence, school officials must develop a culture where students share information of concern.

Schools should not profile students; there is no typical profile of a school shooter. But once a student exhibits warning signs, schools should act. The signs and signals are the sort of things common sense would suggest: a fixation with violence, weapons, past school shootings, dramatic changes in dress or behavior, threatening behavior or explicit threats.

What鈥檚 more, this is not just security work. A healthy school culture and a sense of belonging carry multiple benefits for students, including better academic outcomes. Bullying and alienation are a factor in many school shootings. Some anti-bullying and social-emotional learning initiatives are facing political pressure, and some are poorly designed or ideologically fraught. Yet the Secret Service, hardly a hotbed of leftism, , 鈥渋t is critical that schools implement comprehensive programs designed to promote safe and positive school climates, where students feel empowered to report bullying when they witness it or are victims of it, and where school officials and other authorities act to intervene.鈥�

Training also matters 鈥� for adults more than students. Active shooter drills in schools are too often just security theater. They convey the sense that officials are doing something, but in practice serve only to increase anxiety and depression among students. Training for adults, however, is crucial, with all staff knowing their role in an emergency. In the Nashville bodycam video, officers are greeted by school personnel relaying pertinent information and giving them access to the building. They don鈥檛 slow the officers down, inundate them or have multiple people creating confusion. Schools should take an 鈥渁ll-hazard鈥� approach to emergency response, with 鈥渁ctive shooter鈥� just one contingency among many, much more likely ones schools will face. 

Of course, there are basic steps schools should take with regard to security, including controlling building access and implementing passive measures like making sure doors and locks work consistently and that there are clear lines of sight outside of schools. These steps do not adversely impact the experience of students but make schools safer.

In the end, schools are places of learning, filled with children, not forts or foxholes. The Nashville shooter shot their way into the school. That鈥檚 horrifying, but exceedingly rare. All the attention obscures just how low the risk is for any given school.  Regular communication from schools emphasizing this while also explaining steps that are being taken for safety should be the norm. 

Politicians and education leaders can turn schools into bunkers and 鈥渉arden the target鈥� to the point of absurdity or recognize that the best gunfights are the ones that never happen. And they don鈥檛 happen because of a healthy school climate that heads them off far upstream.

What began as a modest community on the social media platform quickly grew into the political juggernaut Moms Demand Action, the nation鈥檚 largest grassroots gun control group and a primary foe of the National Rifle Association and their allies in Washington, D.C. 

After fighting in the political trenches for more than a decade, Watts plans to retire this year after a long-fought win: Last year, President Joe Biden signed into law the first new federal gun rules in nearly three decades. 

But the mass shootings haven鈥檛 stopped. On Wednesday, students nationwide marched out of their schools to demand additional gun control measures after a shooter killed six people 鈥� including three 9-year-olds 鈥� March 27 at a private Christian elementary school in Nashville. This week, Tennessee House Republicans three Democratic state representatives who led a protest on the House Floor in response to the shooting and in solidarity with the hundreds of demonstrators, many of them young people, who packed the Tennessee Capitol.

The Nashville shooting has become the latest partisan flashpoint at the center of the country鈥檚 divisive political discourse. As students in Nashville and nationwide flood the streets to demand additional gun control measures, Republicans have latched onto the tragedy, which was carried out by a 28-year-old transgender shooter, with anti-trans rhetoric. 

In an interview with 麻豆精品, Watts 鈥� who now lives in California and whose children are grown 鈥� said the GOP鈥檚 response to the Nashville shooting follows a long history of leaning on 鈥渟traw men鈥� to avoid an honest dialogue about gun violence. She also offered insight into the power of mom-led advocacy and advice for parents advocating for changes in their own communities.

The interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity. 

This week it鈥檚 students who are walking out of school and hitting the streets protesting after the recent school shooting in Nashville. But we鈥檝e been here before. What, if anything, is different this time? What factors have made this shooting in Nashville so politically galvanizing? 

I think it鈥檚 different every time. There鈥檚 this idea that somehow there鈥檚 going to be a tragedy and everything is going to change overnight. And it didn鈥檛 happen after Columbine, it didn鈥檛 happen after the Sandy Hook school shooting, it didn鈥檛 happen last summer [after mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas]. But that doesn鈥檛 mean that things aren鈥檛 changing. 

