School Safety: In Active Shooter Situations, What Do We As Educators Have The Most Control Over?

Posted on by drentsminger

I’m sure you’ve seen/heard the vociferous debate raging throughout the nation regarding school safety. One side seems to embrace a focus on enhanced gun control and regulations while the other seems to emphasize a focus on better mental health care. The debate is quite controversial, contentious, in depth, and currently divided.

Over the weekend, I was dialoguing with a friend concerning the horrific events in Florida. While listening, I couldn’t help but think, “Sure, this side/that side makes sense. Both sides have valid opinions. Yet, how quickly can any of these types of changes truly be actualized?” During the conversation, I found myself focusing on a bigger, (and in my opinion) more important question… In active shooter situations, what do we as educators have the most control over?

The field of education has been notoriously slow in accepting and implementing new change initiatives (example – the U.S. Department of Labor has decried the current and future shortage of trained STEM workers entering the field. Yet, the field of education hasn’t been successful in addressing this issue because of rampant budget cuts and an accountability movement that forces narrowing of the curriculum). I’m not saying we can’t be the change agents this country needs. Students are gathering and organizing all over the country. But, I just read today that, much to their dismay, students in the Florida capital witnessed legislators vote down gun control legislation while simultaneously choosing to highlight the negative health effects of pornography. These kinds of legislative changes, whether they focus on gun control or mental health support, require extensive amounts of time and excessive levels of consensus and support that may take too long. Because this is an emergency and lives are literally at risk, I think we must focus on what we can do NOW as schools/principals/teachers/students/community members/etc.

Thus, through my research, I’ve found the ALICE Training Institute, which focuses on “options-based” responses for individuals facing violent situations like an active shooter crisis in a school. Traditionally, local law enforcement agencies have advised that schools utilize “lockdown” procedures that instruct teachers and students to do a number of things in an active shooter “lockdown,” such as move to the corner of the classroom, lock the door, huddle in a classroom closet or bathroom, stay away from the windows, STAY PUT, etc. In contrast, the ALICE Institute focuses on empowering individuals to participate in their own survival in the critical time between the start of a violent event and the arrival of law enforcement. I found that many districts are moving in this direction. I know of school districts in Illinois, Wisconsin, and Michigan making these kinds of changes to their school safety policies. In fact, according to ALICE, if a school district still employs a “Lockdown” response to active shooter situations, the district is at odds with the U.S. Department of Education.

Again, I’m not advocating one side over the other (gun control vs. mental health). I’m saying that we in the field of education should focus on the things over which we have the most control. I want to focus on all that we can do NOW, as opposed to waiting for legislators to make a decision. We should look at adjusting current school safety policies in order to maximize safety and survival for all. Based on my current understanding (which is admittedly limited), an options-based approach that empowers individuals to participate in their own survival sounds more logical and potentially beneficial (in addition to being more in line with what the U.S. Department of Education wants) as opposed to a “lockdown” approach.

What do you think? Share your thoughts with me!

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Considering School Improvement in Underserved/Disadvantaged Areas

Posted on by drentsminger

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. Actually, this has probably been a thought of mine (at times, it may have lingered in the back of my head as opposed to taking center stage), since I first started my career in education. I work (and have worked since the start of my career) in a severely disadvantaged school district. Over 80% of our students come from low-income homes. We have a 40% student mobility rate. It doesn’t help that our standardized test scores according to PARCC are not very good (which, in my opinion, is highly indicative of socioeconomic status. You can take a map of the south suburbs of Illinois, throw a dart at it, and you will more than likely hit an area that’s underperforming while serving a severely disadvantaged population). What’s even more unfortunate, there is an undeserved negative connotation associated with my district and a plethora of unfavorable perceptions regarding my current school district (and a lot of districts that serve similar populations).

This unfortunate scenario is reinforced by social scripts, which are “a series of behaviors, actions, and consequences that are expected in a particular situation or environment”(https://www.alleydog.com/glossary/definition.php?term=Social%20Scrip). In my district’s case, the social script is defined by environmental factors such as poverty, dysfunctional student home lives, high percentages of EL students, high percentages of students with special needs, etc. Districts like mine (there are many) are often expected to fail (sometimes, this expectation is even held by those whom the district employs) because of the out-of-school factors impacting our students and their learning (among other things). But, I’m trying to find a way to flip that script. We focus a lot on what we CANNOT control in education. Let’s start focusing on what we CAN control.

Elena Aguilar (2013), author of The Art of Coaching: Effective Strategies for School Transformation, describes the Coach’s Optical Refractor as an essential tool which encourages coaches to view issues/problems/situations from six different lenses. If you’d like to learn more about the Refractor, I highly recommend her book. I want to focus on the first lens, Inquiry, and how it relates to my thoughts regarding school improvement in disadvantaged areas. She states, “The way we define the problem dictates how we define the solution” (p. 50). Defining/describing improvement efforts concerning our disadvantaged schools are almost always plagued with assertions and descriptions regarding the effects of pervasive poverty, the dysfunctional family home lives of our students, the lack of resources to properly help our students learn and live productive lives, etc. I understand that those issues impact our reality. There’s no way around that. We can’t deny this reality, and we must be cognizant of how it shapes our own perceptions, beliefs, and actions.

However, I can’t help but wonder if we’re focusing on those aspects of the problem so much so that the solution (if there is one) is often (only) defined in these ways as well. I’ve heard the, “If only we had more resources,” “If only our students’ parents cared more,” “If only we had more parental involvement,” “If only the neighborhoods where are students come from were safer,” “If only our kids came to school on grade level (a good portion of our students do not come to school on grade level),” etc.

In my opinion, we may need to reframe the problem so that it doesn’t focus so much on issues outside of our control. By reframing the problem, we may also need to adjust our professional practice mirrors onto ourselves to determine what exactly we CAN do in order to positively enact change and improve learning and/or achievement for our students. Can we safely reframe the problem so that we take into consideration all the contributing factors to a student’s success, but also focus mainly on what we, as educators, can do to help ensure learning? I think so. I think it will require honest, courageous, uncomfortable conversations. But, I think it’s possible (and worth it). I also think that this type of change won’t occur until we get honest with ourselves and begin focusing on what we CAN change, as opposed to focusing on those issues over which we have no control.

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