School "lockdowns" during emergencies?

[the possum]

The other night my wife came home and told me a bit about her day at work. She started at a daycare not too long ago, which is attached to a small private grade school, so there are children 15 months old through 8th graders present. The two buildings are only about 10 yards apart connected by a breeseway.

She was actually telling me about something their cranky co worker said, and mentioned it happened during "lockdown". I stopped her to ask what she was talking about, and was told they regularly hold "lockdown drills" where everyone must stay in their rooms with the doors closed for a given length of time, as a preparation for all kinds of emergency situations.

I suppose this is the latest tactic and best solution somebody came up with in response to school shooting incidents or something. We sure didn't have these drills when I went to that school. This was also mentioned in a news article about the recent shooting in Wisconsin where a 15 year old shot the principal. The school officials were so proud that immediately after their principal was murdered, the school was locked down. Link

Could somebody please explain this logic to me? There must be something obvious and simple I'm totally missing here.

Why in the hell would you want to stay locked in your rooms if there's a psycho with a gun on the other side of the door? You're only making his job easier! What, he can't shoot off the lock, or just rap a bunch of rounds through the door hitting people inside without ever entering? And no matter how much screaming the kids can hear in the room next to them, they gotta stay put in their own room until it's their turn.

My first thought was to clear the halls & lock those doors, and then make everybody climb out the windows & run. The natural response of running for yer life when shots are fired makes more sense to me! Really, about the only emergency I can think of where it would be better to stay inside would be a tornado.

School shootings are almost becoming clichéd. What if someone thinks outside the box & takes advantage of the fact they know everybody will stay locked in their rooms for a given length of time? Don't they realize that a "lockdown" means the bad guys will be able to roam the empty halls with plenty of time to set up something *really nasty*? Hell, it wouldn't take much. Bring in a couple 100# bottles of LP gas, crack the valves so the entire hallway fills with gas and strike a match. No one will even know what he's doing out there until it's too late, when in reality the students would have had plenty of time to escape.

Didn't we learn from the 911 attacks that sometimes it's best to ignore the rules? Remember how many people were told to stay put and then died in the towers?

Tell me what's going on here.

Thanks.
-the possum

[HangFire83]

I think the whole philosophy behind the lockdown is to give the calvary a little more time to get there before the bg can start shooting. If the classrooms evacuate and fill the halls then it would be like shooting fish in a barrel (pardon the gruesome analogy) in that it would be hard to miss. I noticed you mentioned a window escape possibility. Well lets say, for the sake of argument, that there are multiple bg's and one (or more) happen to be outside. If the students stay in the classroom, it may (and I stress MAY) give them one more obstacle b/w them and the bg, while allowing valuable ticks on the clock for LE to respond. Thats my take on it anyways.

[RevoRick]

As a teacher in a middle school I can say that Hangfire is on the right track. While "locked down" the teacher has been taught strategies for informing school officials and police, ie. cells phones, computer email (pre programed) and school phones. The lock down is the more safe way to keep kids unharmed.

[Bill T]

This concept has been under fire reciently since the Amish school shooting. Even Geraldo Rivera spoke out against it on the "O'Reilly Factor". These guys walk in full well knowing what they are going to do. Being complacent just plays into their hands and makes it easier for them to achieve their goal, (a big body count). This is the same deal they argued about with rape attacks some time ago. Is it better for the woman victim to submit, and be raped, (which is what happens regardless), or put up a fight kicking, scratching, and clawing at her attacker trying to get free, or else raise enough hell to draw an outsiders attention. This is no different. I think "lockdowns" are stupid, and in the long run going to get more kids killed. It falls into this less violent "PC solutions" liberals come up with. Most school teachers fall into the liberal catagory. If I had a son or daughter who fell victim because they could not get out because of a "lockdown", there would be a lawsuit for sure. I'm sure other parents feel the same, and it's only a matter of time before this happens and this stupid, foolish "strategy" comes to an end. There are a lot of ways to fight violent, crazy people. Sitting and submitting while you wait for someone else isn't one of them. There is no way one man can control a school with umpteen classrooms and 1,000 students and God knows how many able bodied faculty. Bill T.

[bclark1]

This started going on almost immediately after Columbine at some schools I'm aware of, so it's nothing new. Criticism is due for the questionable tactic of "holing up," but it's the best thing the schools can come up with given how things are currently. It would be a bad situation being in the wrong hall on the 4th floor, but if you've got a high concentration in one area as it is, you also increase the risk of fatality by flooding choke points during a mass evacuation, whether it's from giving the shooter a crowd to fire at or the result of student panic. For every Lancaster County there's got to be at least 2 Cocoanut Grove type events, just something to consider.