The system is not set up in this country for overnight change. The system is set up for people to get involved in democracy and that means that you do what I call the unglamorous heavy lifting of grassroots activism, and that forces incremental change. 

I have seen over the last decade incremental change lead to a revolution. There鈥檚 been a seismic shift in American politics. Back in 2012, a quarter of all Democrats in Congress had an A rating from the NRA. Today, not one does. They鈥檙e proud of their Fs. 

And we had 15 Republicans support the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act that passed last summer. So things are changing and I believe that after every national shooting tragedy, when people start to pay attention, you鈥檙e seeing change.

The NRA is incredibly weak. They really didn鈥檛 have a seat at the table when the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act passed. The fact that we have a 90% track record of stopping the NRA鈥檚 agenda every year, those things are only enabled by all of the change that has happened and added up over the last decade. 

When you ask what鈥檚 different this time, I think it鈥檚 that there are even more people who are filled with rage over this situation, who know we don鈥檛 have to live like this. We sure as hell shouldn鈥檛 die like this. The more people who use their voices and vote on this issue, the faster we get to a place where our country isn鈥檛 run by the gun industry. 

President Biden signed the first federal gun control measures in nearly three decades 鈥� yet these shootings keep happening. What do you see were the effects of the law that has been signed, and what more needs to be done to solve the problem? 

The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act was a very important, critical step forward, but it was just one first step on a much longer journey. 

We need to have background checks on all gun sales at a federal level, we need a Red Flag law, we need to make sure that domestic abusers can鈥檛 get guns, including stalkers. There鈥檚 so much that needs to be done, and we鈥檝e done it really at a state-by-state level. 

Blue states in this country now have pretty strong gun laws, whereas red states don鈥檛. We鈥檙e only as safe as the closest state with the weakest gun laws, so we need much more to happen at a federal level. But in order to do that we have to have a Congress that will make that happen. 

The idea that shootings were going to stop after the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act passed is not realistic, but I want to be clear that it is meaningful. It takes a multifaceted approach to looking at gun violence as a complex issue. It isn鈥檛 just mass shootings or school shootings, that鈥檚 about 1% of the gun violence in this country. It鈥檚 also domestic violence and gun suicide and community gun violence. 

You asked what鈥檚 happened since the law was passed. The fact that we have stepped up background checks through the FBI through the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, 119 buyers under the age of 21 have been blocked from gun sales because they were deemed too dangerous to have access to guns. Prosecutions have increased for unlicensed gun sellers. There are new gun trafficking penalties that now have been used in at least 30 cases across the country. Millions of new dollars have flowed into mental health services for children in schools and into community violence intervention programs. 

President Biden said after the Nashville school shooting that he on the issue without Congress at this point. What is your response to this admission? 

I think that was a little more nuanced. I think he was basically saying that if we want holistic solutions for gun safety it really does have to be passed by Congress. I also want to be clear that the Biden-Harris administration has done more on this issue than any other administration in our nation鈥檚 history. 

Right now, the House is controlled by gun lobby lackeys. They鈥檙e not only opposed to passing good gun safety laws, they鈥檙e actually attacking federal law enforcement and they鈥檙e pushing gun extremists鈥� laws that would put us at risk. Just hours after the shooting in Nashville, a House committee scheduled a vote on legislation that would make it easier to buy really dangerous assault weapons that have arm braces. It鈥檚 the same device that the shooter in Tennessee had. 

So you know, I want to be clear that we鈥檙e making progress. If you鈥檇 asked me a year ago that we would have passed the first gun safety bill in 30 years that expanded background checks and funded state Red Flag laws and helps close what we call , I would not have believed you. 

So it is possible, and I think it鈥檚 inevitable, that our lawmakers at a federal level will eventually take action on this issue because their constituents are demanding it. There was a reason that Mitch McConnell whipped the votes on the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act and that鈥檚 because he saw polling that showed the Republican Party would be decimated if they did not act after Buffalo and Uvalde. That trend, especially when you see shootings like what just happened in Nashville, will only continue. 

We鈥檙e seeing more and more gunfire on school grounds in this country and we know why. It鈥檚 because there鈥檚 unfettered, easy access to guns.

The Nashville tragedy was carried out by a person who was reportedly transgender. As such, many Republican lawmakers and pundits have blamed the shooting on the suspect鈥檚 gender identity 鈥� rather than on guns. In what ways are you working to counter efforts to divert the focus from firearms to other social issues?

