The Problem Of School Violence

Unfortunately, the notion of schools being a safe place is no longer a trend across American schools. Disturbing mass shootings in the U.S continue to shock the media. A school shooting is when someone attacks a school using a gun. The Secret Service says these shootings are "deliberately selected as the location for the attack". The reasons massacres occur in schools is because of poor security, violence in video games/media, and bullying. Shockingly the U.S. has the most school shootings than any other country in the world. According to the FBI, mass shootings occur, on average, every 2 weeks in the U.S. While the cause of school shootings are sometimes unpredictable, it is a growing issue and they need to be prevented. Most shooters don’t have mental issues, they have a plan to kill, so there is no singular cause that creates violent people. On April 16th, 2007, the most deadly school massacre occurred. Seung-Hui Cho killed thirty-two students at Virginia-Tech. As Americans, we no longer should turn on the news and witness these gruesome murders. We try to make sense of these murders, but it’s ineffectual. There are measures we can take as a society to help. The number one question in a school massacre is, "why would a person that has a capable sense of mind even do that?” It is our moral responsibility to fix these issues. In order to stop this problem, we need to find its roots.

Not only is school violence affecting children, but it affects teachers as well. Deaths in schools are tragic events that affect not just those involved, but it also affects everyone else in the school, the neighborhoods, and the families as well. There’s a 2006 study saying that public school incidents have increased from a 71 percent to an 81 percent in a 5-year period. . In the article, “Thresholds of Violence”, Malcolm Gladwell said and I quote, “Since Sandy Hook, there has been more than 140 shootings in the United States”.

School shootings and those who instigate them have changed over time by the perspectives of these people that are influenced by violence. Couples of years ago, school shooters were kids that got traumatized, raped, bullied, etc. A perfect example of this would be Evan Ramsey. Evan walked into his high school with a 12- gauge shotgun and killed two people. He had a chaotic home life. His mother was an alcoholic who lived with a series of violent men. He lived in 10 different foster homes where he got both sexually and physically abused. I feel that Evan did this because of the tragic life or even for attention. His life wasn't a good life and it's sad that the events that occurred to him had to happen. Now things have changed and anyone can

“From all these friends, I could not escape learning some of the statistics that I preferred not to know. Forty-one people at the mall had been wounded. Nineteen had died. Everyone said it was a miracle that only nineteen perished. What has gone wrong with our world when nineteen dead can seem like any kind of miracle?” - Renowned author Dean Koontz.

Violence in schools encompasses a number of different acts. Whether it’s physical or emotional bullying or even cyber-bullying; violence within schools is a major problem and it’s only increasing. However in a number of cases these may only be the beginning. Sometimes people take it a step further and actually bring a firearm into the school and start shooting it. Unfortunately school shootings have occurred throughout the country at an alarming rate. When someone shoots another (especially within the confines of a school) everyone is effected by this immense act of violence.

Gun violence in schools is becoming more common and out of control. The Freeman High School shooting was a total tragedy. Caleb Sharpe was a ongoing bully victim. I believe everything could have been prevented if he was assisted properly by the school.  I feel like the school didn’t help Caleb at all. In the article it says that Sharpe’s classmates alerted the counselors, but it wasn’t clear what the school staff did in response. Classmates reported troubling signs from Caleb, saying they knew videos he posted online playing with guns. Evidence like that is clearly a cry for help. Freeman High School consist of 300 students compared to other schools who have 800+.  The school have no excuses why they couldn't catch the warning signs earlier.

When you hear about a school shooter, you might think “Oh, there parents are awful, they just let their child do that,” Well you would be wrong. Most of the time we can`t comprehend if a child will be a potential school shooter, also them owning a gun does not make them a suspect for a potential school shooter.. The real issue here is the lack of communication between the victim or potential school shooter and the school. In “Here’s How to Prevent the Next School Shooting, Experts Say” by Anya Kamenetz, she states “It means the quality of relationships among the students and the adults in a school. It's affected by the school's approach to discipline and behavior, the availability of professionals like counselors and social workers, as well as any social-emotional curriculum taught in the classroom.” Also “School climate, in turn, affects students' mental and emotional health and