[the possum]

While "locked down" the teacher has been taught strategies for informing school officials and police, ie. cells phones, computer email (pre programed) and school phones.

The whole point to cell phones is that they're mobile. There aught to be more than a few cell phones present in most schools, with teachers or kids these days. I don't know how it is in other schools, but there were never any (regular) phones in the classrooms at this grade school or our high school. The idea of sending an emergency distress call via email sounds rediculous to me, but then maybe other departments check theirs more than once a day.

I noticed you mentioned a window escape possibility. Well lets say, for the sake of argument, that there are multiple bg's and one (or more) happen to be outside. If the students stay in the classroom, it may (and I stress MAY) give them one more obstacle b/w them and the bg, while allowing valuable ticks on the clock for LE to respond. Thats my take on it anyways.

I agree that the halls should be cleared, but disagree with the rest of your post. First off, I don't recall any actual shootings going down like that. There have been cases where multiple assailants started at opposite ends of the building or whatever, but not waiting outside. And, if they did wait outside, it would probably be by a main exit. One man cannot cover every window on even this small school. Furthermore, even if they did do things that way, what would stop them from simply shooting through the glass? A mass of bodies huddled in one corner behind the teacher makes a far easier target than individual moving targets scattered across the grounds.

I think the whole philosophy behind the lockdown is to give the calvary a little more time to get there before the bg can start shooting.

In a hostage type situation, then maybe the cavalry would have a chance to arrive. And in that case, the hostages don't have a choice to leave by definition. But "school shootings" do not seem to happen that way. The shooting starts immediately, and then the cavalry is called.

ALSO, doesn't anyone remember what happened in this regard at Columbine? The first cops on the scene waited outside for some time, afraid to go in. Need I say more?

Take a look at another aspect of many school shootings. They are often carried out by the students themselves. Those same students would now have taken part in these lockdown drills, and so are well aware of them. Just seems they could use that to their advantage, hence my comments about blowing the place up earlier.

So, once again, I'm failing to see any logic to all this.

Being complacent just plays into their hands and makes it easier for them to achieve their goal, (a big body count).

I'm not trying to accuse the decision makers of being complacent, because I honestly don't know their reasoning. Sounds like I have some homework to do. But my feelings were summed up with my earlier comment above: "no matter how much screaming the kids can hear in the room next to them, they gotta stay put in their own room until it's their turn." The very thought of this makes my blood boil. My wife should not be told she has to stay and wait to see if somebody wants to shoot our two year old daughter in front of her, when there's an escape route right behind her. (yes, our daughter goes to the daycare and is in the same room my wife works in.)

[the possum]

Criticism is due for the questionable tactic of "holing up," but it's the best thing the schools can come up with given how things are currently. It would be a bad situation being in the wrong hall on the 4th floor, but if you've got a high concentration in one area as it is, you also increase the risk of fatality by flooding choke points during a mass evacuation, whether it's from giving the shooter a crowd to fire at or the result of student panic.

All three of the schools in our town are only one story, so that's what my comments above were based on. Perhaps that's a bit short sighted, but why should we adopt rules that were based on a 4 story building? Even then, don't schools with 4 floors have several fire escape routes? Even if a fire exit were blocked by the shooter, if I heard him wreaking havoc in the next room, and then start demolishing the door on my room to get in, I'd be temped to take my chances jumping out the window, depending on what's below.

I concede that's a tough call either way since fire escapes would also be a choke point, but it would take several bad guys to cover more than one. But even then, if body count is what they're after, why would they start on the top floor? Why would they bother covering escape routes at all if they know everybody will stay in the rooms? (That is, I'm saying such escape routes should be safe for those who chose to break the rules & get out.)

[bclark1]

Just to answer possum, I just invoked the hypothetical of fourth floor because it means tougher escape routes. If you're on the first floor and the door's about to get caved in, I assume you make for the windows. I was just trying to complicate it as much as possible.

[RGS]

Course...there is always home schooling.

A couple points.

First, schools are under pressure to "do something" about this sort of violence. What better way then documented and district approved "lock down drills"?
If it should happen at their school, the staff will be able do show documentation that they were compliant with district standards buy having X many drills per semester, so as to ward off law suits don't ya know.
Note they did not choose to train and arm the staff, or even some of the staff.

Second, the only thing worse then children killed or wounded at school is pictures of them in that condition on the playground on the evening news. Better the crime scene is inside away from TV helicopters and roof top cameras. Police will restrict access to the area and tactfully draped stretchers will bear out the victims. Jeraldo will have to be content to "perform" outside next to the sign in the front of the school.