We see these same straw men after every single shooting tragedy in this country. Republicans always want to make it about anything but what data shows is causing our uniquely American crisis, which is easy access to guns. You know, other nations have mental illness, they have access to video games, they have divorced parents. 

The reason we have a 26-times higher gun homicide rate is that we give people easy access to guns. You know, the vast majority of mass shootings in this country have been by straight white men. And at no point have they said that that is a crisis, that we should really look at straight white men. It鈥檚 clear that that is just a way for them to divert attention because what they don鈥檛 want to talk about is the fact that too many guns and too few gun laws have given us the highest rate of gun homicides and suicides among all high-income countries. 

Gun politics have long been divisive and you鈥檝e found yourself the subject of sharp political critiques and, most alarmingly, death threats. There鈥檚 evidence of the country growing increasingly divided, and with that an uptick in political violence. In what ways have you experienced this change firsthand? 

When I started Moms Demand Action, I was sort of living in a bubble. I was a white suburban mom and I got off the sidelines because I was afraid my kids weren鈥檛 safe in their schools. Then when you come to this issue, what you realize is that it is much more complex and much more holistic than that. 

I was really shocked that we were having rallies and marches in those early days in Indiana and we were surrounded by men who were carrying loaded long guns in public. I was just shocked that that was legal. And in fact, open carry is legal in over 40 states in this country. To me it was a signal that something is very wrong. 

The more and more we pushed on gun extremists, the more they pushed back by behaving that way and we saw them starting to open carry in stores which is why we started corporate campaigns to change their gun policies. What we were starting to see were the seeds of gun extremism. They felt like a right not utilized and expressed in public was a right they didn鈥檛 have, and the NRA actually pushed back on this idea. In 2014 they came out and 鈥榙ownright weird,鈥�  and said it was not something that you do in normal society. And then just days later, they had to change their position because gun extremists in Texas were burning their NRA membership cards. 

Every state has its own version of the NRA but it鈥檚 often to the right of the NRA and much more extreme. When I lived in Colorado, they鈥檙e called the Rocky Mountain Gun Owners. They believe any gun law whatsoever is an infringement on the Second Amendment. So the NRA tends to be pulled to the right by these extremists. I mean, in 1999, the NRA opposed guns in schools and supported closing the background check loophole. And certainly that鈥檚 a far cry from where they are today. 

They鈥檝e lost control of their Frankenstein, and gun extremism is now this recruiting tool. It鈥檚 an organizing principle, it鈥檚 a fundraising tactic all for the right wing. I mean, guns excite the right-wing base about things that have nothing to do with guns. And so it is getting young white men through the door, it is radicalizing them, these groups often play in conspiracy theories. Again, some of those were originated and propagated by the NRA. 

The goal is to stoke fear, recruit new members and sell guns. Those fringe gun extremists that our volunteers were facing in those early days started showing up at state houses and anytime a statue was being removed and even threatening lawmakers and police officers and fellow citizens.

We鈥檝e tracked armed demonstrations since 2020 and found that they鈥檙e six times more likely to be violent or destructive than demonstrations where people are not armed. It seems pretty intuitive, but the data bears this out. 

So to answer your question: Yes, I think gun extremism is on the rise and is a very dangerous threat to democracy.

Tennessee Rep. Andy Ogles deleted a recent family Christmas card from social media after you criticized the photo, which featured the lawmaker and his family wielding guns. Republican lawmakers have faced similar criticism in recent years for posting similar family portraits. Why do you think it鈥檚 important to highlight these images? Are you concerned that the attention may ultimately play into their hands? 

I think it鈥檚 fascinating when these gun extremists back down, like deleting the photo. I think it鈥檚 really important to point out that this is the culture that鈥檚 killing us. 

This idea of unfettered access to guns and treating them like toys, like putting them in the hands of children. Both of my grandfathers were World War II veterans. They were responsible gun owners, they had the highest amount of respect for those guns and in a million years would not have posed with them like they were toys as opposed to tools meant to kill things. 

It鈥檚 really important that we shine a light. Sunlight is the best disinfectant and that鈥檚 certainly the case when it comes to gun extremism because people see this behavior. The vast majority of Americans 鈥� regardless of whether they鈥檙e gun owners or not, regardless of whether they鈥檙e Republicans or Democrats 鈥� they support common sense gun laws. And I think that seeing that kind of gun extremism is a turnoff to most Americans and they know that鈥檚 not who they want making our policies. 

