Dive Brief:
- Nearly 1 in 4 teachers (23%) said they experienced a gun-related lockdown at school in 2022-23, according to a Pew Research Center survey released Thursday, with 15% reporting a lockdown happened once and 8% saying they went through more than one lockdown.
- Overall, 60% of teachers said their school did an “excellent or very” or “good” job at preparing for a potential active shooter, Pew found. However, 39% said their schools did a “fair or poor” job at providing teachers with training and resources to deal with such a situation.
- A majority of teachers are at least somewhat worried that a school shooting could occur, Pew said. When it comes to preventing school shootings, 69% of surveyed educators said improving mental health screening and care for children and adults would be “extremely or very effective.”
Dive Insight:
The psychological toll of school shootings continues to loom over classrooms, as illuminated by the Pew survey of over 2,500 public K-12 teachers conducted between October and November.
The findings come as school shootings reached a record high in 2023.
On top of that, threats against schools increased 60% between 2021 and 2022, according to the FBI. These threats are often made anonymously, and most were posted on social media, according to a recent report by RAND Corp.
Due to a lack of national or state-level protocols for responding to threats made on social media, handling these concerns is even more difficult for schools, RAND said. This, the report suggests, makes it increasingly crucial that schools establish a multidisciplinary process that taps into school staff, law enforcement and psychologists when investigating social media-based threats.
On the prevention front, the White House announced Thursday a final rule from the Department of Justice that expands firearm background checks under the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act of 2022. The White House stated that the rule will help close loopholes in the U.S. background check system that have previously allowed school shooters and other assailants to illegally acquire firearms.
The $13 billion Bipartisan Safer Communities Act was passed just one month after 19 students and two teachers were massacred at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, on May 24, 2022. The law is focused on bolstering school safety and student mental health services.
Regarding other prevention strategies, 49% of teachers surveyed by Pew said having police officers or armed security in schools would be an “extremely or very” effective way to avert school shootings. Additionally, 33% said the same for metal detectors in schools, while 13% said allowing teachers and administrators to carry guns in schools would be an “extremely or very” effective prevention approach.