Course...there is always home schooling.

[chemist308]

So, this week my 8 year old son and 7 year old daughter came home and told me they had a 'drill' where all of them huddled in the back of a classroom and the classroom door was locked. Supposedly there's a corner that can't be seen from the door...
What happened was a couple of parents found guns missing in their homes--maybe there were some vague notes too, I don't know all the details. Long story short a couple vo-tech kids skipped school to go hunting and the parents and school system freaked.
But this one hits home a bit because my initial reaction is that I'll be damned if my kids huddles in the corner of a room while some ******* goes from room to room and shoots the place up. This is bull****. It's a classic example of what happens when guns are outlawed--only the criminals can have them, while the rest of us are supposed to wait to be slaughtered...

[Joe Demko]

You gentlemen can do all the ranting and fulminating you like, but the lockdown remains the most practical solution to a problem that is very, very seldom encountered.
We have regular fire drills where I teach, it takes a non-trivial amount of time to get the kids out of the building and that's when they aren't panicked and taking incoming fire. Hallways and stairwells are chokepoints where even a blind badguy could rack up a huge body count just by spraying. More kids will be killed and injured when the inevitable panic causes them to trample each other.
Districts aren't going to arm teachers. Forget it and quit saying that's how it should be. Armed guards/police stationed in the building full time cost a lot of money, whether that happens is going to be a factor of the taxpayers in your district. In the meantime, school shootings typically involve one or two shooters who can attack only one point at a time. Taking cover behind a locked and barricaded door, out of direct lines of fire is an emminently sane and practical response in such a situation when the alternatives amount to little more than providing a target-rich environment in the halls.
You may now return to your impotent ranting.

[the possum]

Joe, did you accidentally reply to the wrong thread or something?

Hallways and stairwells are chokepoints where even a blind badguy could rack up a huge body count just by spraying. More kids will be killed and injured when the inevitable panic causes them to trample each other.... Taking cover behind a locked and barricaded door, out of direct lines of fire is an emminently sane and practical response in such a situation when the alternatives amount to little more than providing a target-rich environment in the halls.

Nobody here is advocating lining up the kids and marching them down the halls so they can be mown down. On the contrary, we have all agreed the hallways should be kept clear, and doors locked to buy a little more time.

There were 8 (yes, eight) kids in my graduating class from this grade school. The room had like 5 or 6 windows. No one would be trampled to death climbing out the windows & running to safety. This alternative sounds imminently better to me than either of the two alternatives you've mentioned. I agree it may not work in every school depending on the architecture.

You gentlemen can do all the ranting and fulminating you like...
Districts aren't going to arm teachers. Forget it and quit saying that's how it should be. Armed guards/police stationed in the building full time cost a lot of money, whether that happens is going to be a factor of the taxpayers in your district.
You may now return to your impotent ranting.

Who's doing the ranting here? The subject of arming teachers was not brought up one single time in this thread. No one has said "that's how it should be." The story I link happened to be on this subject, but I only linked it for the quote about the lockdown, as I said.

[RevoRick]

As I posted before the lock down is the only way, in my opinion, to deal with the majority of school shooting situations. Joe (above) and I as teachers have been in these drills and have thoughtfully planned how to keep kids safe in OUR rooms. Each teacher mentally goes through what would be the best response for that individual room. This coming Friday we are having a lock down drill with police acting as shooters. The responders and BG/BG's will both have live pracitce ammo and will be using it to get the real sound feel of guns going off in the building. It will all be taped for training new teachers and teachers of other buildings. Discussions will follow with police to answer any questions school personel will have. The police liason officer in our school will admit that an armed well trained teacher or more could help by taking out the shooter the minute he is seen it the building shooting. But he and most of know this will never happen in this country. If I could I would train and volunteer to carry in school, but again, I know this will never happen. School shootings have been studied over and over to find out what would be the best plan of action in each case. This is where the lock-down concept came from.
Again, our school district is attempting to be on the cutting edge of protecting students from external and internal shooters and they believe this is the best policy and so do I.

[pax]

There's nothing fundamentally wrong with holing up in a safe room, and keeping the known good guys together.

The only thing reallly wrong is that the people holed up have no functionally useful way to defend themselves or their charges if the cavalry doesn't come riding in before the BG does.

Sure, they can (and should) plan to tackle the BG if he enters, and the kids can be taught to distract him by throwing textbooks and staplers at him ... but it's just a fundamentally poor plan to bring a textbook to a gunfight.

pax

[the possum]

I would be interested in hearing the report of your up coming drill, RevoRick.
Out of curiosity, what would you plan to do in your room if the shooters are in rooms nearby, and start trying to access yours?