You began your advocacy after the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012 with a Facebook group. What is it about grassroots, mom-led advocacy 鈥� based on the idea behind Mothers Against Drunk Driving 鈥� that makes it a particularly effective gun control advocacy approach? 

Bigger picture, women are the secret sauce to advocacy in this country and frankly, in the world. If you go back to when women were first allowed to be activists in America, which was Prohibition 鈥� they [men in power] could never really put that genie back in the bottle. Once women got off the sidelines, they wanted to use their voices on issues that they cared about. 

We are often given the task of caring for our families and our communities. All the way from Prohibition up to the water crisis in Flint, Michigan, it鈥檚 really been women and mothers forcing change in this country and using the power available to them. We are the majority of the voting population, we鈥檙e the majority of the population 鈥� period.  So when we use our voices and our votes, we can affect change. 

I often go back to something that feminist author Soraya Chemaly said. She wrote and she featured Moms Demand Action in there and she and I had a conversation about this and she said, 鈥榊ou know, 80% of the lawmakers in this country are men and men are inherently afraid of their mothers.鈥� 

The lawmakers in this country are either very, very excited to see us show up 鈥� hundreds or even thousands of us at a time in our red shirts 鈥� or they鈥檙e very, very afraid. So that can be a powerful coalition. 

Given your success in taking that Facebook group and turning your advocacy into the size of the organization that you did, I鈥檓 curious what lessons you learned about American politics and policymaking? What advice do you have for other mothers and other women who are working to inspire change in their own communities? 

I don鈥檛 think that men are as afraid to fail in public because that鈥檚 sort of seen as brave and courageous, where I think women feel like there鈥檚 blowback when they鈥檙e not perfect, or if they fail. 

If I had waited until I knew everything there was to know about gun violence or organizing, I still wouldn鈥檛 have started Moms Demand Action. I think it鈥檚 important to birth your ideas into the world. The very worst thing that can happen is that you fail and that you learn from that failure and you try something again. 

I had this great reverence for lawmakers before I started Moms Demand Action and I assumed they were very smart and committed and concerned and kind and unfortunately what you learn is that too many of them are not and they really don鈥檛 want to listen to what you have to say. But if you are an activist who is all of those things 鈥� concerned, committed, compassionate, curious 鈥� you would make a great lawmaker. I鈥檓 very proud of the fact that hundreds of our volunteers have decided to take a leap from not just shaping policy but to actually making it and running for office and winning. 

In this last electoral cycle, in November, 140 of our volunteers ran for office and won at all levels of government. We have volunteers who are now members of Congress. I think that鈥檚 a really important lesson, too, which is that women make great lawmakers. 

After more than a decade in this work, at the end of this year you plan to retire. What motivated that decision and what鈥檚 next for you?

I鈥檝e been a full-time volunteer, it鈥檒l be 11 years at the end of this year, and that鈥檚 a long time to do this work. But also, I鈥檝e asked myself that question because I think it鈥檚 important for a founder鈥檚 role to be finite. I never imagined I would spend the rest of my life doing this work. I鈥檓 so honored and so proud to have sort of lit the spark, but it really is up to other new and emerging leaders to keep that going. 

This movement needs to last into perpetuity and so, by stepping back, I think I enable other leaders to step forward. I鈥檒l still be a volunteer for Moms Demand Action, I鈥檒l just be doing it as a California Moms Demand Action volunteer. We have leaders who are ready to step up inside the organization and outside the organization, and I think that鈥檚 really exciting. 

As for me, for what鈥檚 next, I obviously will always care about this issue and it will be very important to me and I will use my voice in different ways. Something I鈥檓 really passionate about is empowering women in all different ways, but particularly running for office. 

I don鈥檛 have an answer for you on specifically what鈥檚 next. I will be with Moms Demand Action through the end of the year, I will certainly rest a little bit and I鈥檓 going to be teaching at USC starting in January and, other than that, I鈥檒l figure out what鈥檚 next when the time comes. 

Clovis Municipal School District recently began using artificial intelligence technology designed to detect guns and potential shooters on school campuses. The software can even alert law enforcement before a single shot is fired.

