Is school security wrong in this aspect?

Man how do you solve such a problem, luckily for myself and my children we live in a society with minimal access to guns (yes criminals can get them) but regular joe who loses the plot and shoots up his school aint happening anytime soon, last 1 was in Dunblane 1996 I cant find many more examples of school massacres in my country (thank god) prior to that there was Hungerford in 1987.

Somehow we have reduce the numbers to zero in the last 20 years, makes me proud to say my kids can go to school safely, I hope all parents will one day feel the same.

In the mean time you can always equip your kids with buller proof backpacks, gotta love money being made from children casulties, I mean using the tune 'Bulletproof' by La Roux, keep it classy San Diego

Bulletproof backpacks being sold in US amid new school year

La Roux Does Not Support Fox Business ‘Bulletproof’ Back-to-School Segment



Freedom aint cheap in America, imagine being able to send your kids to school with a non bullet proof back pack, now that sounds like freedom to me.

a reply to: UpIsNowDown

Oh Please stop, Maybe you guys don't have guns but you are surely dealing with the same thing
This is not a gun debate post. This is more about how schools deal with a threat, any threat. Yes including
a person with a knife, a gun, any other weapon.


firstaidforlife.org.uk...

When it comes to knife crime, the UK is in crisis. This week crime minister, Victoria Atkins, will chair a knife summit to address what one senior police chief describes as a ‘national emergency.’

Latest statistics show a 93% rise in the number of young people aged 16 and under being treated for assault by knife (or other sharp objects) in the last five years.

www.bbc.com...

The number of police officers based in schools in London is going to be significantly increased in response to a wave of knife crime."We've always had youth crime. But this is different, this is vicious," he said.

a reply to: JAGStorm

If two of the most famous school shootings were planned like Parkland High School, I wonder what difference such security measures as you describe might make?

That morning the staff and students were told there was to be a training exercise that day, complete with yelling and screaming and the shooting of blanks.

How can that be defended against?

Well part of the problem with solving the problem is to correctly identify the problem.

Are school shootings actually mass shootings or terrorism? Or does it depend on the shooter as to what it actually is. Perhaps just a suicide by cop situation and the student victims are the collateral to ensure that suicide by cop.

As for building designs, those are thoughts that need to be considered in order to better protect the children. One thing that needs to be gone is the long straight hallways where you can see end to end. More exits to avoid chokepoints but not so much that it makes the building hard to secure. As is, fire alarms need to be confirmed and announced over the PA before evacuation.

originally posted by: Bluntone22
a reply to: JAGStorm

Well schools are like prisons.
You don't graduate, you escape..

But yeah, my daughters school has the glass holding cell that needs opened from the office.

"Glass" holding cell. If anyone really wants to get inside they will shoot the glass or just drive through the doors.

My school had (might still HAVE) doors so heavy that the nerdier kids could barely open them. And had wire in the windows. I can remember seeing some of the glass with what looked to be a gunshot that never penetrated. Kids would come up there after hours and bored, and shoot at the doors I guess. This was in the 90's, but the school had been there since the 1910's. Not sure if or when the doors were upgraded to the heavy steel, but nothing could penetrate them.

One time a chick was flurkin' with a couple of dudes and they ran through one of those doors, she tried to stop it with her finger. I heard screaming and looked out of the window and she was pulling on a tendon or something, it was connected to her finger on the other side of the door.

originally posted by: JAGStorm
a reply to: Hefficide
www.govtech.com...

Success for the lockdown model assumes that our buildings will slow the bad guys long enough for a law enforcement response to neutralize the threat. Several incidents have now shown us this assumption is false. "No plan survives contact with the enemy.” Most of these incidents begin in contact and having more than 90 percent of a building’s occupants trained to sit on the ground, not move and be quiet (training taught in schools and then brought by students into the workplace and universities) is an exploitable tactic and illustrates the limitations of the model.

TL;DR: Exits represent choke points and choke points are easily predicted, targeted and exploited.

This is something I think about too, when shopping and if I need to leave due to a situation etc.

You think about that stuff when you're shopping? So do I! I always, ALWAYS, map out a semi ok hiding spot for me and a nearly unseeable/unthinkable hiding spot for my wife and child, that way if a shooter ever got too close, I would have a chance at disarming/distracting/killing him before my wife or child was detected.

a reply to: LSU2018

You think about that stuff when you're shopping? So do I! I always, ALWAYS, map out a semi ok hiding spot for me and a nearly unseeable/unthinkable hiding spot for my wife and child, that way if a shooter ever got too close, I would have a chance at disarming/distracting/killing him before my wife or child was detected.