The issue of gun violence in schools has been a critical issue on the forefront of national politics in the previous years. There have been way too many school shootings in the United States and even in other countries. Governments are trying to come up with strategic solutions to fix this major issue. Many politicians and human rights activists have been advocating for better gun control and better ways to keep students more protected in schools. Some people believe that school faculty should be allowed to carry weapons as a measure of increased security. Gun control is a problem that must be tackled by rethinking the presence of guns in our society and not making the problem worse by adding more guns and allow an outlook of using guns to

Gun violence continues to dominate national headlines. On average, the gun violence epidemic leaves a child or teen wounded or dead every hour in the United States, resulting in 47 American children and teens shot every day, and culminating to ___ shot every year. Deaths related to gun violence are now the third leading cause of death for American children. And these statistics are based solely on the actual deaths, but does not account for those exposed to this brutality—friends, family members, and other children who are psychologically damaged and struck with fear in their hearts.

Juvenile Crime says, “As a society, do we really want our teachers to be prepared to shoot children, perhaps even kill them?”After the tragedy at Dene Building of the La Loche Community School, schools are asking that teachers be allowed to carry guns to protect themselves and their students. As a high school student this is a mixed feeling for me. This subject truly speaks to me, because I firmly believe that if someone comes at you with a gun

Do you think that the parents of the children that start school shootings be charged? Do you think that they deserve to be punished for what their kids have done? Do you think that the parents should be hurt for something that their kids have done that they may or may not have known what the kids were doing? Lack of funding and resources, many discipline problems arise when students are disengaged and do not have support services to help them persist in their educational pursuits. Lack of textbooks, inexperienced teachers, and non-existent counseling and special education services all contribute to delinquency and high dropout rates. Alternative school environments,In some public school districts, children that have been disciplined are remanded

As violence in the community makes its way into the schools, it is pertinent that school administrators have a plan in place to help reduce and eliminate acts of violence within their classrooms (Lunenburg, 2011). Becoming proactive, rather than reactive, is crucial because according the to the National Crime Survey conducted in 2004, “the number of crimes committed at or near the 85,000 U. S. public schools was estimated at more than 3 million annually, with 185,580 people injured…on any given day, it was not uncommon for students to carry guns to school” (Lunenburg, 2011, p.

¨School violence refers to criminal acts committed at educational institutions such as elementary, middle, and high schools as well as colleges and universities” (¨School¨ 1). A recent school violence happened on December 14, 2012 in Newtown, Connecticut, at Sandy Hook Elementary School. On that day, “twenty-year-old Adam Lanza Adam was armed with a variety of weapons, including two handguns and an assault rifle (“Guns” 17). With those firearms, he killed his mother, six adult staff members, and twenty first-graders (17). When school violences such as Sandy

Since the tragic incident at Sandy Hook Elementary where 26 people, 20 of them being six-seven years, lost their lives to an active shooter several state legislators have been introducing and passing laws that allow educators to carry weapons on school boundaries. Others are calling for a banned-on assault weapons and stricter background checks. U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer introduced several bills for school safety that included, use of surveillance equipment and secured entrances (Weiler and Armenta, (2014). Colorado voted to allow high school principals and superintendent to act as school security officers and in doing so allowed them to carry concealed. The author conducted this research with a survey, they sent it to over 40 principals, of those 40, 19 replied. There were seven questions included in the survey. The first question asked the principal to assess the safety level of their schools. They rated their school safety on a scale from five to 0, five being very safe. Fourteen of the principals assessed their schools at a four. On average, many the principals felt their schools were safe, didn’t worry incidents like Sandy Hook. However, weren’t confident their schools were ready if something like Sandy Hook happened to them. In conclusion, the authors believe the principals’ opinions are quite different than the

It is without a doubt that there has been an increase in violent crimes in schools throughout recent years. School shootings continue to become more and more common, especially in North America. Safety concerns for any and all students and staff in schools are at all all time high due to the high number of fatal and non-fatal occurring incidences. Since 2013 to the present, it is estimated that the United States has seen approximately 205 school shootings. Weekly, that is a shocking one shooting on average. Many of these shootings have resulted in the injuries and deaths of multiple of students and staff members. (Everytown Research, 2017) Evidently, school shootings are tragic events that affect so many more people than just the victims. However, these events are also interesting to look at from the psychological and sociological point of views. Through much research, it can be concluded that school shootings are a complex problem that are caused by a mix of improper brain development and societal and media influences which motivate school shooters to emerge. Psychological factors may include struggling with mental illnesses and/or abuse that leads to damaged brain development. Additionally, being bullied and/or the role of the media are examples of sociological factors.