The AI technology is designed by ZeroEyes, a Philadelphia-based company founded by a group of former Navy SEALs. The company鈥檚 software installs in line with the district鈥檚 existing camera systems and operates in the background, constantly analyzing every frame of video as it searches for signs of a firearm. If a gun is detected, the software sends still images to a human who will determine if the gun is real and if lives are in danger.

That human review of a perceived gun is often completed within five seconds, ZeroEyes鈥� co-founder and Chief Revenue Officer Sam Alaimo said. And if the gun is determined to be real, district officials can be notified within seconds through a number of methods, and ZeroEyes even has the capability to contact law enforcement directly through RapidSOS, a platform that sends data to 911 call centers.

Along with fast notification, the software can also relay the exact location of the potential shooter to police to help officers locate and stop a gunman.

鈥淪chools are complex. Kids that go there often don鈥檛 know their way around them. If you call law enforcement and say, 鈥楾here鈥檚 a shooting in my school,鈥� where are (first responders) going to show up?鈥� Alaimo said. 鈥� If we can get them to where the shooter is, they can stop the killing as soon as humanly possible and then take care of anybody who may have been injured in the process. Every second in those situations counts. Every second literally could mean a life.鈥�

Clovis Municipal Schools has signed a four-year, $345,000 agreement for a subscription to the ZeroEyes software and its monitoring services, Loran Hill, the district鈥檚 senior director of operations said. The district has funded the technology with money from the coronavirus aid bill, a $2.2 trillion federal pandemic recovery package.

Hill isn鈥檛 aware of any shooting in the history of Clovis schools but said the district was looking for ways to prevent one from ever happening. The district took proposals from several companies with detection and prevention technologies, and ultimately, ZeroEyes was selected by a review committee.

District officials were drawn to ZeroEyes for its ability to potentially prevent tragedy, and because of its human-staffed operation centers. These facilities, which ZeroEyes calls ZOCs 鈥� are staffed by former military and law enforcement members who await notification of potential threats. When the AI detects a possible gun, the software takes a screenshot of the video and outlines the perceived gun with a brightly colored box to aid the human that will review the image in finding the possible gun.

Within three to five seconds, a human in the ZOC determines if there鈥檚 a threat or not. If law enforcement is contacted, those in the ZOC are able to relay directly to local law enforcement what type of firearm the person is armed with. The company currently has two ZOCs, one near Philadelphia, and one in Hawaii.

ZeroEyes also maintains a green screen lab at its Philadelphia headquarters where any type of scenario can be created to mimic any physical environment, from a classroom to a school hallway, and any location outdoors. The software is also trained to recognize a variety of stock and modified firearms from the smallest pistols to the longest rifles or shotguns.

The software constantly searches for any sign of a firearm, from a gun being pulled out of a backpack to a gun being pointed at someone. In one instance, Alaimo said someone was wearing a T-shirt with an Uzi submachine gun printed on it and the software detected the gun as a possible threat. A still image of the shirt was sent to an operation center for analysis where a human was able to determine that no real gun was in the image.

Since the software works with a school district鈥檚 existing camera systems, it will search for a gun anywhere within view of the camera systems. And the software works with the same certainty as having a human watching for guns on campus.

鈥淚f a gun鈥檚 in front of that camera, it鈥檒l pick it up,鈥� Alaimo said. 鈥淚f the human eye can tell it鈥檚 a gun, the camera will tell it鈥檚 a gun. We learned this early on: You can鈥檛 just train an algorithm to detect a gun being held as if it鈥檚 about to shoot somebody. You have to be able to detect a gun in any circumstance to make sure you never miss a true positive.鈥�

Hill with Clovis Municipal Schools said one thing that drew district officials to ZeroEyes was how the software can detect things that a human might miss.

鈥淎rtificial intelligence is able to look all day, every day,鈥� he said. 鈥淲e appreciate our (student resource) officers, but ZeroEyes is going to cover much more ground than an officer is able to.鈥�

As with the use of most technology in schools, some may be concerned about student privacy. Alaimo said ZeroEyes only receives images from cameras placed in schools when the software detects a possible threat, and the company does not have the ability to access a live feed of any given school district鈥檚 cameras.