My dad raised me as a survivalist. Always examining my surroundings, always to be aware of exits, and what if scenarios.
I went to school overseas, and there we were schooled on the possibility of terrorist kidnapping us. The school I went to had diplomat kids and some other high ranking military folks kids. Some of them had personal bodyguards. It was always on our mind. I know that sounds scary, but I think as an adult that upbringing has come in handy.

I used to work for a public school and was in charge of the security cameras. I also went through a live exercise with volunteer "victims" and blanks in the guns. I have been shooting since I was 12, back in the mid 70s and am quite familiar with the sounds, smells and recoil but nothing had prepared me for a shotgun going off inside a cafeteria. That shook me for a second. Anyway, we (staff) were all told where to go and to pull our locked doors shut once the exercise started. When I moved inside my office after spotting an "intruder" with a gun coming into the building it started feeling real. I hid behind my door and was not visible even if you looked in the window. The "perp" "killed" the gal in the office next to me (burning a hole in the carpet as a result of firing straight down), rattled my door handle and quickly moved onto the next rooms. They will not waste time trying to enter a room that they don't believe is occupied.

A few years after that exercise, the Michigan State Police re-did their safety guidelines for active shooters and bomb threats. Turns out somewhere, someone used a fire alarm to get people out into the open and shot at them. I forget which incident it was but this was years ago, not recently. So for a bomb threat, instead of rounding everyone up and sending them off-campus on school buses as had been done for years, we were told to lock down the rooms and the bomb dogs would clear the building before anyone was allowed to leave. If you think about it, it makes sense. Most of the homemade bombs weren't powerful enough to blow up the whole building, so they concluded by keeping kids in rooms that are made from concrete blocks, it would be safer for the majority even if a bomb went off in a classroom, kitchen, etc. My wife still works in the school and they have changed their process to a system called "ALICE" which was mentioned earlier. It's been several years since I have been involved with it, but until we figure out how to deal with the mentally ill that commit most of these crimes, I see nothing wrong with securing the buildings and the kids to keep them as safe as possible.

This is something I think about too, when shopping and if I need to leave due to a situation etc.

You think about that stuff when you're shopping? So do I! I always, ALWAYS, map out a semi ok hiding spot for me and a nearly unseeable/unthinkable hiding spot for my wife and child, that way if a shooter ever got too close, I would have a chance at disarming/distracting/killing him before my wife or child was detected.

I have done the same as long as I can remember, even as a teenager all those years ago. I do the same when driving too. Always look for an out, an escape route, a hiding place.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Um yea... "except one is outside and the other isn’t." ... Would you rather be in an indoor mall when there is a shooter or an outdoor mall. I know which one I would pick 100% of the time.

If the shooter is inside your classroom then it doesn’t particularly matter whether it’s attached to a hallway or a sidewalk, does it? An escape route is an escape route. I’d rather not need an escape route, period. If I do need one, I don’t particularly care if it’s inside or outside as long as it works and I’d be thankful if the building took minimal precautions, like having locked doors, to delay a shooter.

Most of these shooters are students or former students that go right in with them, without anyone blinking an eye. They normally don't check in first.

Because, as I said, any security system can be defeated. Not allowing every Tom, Dick, and Harry to walk unhindered into a school isn’t a bad thing.

You keep arguing as if I’m presenting this as some foolproof system that you’re poking holes in when I’ve repeatedly said it’s not foolproof at all. It’s also not a terrible idea, however, to lock doors in a school because if something happens, most people know how to operate a door and get out if they can. Unless you’ve got an idea that you’re keeping from the rest of us that will work all the time, every time, all you’re doing at this point is trying to be right rather than trying to learn anything.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Yea, but all the kids live if the perp doesn’t get past a security gate that crazy..


That said i’m 100% sure any lesser security will work not at all..


The attacker is always a student or recent student there... that means they do not look out of place.. until they draw, there is zero way we can expect ANYONE to catch the threat ahead of time, unless basically every single student is searched every single day.. and searched well.


Hardening the target a little doesn’t help.. because shooters are not picking schools based on security level. They are attacking THEIR PERSONAL SCHOOLS..







The only common thread that can be followed is the fact that the shooter will come from within the school they will later shoot up.

a reply to: Shamrock6

I agree completely, except would add that EVERY security system cannot be beaten by everybody...


Accessibility matters...

In all aspects...

How easy/cheap to gain entry to the school?


How easy/cheap to obtain a gun??


How easy /cheap to get bullets??


And I say easy/cheap because easy equals cheap..




