How American Schools Are Preparing Their Children To Face Mass Shooters

In the wake of the Parkland school shooting, this article looks into the psychological effects of active-shooter drills on kids. Introduced in schools in the late ‘90s, after the Columbine massacre, these active-shooter drills are supposed to teach pupils how to act in case someone barges into their school and starts shooting. In preschools, they’re called “self-control drills”, and their goal is to teach children to stay very quiet.

One problem is, however, that no one can tell exactly if these drills actually have any effect in terms of preventing harm. The Parkland high school had just gone through an exercise a month before the shooting. Moreover, some children are confused as to whether the drills are real or not. Studies show that exposing kids to such actions increases the level of risk that they perceive. “This heightening can manifest as stress and anxiety, not to mention changing the way kids understand how people treat one another—to even consider violence an option, not in some abstract way.”

Yet another of the many problems with school shootings is that they are blamed on mental illness. Trump and other politicians help spreading this lie about mass shooters suffering from a mental disease and they’re fanning the flames on the ‘mental illness leads to violence’ subject.

A man who went through active-shooter drills as a child explains the impact they had on him this way:

“I will never be able to explain it well, but losing a feeling of safety as a child, especially at school, is a major thing,” said Marino, the emergency physician who was terrified to cough. “Anyone who has not gone through school with active-shooter drills can never understand what it feels like.”