鈥淲e鈥檙e very stringent with our data protection privacy rights,鈥� Alaimo said. 鈥淲e cannot recognize faces, we can鈥檛 store biometric data and we don鈥檛 want to do those things. It鈥檚 literally just: Is there a gun, yes or no? That is our primary focus.鈥�

Racial bias is also a concern when it comes to determining whether someone might commit a crime 鈥� like carrying out a mass shooting. And while software may not hold any bias while making a threat determination, a human who reviews the images sent by the software might. Alaimo understands those concerns, but he said those in the command center that review the images are solely focused on the gun.

鈥淭丑别 algorithm makes it very apparent 鈥� the situation makes it apparent,鈥� he said. 鈥淚s it a gun or not a gun? Race does not come into it.鈥�

Hill said the district researched ZeroEyes prior to adopting its technology and district officials feel confident that student鈥檚 privacy is protected because the company isn鈥檛 monitoring or keeping the district鈥檚 data. He said he鈥檚 confident that race will not be a determining factor in whether law enforcement is called or not because in the demonstrations of the software the district has seen. And because the process of determining a threat happens so quickly, the district doesn鈥檛 feel there鈥檚 much time for the human reviewer to determine the race of the potential shooter.

Founded in 2018, ZeroEyes is currently in use in 30 states, and Alaimo estimates ZeroEyes will be in use in all 50 states by the end of the year. The company鈥檚 AI technology is also used in Mexico and England. And while the technology can be found in locations like casinos and shopping malls, Alaimo said it was developed for use in schools with the goal of keeping kids safe from mass shootings.

鈥淲hat often happens in these circumstances is that people talk about mental health, and then they argue about gun laws, and then everybody offers thoughts and prayers,鈥� he said. 鈥淲e wanted to build something that could work right now. We wanted a solution that could actually make a dent right now, and save the lives of kids.鈥�

is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Source New Mexico maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Shaun Griswold for questions: info@sourcenm.com. Follow Source New Mexico on and .

FRANKFORT 鈥� After a gunman killed 21 people and wounded 17 others at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, last spring, high school students on a Kentucky advisory committee 鈥渞ealized we needed to use our voices to change,鈥� said Malley Taylor, a junior at the Craft Academy in Morehead.

On Tuesday, the students as the chair of the Kentucky House Education Committee, Rep. James Tipton, R-Taylorsville, listened.

The Commissioner鈥檚 Student Advisory Council, a group of about 30 students from across the state, , such as strengthening active shooting drills and communication with parents and students. They also called for promoting and supporting 鈥済un control legislation that would make it harder for an active shooter/assailant incident in the first place.鈥�

The students advise Education Commissioner Jason Glass, who said to media after the event that he was optimistic the legislature would take students鈥� recommendations into consideration. The perspective of students and their voices is important in conversations about school safety, he said. 鈥淭丑别y are the ones that are under the threat of this on a regular basis.鈥�

According to the , the U.S. has had 39 mass shootings since New Year鈥檚 Day. The nonprofit organization tracks data about gun violence across the country.

Taylor said the group was divided into three subgroups to gather information about recommendations on how gun violence should be addressed before, during and after crises occur.

The students released a full report of of their findings: the highlights were:

Before

• Promote how to use the STOP tipline, which is an anonymous reporting tool, in Kentucky schools.
• Improve the rate of intervention in concerning behaviors.
• Promote and support gun legislation that would make it harder for an active shooter/assailant incident to occur, including strengthening background checks.

During

• Improve the quality of active shooter drills and enforce existing requirements for them.
• Improve the training for staff, school resource officers and first responders to ensure quick response times to incidents.
• Create a clear notification system to contact students and parents about an event.

After

• Provide access to mental health support, including therapy sessions and other mental health professionals.
• Host town-hall style meetings in the community.
• Repair and rebuild the school building.

Tipton, the House Education chair, thanked the students for taking their research seriously and promised that he would read it entirely and bring it back to the legislature. He recalled when he and other lawmakers first learned of the 2018 shooting at Marshall County High School during a House Education Committee meeting. A gunman killed two students and injured 14 people. The fifth-year anniversary of the tragedy was Monday.

After the shooting, the Kentucky legislature passed the School Safety and Resiliency Act in 2019.聽 鈥淲e鈥檝e already made some great strides there but that does not mean we need to be complacent,鈥� Tipton said. 鈥淲e need to continue to look at this, we need to continue to study, we need to continue to learn when these unfortunate situations happen,鈥� the chairman said.