I am not saying ban all the guns, but that is part of the reason the “ they can always find a gun” or they can always use something else!” Is ridiculous.


This is not a policy proposal, just an example..


If the cheapest gun cost 4,000... that makes it incredibly hard for a teenager to get a gun..

Teens don’t have that kinda money usually, and dad probably locks his up is they are all worth thousands apiece...


And no other options are not nearly as effective or versatile.. there is a reason soldiers don’t say “screw the assault rifles, I’m taking my Honda!”

Same goes for cops, and everyone else who might want or need to take a life.... except for very specific situations, they all take a gun..



That doesn’t mean we should ban all the guns.... that just means those talking points suck, and they should instead try some that do not suck.




I kinda think the logical fallacies are intentional..


They make a horrible argument against something no one actually wants, then the other person ends up debating the logical fallacy, when they in no way support confiscation.. they are just driven crazy by the obviously ridiculous point...and cannot help but address it...


Well the the conservative takes them debating the crap argument as “proof of some vast leftist conspiracy to take all the guns.” Because they only wanted to hear what they wanted to anyway.

a reply to: JAGStorm

How can a gun debate not be relevant when the OP is literally asking about possible fixes to school SHOOTINGS?!?!


It is the same with every issue.. conservatives have literally been trying to silence decent forever, with no break..

originally posted by: JAGStorm
a reply to: UpIsNowDown

Oh Please stop, Maybe you guys don't have guns but you are surely dealing with the same thing
This is not a gun debate post. This is more about how schools deal with a threat, any threat. Yes including
a person with a knife, a gun, any other weapon.

and yet in your OP you said

"It really got me thinking about Columbine", yet I cant think about a school shooting massacre in my response, how does that make any sense

What should I stop, is this not a response to the threat of violence for children in the US, did I make it up?

Do you think if we had guns still that these knife crimes would still be taking place? or would we have a higher rate of gun crime in schools ala the US

I used to teach automation software to librarians in high schools across the USA and Canada

I went to a Texas district on one occasion. When I checked in with the school office, they asked if I could pass a USA background check. Told them "yes, I can. I have a valid gun license in UK and in Canada"

They gave me a gun and some ammo and had me go to a range in the basement to show I knew how to use it. After this, they told me to carry it on me at all times while in the school, and to return it to the office when I left. This would have been late 90's.

The idea that the best defense against guns being "more guns" is insane, and an idea that only takes shape in the USA, no other country thinks like this. Every other country thinks the best defense against guns is to regulate them.

This idea that criminals can still get guns if they're regulated is a weak one. If guns aren't for sale except through gun stores and private sellers are also held accountable for who they sell to, gun crime drops drastically and we don't have to worry about things like school shooters at all.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Oh Please stop, Maybe you guys don't have guns but you are surely dealing with the same thing

Um, no..not really. I feel for you guys.

originally posted by: babybunnies
I used to teach automation software to librarians in high schools across the USA and Canada

I went to a Texas district on one occasion. When I checked in with the school office, they asked if I could pass a USA background check. Told them "yes, I can. I have a valid gun license in UK and in Canada"

They gave me a gun and some ammo and had me go to a range in the basement to show I knew how to use it. After this, they told me to carry it on me at all times while in the school, and to return it to the office when I left. This would have been late 90's.

The idea that the best defense against guns being "more guns" is insane, and an idea that only takes shape in the USA, no other country thinks like this. Every other country thinks the best defense against guns is to regulate them.

This idea that criminals can still get guns if they're regulated is a weak one. If guns aren't for sale except through gun stores and private sellers are also held accountable for who they sell to, gun crime drops drastically and we don't have to worry about things like school shooters at all.

I agree with most of what you say here. But...

I can’t imagine living in a world where the Government has the majority of the guns and populace largely doesn’t. That’s honestly frightening to me - particularly when I look at today’s US political landscape. Not to mention as it pertains to national security it’s highly unlikely another country attempts to invade the US - too many guns that basically turn the majority of the population into a defense force in that scenario (I’m saying this in the vacuum of the gun discussion - there’s obviously other reasons the scenario of US mainland invasion is a low probability event).

So, and I mean this with sincere empathy for families impacted in shooter situations - it’s a price we live with potentially paying as a trade off for the points mentioned above (and more) which I’m at this point I’m willing to accept. I don’t want to accept it per se, I kind of have to.

To the OPs point - yes, schools are very locked down and i personally would argue that locking down the school in an active shooter scenario is the best way to handle the situation to reduce the chances of the situation escalating and thus enduring more casualties.