For years, in the back of my mind, I have relived the Columbine High School massacre every day I send my daughter to school.
Isabella was in the first grade at a Denver charter school when Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold unleashed their arsenal inside Columbine, murdering 12 fellow students and a teacher. Days after the slaughter, she told us one night at dinner that she, her classmates and her teacher had practiced hiding from school invaders during a drill. Pushing her food around her plate like she always did, she told us how all of the kids had to sit very close to each other against a wall so if an intruder were to look in the window of the door, the children couldn’t be seen. The lights had to be off. The kids had to sit perfectly still, perfectly quiet, so to thwart an assassin loose in the school.
When I was her age, we were taught to hide under our desks to protect ourselves against a Soviet nuke. That horrible spring in 1999, we were teaching our children to protect themselves from each other. School became a liability, instead of a refuge.
Since then, principals and teachers have been piling layer upon layer of ways to keep bad guys out, sensing that they seem to keep wanting in. Despite best made plans, the shocking murder of 20 children and six staffers at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December made it obvious that children in our schools are still defenseless.
So now, schools here in Aurora and all over the country are back in Columbine-Sandy Hook mode, checking cameras, door locks and talking about arming teachers or posting guards in the halls.
It’s a very unfunny joke. Armed teachers and lunch-ladies? Librarians screaming for the kids to hit the floor so she can fire over their heads at marauders? A cop in a school the size of a football field trying to race through 4,000 kids to get to the other side and start peeling off rounds in a science lab full of students?
That’s as crazy as the monsters setting out to kill kids in schools. The problem is, some gun proponents not only think this is a rational, realistic idea, they think it kind of sounds like fun.
Get real, folks. There aren’t enough doorbells, spy-cams, intercoms and rent-a-cops in the world to stop another Klebold, James Holmes or Adam Lanza. Even school officials here admit that the best they can do is to try and mitigate a disaster rather than prevent one. But short of airport-like security at the nation’s 99,000 public schools, there’s really not much we can do. If you’re drawing any comfort from your school principal telling you they’re keeping a closer eye on who comes in the front door, you’re deluding yourself.
There’s nothing that we can realistically do from inside the school to guarantee against another Columbine or Sandy Hook. We’re simply out-gunned. It’s all school officials can do to focus on learning. Arsenals and DEFCON defense strategies are too much.
The changes have to focus on everything outside the schools. Rather than shrug our shoulders and lament that it’s going to be really hard to keep super-lethal guns out of the hands of murderers, we have to work harder to find a way to do it. We have to find a way to err on the side of public safety when someone’s behavior sets off alarms. More times than not, these murderers were razor-close to being snagged by cops or mental health officials for tell-tale mental problems. People don’t come forward and say, “I’m surprised.” They seem to say, “I saw it coming.” But they didn’t do enough about it.
Don’t be lulled into thinking that doubling up on bad-guy drills at your school is making your kids or anyone else’s secure from the next attack. And don’t let anyone tell you that changing gun laws, enforcing gun laws, holding people accountable for ignoring warning signs is just too difficult and unsavory to pursue. That’s cowardly.
There’s no escaping for any of us. Although Isabella has only a few months left of high school, there’s college after that. There are my friends who are teachers. And my friends with babies on the way. Surely the country’s 50 million students and their families deserve more than what we’re offering right now.
Reach editor Dave Perry at 303-750-7555 or dperry@aurorasentinel.com
What a pipe dream you present Dave. Fun? Shame on you, they are only looking to protect these children. They are taking it far more seriously than the ever emotional gun control individuals.
These monsters will exist no matter what the security, the gun bans, the totalitarian state you are so intent on implementing here in the US. 400 teachers have taken the concealed carry class recently here in Colorado. Give them the opportunity to defend themselves. No one is saying arming teachers is mandatory, but why should teachers give up the God given constitutional rights. Gun free zones don’t work. How hard is it for you to understand that. If you like them so much, please move to Chicago.
Yes we need to look at the mental health of folks, but who gets to decide who’s crazy? The government? Under what guidelines. That is a power that is easy to abuse. Lets make sure there are checks and balances in that system.
For once, I agree with you, Dave, about looking into the mental health of our community. It is not the gun but rather the USER that should be the point of interest. These unstable people don’t just “appear”. For the most part they have behavior changes which their friends and family should be monitoring. The practicality of keeping our children safe should be the same issue as safety for any of our citizens. Does anyone keep statistics on the number of mentally challenged individuals who are responsible for these deadly acts? Outlawing gun ownership will never keep the bad guys from having guns!
Would suggest all gun-control types review complete text of Capt . Mark Kelly (Astronaut) when he listined thousands of peropd in Arizona with mental prob lems were never reported to State or Federal Databases. Required by law, but like our Federal Justice Department, choose to ignore the law. Of what value is a database or records check (at high cost to gun buyers) if doctors, hospitals, law officers do not report the bad guys-girls (male-females-and those who don’t know which they are).
And in 1940s we practiced hall sitting in case of thunder storms with high lightening hazaards. Same during WWII and some even built bomb shelters in backyards. Even had an Aunt who loved to tell ghostt stories to us, and we had nightmares. Just think of all the scary movies through the years. Born in 1929, we have always had something to fear. This Administration fills that need completely.
MR PERRY:I have just finished your comments in your article ” Don’t be lulled into thinking “etc..I totally agree ,NO amount of laws or regulation, lock , cameras are going to do any better, they work fine after the crime is committed, to help catch the criminal after the fact. I am over 50yrs young, my yrs are kinda in a way numbered left on this rock we call home. My kids are grown ,they enjoyed their childhood .But them were the days of the 50, 60, 70’s. Today we have gangs for what ever reason, they think it’s their turf but it belongs to all of us. But as I was saying’ parents can go by their kids school’s, sit in the cars, watch people for about a hour or two a day’. No body would hardly pay any attention to them . Then they are not disrupting class, school can go on being school. But watched from out side. See someone they think shouldn’t be there confront them ask questions if the parent has a concealed weapon permit All the better , call 911 w/paramedics or notify someone. Your child wouldn’t even know you were watching. But if I have to go to Psion, so my grandkids can have a great childhood like us adults did, then,. At least I know some Klebold, Holmes, or Lanza didn’t get near my grandkids or anybody else. Thanks for your time . Nightmoves
“There’s nothing that we can realistically do from inside the school to guarantee against another Columbine or Sandy Hook. We’re simply out-gunned.”
Without having teachers or administrators volunteer to carry guns in schools, then you gaurantee, “We’re simply out-gunned”.