To reporters, Tipton said improving school safety through the addition of metal detectors, bullet resistant glass, more school resource officers and supporting mental health and school counseling programs requires funding.

When asked about inclusion of gun control legislation in the students鈥� presentation, Tipton called it 鈥渁 polarizing issue.鈥� As a gun owner himself, he said others should be responsible with ownership.

鈥淚 think it鈥檚 something we need to continue to look at and study and evaluate. I don鈥檛 know what the probability of getting something like that passed here in Kentucky (is) 鈥� It would be something that would be very difficult but I think we still need to examine that issue,鈥� Tipton said.

Peter Jefferson, a sophomore from Henry Clay High School in Lexington, told reporters that while feeling anxious about a possible school shooting is not constant, it鈥檚 something he and his peers are conscious of. Joud Dahleh, a junior at Ignite Institute in Boone County, agreed that it is not a day-to-day focus, but her classmates have had conversations with each other and teachers about it.

鈥淢y school is mostly glass so we walk around sometimes and just wonder how safe we would be if that were to occur,鈥� Dahleh said.

is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Kentucky Lantern maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jamie Lucke for questions: info@kentuckylantern.com. Follow Kentucky Lantern on and .

Barely a week into the new year, a at Richneck Elementary School in Newport News, Virginia, becoming one of the youngest school shooters in the nation鈥檚 history. While , his teacher remains hospitalized with serious injuries. David Riedman, creator of the , discusses the relative rarity of school shooters under age 10 and the likely aftermath of the event.

How rare is it to have a school shooter this young?

This is the 17th shooting involving a student under the age of 10 at a school since 1970 鈥� the first year for which my database keeps track. Most of these shootings were not intentional. But in 1975, a 9-year-old student at the Pitcher School in Detroit was in a fight with a 13-year-old, left campus, got a rifle from his house and came back to the school and shot the student in the head, killing him.

In 2000, a , in their classroom at Buell Elementary School in Michigan while their teacher lined up other students in the hallway. The shooting .

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How do kids this young typically get guns?

In most school shootings, the gun is taken from the student鈥檚 home or from the house of a friend or relative. In the 2000 shooting at Buell Elementary, the student鈥檚 uncle pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter and was for leaving a firearm in an easily accessible place.

The 6-year-old shooter did not face charges due to his age.

What stands out about this recent case?

The most striking part of this shooting is that it appears to be . While many details remain unknown, it is likely that the student had the gun with him the entire day, possibly multiple days, before shooting his teacher. In many states, the legal system assumes that young children are not capable of the thought and planning that goes into committing a violent crime. In Virginia, the to charge someone with a felony is 14 years old.

Do schools need to start searching first graders?

Despite the attention that they generated, school shootings at any age are relatively rare. There have been 17 shootings involving kids under 10 publicly reported across a 52-year period. attend schools every year, and fewer than 300 of them shoot someone on campus.

When most guns that end up in schools come from the home, I鈥檇 argue it is the responsibility of parents, relatives and older siblings to make sure that every firearm is locked, secured and accounted for.

The use of metal detectors has been shown to and are only effective with constant maintenance, training, staffing and screening procedures. Some of the incidents involving children have resulted from adults putting a firearm in the kid鈥檚 bag and the child firing it when they find the gun at school.

What鈥檚 next for this boy?

This remains unclear, and due to juvenile privacy laws, we may never know. The 6-year-old who killed his classmate at Buell Elementary in 2000 was not charged with a crime. In 2021 in Rigby, Idaho, a 12-year-old girl shot three people during a planned attack at Rigby Middle School. Based on her written plan, this young girl intended to . She is until she turns 19 鈥� and possibly until age 21 if she is not deemed fully rehabilitated 鈥� following a guilty plea to three counts of first-degree murder.

What鈥檚 next for the school?

While much attention is focused on the shooter and teacher, a classroom full of first graders witnessed their classmate shoot the teacher. She was , which means that it was likely a gruesome scene. These students will all need extensive counseling to understand and deal with this trauma. For the other students, teachers and parents, this is also a traumatic experience, and many students may no longer want to go to school.

What does this case suggest for school safety in the US broadly?

There were 302 shootings in school property in 2022, more than in any other year since 1970. Since 2017, the number of shootings each year has significantly increased. This pattern matches the across the country. It is important to remember that most shootings at schools are committed by current or former students, not outsiders breaking into the building. Because of this, school security plans need to include all levels of schools and shootings by all ages of students.

