School Shootings and Security Lock-downs: Myths, Positive School Climates, and Safer Campuses

Abstract

School shooting tragedies and the juvenile justice system’s movement toward a retributive and punitive framework gravely impacted how primary and secondary school students, disproportionately urban districts, used security measures to lock down campuses and build “fortress-like” schools. This iteration of control on school campuses emerged in tandem with the most recent generation’s zero tolerance approach to student violence and problems; a policy widely regarded as ineffective in urban, suburban, and rural districts. As school shootings continue to impact state legislative action and public reactions to school management, this paper takes a critical approach to school security policies and reviews the evidence on the risk for school violence and how to move away from student control approaches that do not improve school safety. Instead, the incorporation of prosocial education and school engagement efforts finds that school and student safety is improved. These, and related approaches to student body management, decreases campus violence and may also minimize the risk of some school shootings - as rare as these tragic incidents are across the nation’s schools. The interplay of schools, students, and the juvenile and family courts is ongoing. Knowing how school districts can best approach their campus environments, safety, and learning is important for school social workers and court personnel because of how often these systems work, or do not work, together.