This article is republished from under a Creative Commons license. Read the .

In the ensuing days, cable news channels and social feeds have been full of diagnoses and remedies to this national sickness. Some solutions 鈥� such as common-sense and largely popular gun safety reforms, mental health supports and  better protocols for emergency response 鈥� warrant urgent action. 

But there is another set of supposed solutions that are unserious, uninformed and utterly reckless as they pertain to protecting the emotional, psychological and physical safety of students in school buildings. Worse, these irresponsible suggestions are finding their way into legislation, such as a new law in Ohio (where one of us leads the state鈥檚 second-largest school district) that directly encourages districts to staff schools with armed teachers and personnel.

For people like us 鈥� school system leaders and safety experts who have committed our lives to creating safe spaces for children every day 鈥� the tragedy in Uvalde, Texas, followed by a gunfight among teenagers on a crowded Philadelphia street that , reinforces the urgent need for more credible investments in the support and safety of young people 鈥� not more armed adults. 

The : More guns in schools will simply mean more kids and adults being accidentally shot. Teachers aren鈥檛 trained in gun safety or even in how to use a gun in the unlikely event they happen to be in a position to use one in self-defense. We don鈥檛 want them to be. Can you imagine it? During professional development on Monday, we discuss the science of reading, and on Tuesday, where to shoot if a mass murderer is wearing body armor? 

Further, in too many schools across America, implicit biases lead to the costly and inappropriate criminalization of student behavior, especially for Black students (who, incidentally, have not perpetrated a single mass school shooting). The consequences of these unexamined dynamics will be even deadlier for the most vulnerable students if teachers are encouraged to think of themselves as vigilantes rather than mentors and molders of young minds.

Similarly, may appeal to a visceral instinct to shield children from harm, but they quickly unravel with dire unintended consequences under any reasonable scrutiny. 

Having a single point of entry in and out of a school is dangerous. Obviously, students and staff might have multiple reasons to evacuate, including during gun emergencies. Instructing classroom teachers to lock their doors as a matter of practice is not viable 鈥� administrators need to see what鈥檚 happening in real time to give feedback, build relationships and build collective momentum for progress. Students need to get water and use the bathroom. 

Moreover, many school buildings already lack basic infrastructure like or even . Are we seriously suggesting that they will now become impervious to military-grade weapons? And beyond the fatal practical flaws of these ideas, what about the profound psychological impact of turning schools into military-style fortresses?

It is not enough to argue against these destructive recommendations as though they were worthy of consideration. The mere injection of these ideas into the policy debate is a kind of toxicity, akin to the smog of disinformation that already chokes the country’s democratic process and prevents effective governance. These toxins must be eradicated and summarily dismissed out of hand.

But instead of extinguishing these ideas when when they spark, traditional and social media fan the flames, validating the pundits and politicians who offer up these ludicrous and deeply flawed policies. This quickly derails productive debate over the kinds of solutions our children and communities need. Productive debate is quickly derailed from the kinds of solutions America desperately needs (and which hold ), while these dangerous ideas spread like wildfire through dry brush. Even attempts to extinguish the spread somehow confer validity onto ideas that should have fizzled from the start.

The nation has seen the implications of this vicious circle before. Throughout the COVID pandemic, too many news programs and social media apps gave platform to hucksters who downplayed the effects of the virus, cast doubt on highly effective vaccines and weakened public resolve to tackle a global health crisis. Some brave infectious disease and medical experts did what they could to break through with facts and evidence, but the damage was done. 

Our country shouldn鈥檛 make the same mistake when it comes to the epidemic of gun violence. This moment of public outcry is an opportunity to enact real solutions that truly can lead to safer and healthier schools鈥攊ncluding commonsense gun laws and investments in school infrastructure and mental health. Arming teachers and bringing more guns into schools are not solutions. 

We implore every American 鈥� especially elected leaders and the media who give them lift 鈥� to consider the consequences of reckless and uninformed positions and focus on what it is actually possible to do to protect the nation’s children. 

Cami Anderson has served as a public school superintendent in New York City and Newark, New Jersey. Eric S. Gordon has served as the chief executive officer of Cleveland Metropolitan School District in Ohio since 2011. Dr. William R. Hite has served since 2012 as Superintendent of The School District of Philadelphia, the largest public school system in Pennsylvania.