[gunslinger555]

My school does lock down drills, the last one I asked the teacher what was the point the gunman can just shoot the door open. Then she pointed to a fake tree next to the door and informed me that the bottom was concrete and it would be the best weapon for me to use that is available (of course I would have to hide next to the door). Oh and in this class room their was no windows. But if it was in my Welding class I would just use my slag hammer (which I keep very sharp) its just like this one http://www.weldingmart.com/Qstore/p000298.htm

[cgraham]

In a mass shooting scenario, what makes anyone think that the shooters are going to wait for the cavalry to show up, get organized and make (cautious?) entry, before opening fire. More likely, the first thing anyone knows is that shooting has broken out.

The schools should take into account the amount of time it tales for LEOs to reach and enter the school after the first shot. Instead of hiding under desks, school officials should be assesing where the threat is, and setting up a pre-planned communication net (cell phones) ASAP. Then they can cordinate evacuation by the safest route where possible, and stay in contact with police to keep tem informed and avoid blocking their entry.

In other words, an assult emergency preparedness plan should be preconceived, coordinated with police and other authorities, and above all, be fluid, because the circumstances will be totally unpredictable.

There have been a number of school shootings where a a small number of specific individuals were targeted, and then it was over. It may not be necessary to pull out all the stops if an attack can be determined to be of this limited type - lockdown probably is the least chaotic response.

Relying on what they can hear, and learn from available communications, teachers ought to be allowed to decide whether evacuation or lockdown is the best defence. Being wrong does not guarantee the worst possible outcome.

I'd say, if the next classroom is being shot up, then providing the hall is clear of gunmen, have the kids run like hell out of there. Even if there is a gunman in the hall, the survival rate of running targets is likely to be better than waiting for the executioner, as long as they don't bolt in a solid mass, but instead present scattered targets.

It's a hard thing to say that some kids may be killed while running for it, but its about minimizing the total death count, in a situation where the victims are probably totally random anyway.

Anyway, that's how I see it.

C

[RevoRick]

Possum, Luckily I teach science and have a room with no window. I have a back door that leads to an internal science work area with fireproof solid core doors. I have a key that I could herd the kids into this area and lock doors. It is kind've a maze and I would be able to move around with kids and lock doors behind me.

In addition we have a full time armed police liason officer that is split between 2 middle schools which share the same campus. His office is at our school so he is there most of the time.

Worst case I have a lot of concentrated sulferic and hydrochloric acid. I could fill flasks, stopper them and throw them at the headers above doorways where it would splash down on the shooters. Or even thrown on the floor would release semi-toxic vapors that would burn the eyes and mucus membranes of the attacker/s. I think any shooter would turn and go the other way. Toss a handful of potassium chlorate and a handful of sugar into the pool and there is no way they will come through. In addition all the sprinklers would go off the the fire department would soon arrive.

ps- I will let you know how the drill goes. I will not be there however as I will be chaperoning 150 8th graders on a three day trip in Washington DC.

[klambpix]

yes, since the sheeple aren't allowed to defend themselves, the lock-down is the politically correct action to take, Utah, seems to think otherwise though! Wonder why there's not been any school shootings there?
Teachers in Utah are jumping on the armed band wagon now, seems some of them think it just might be a good idea to have a concealed weapon available to them while they're working.
Anyone ever wonder why schools have been the targets lately, because everyone knows that they're GUN FREE ZONES...so there will be little or NO resistance!!! and we all know that GUN FREE ZONES keep the criminals at bay...DC's a prime example of how well that works.
It really is high time that this country wake up and realize that it's not the guns that are bad!!!
Want to know how a teacher could safely keep a handgun in a classroom? Retrofit a $350 biometric/fingerprint wallsafe into the wall, there are always posters, corkboards, etc. to cover it with, keep the mag/ammo elsewhere if you want an extra measure of security.
Yes, I'm a newbie, but I felt I had to give my .02, my wife's a teacher and personally, I think they should be given the option of being armed if they want to get some training...THEY ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR OUR CHILDREN!

[CALNRA]

Here is the deal:

require all public school teachers to carry a pistol that's at least 9mm with two spare magazines.

Then wait and see how mayny school shootings happen after the law is in place.

The low-lives that pick on unarmed kids might have to learn to play fair...

[44 AMP]

Long, long ago, in a place far, far away
We had school drills for nuclear attack. Everybody lined up kneeling along hallway walls, with one hand over your eyes, and the other over the back of your neck. I'm sure it made sense to someone,...like
Lockdown (cover/cower in place)

on the plus side;

keeps students together and accounded for

Keeps them out of the way when cops/swat finally does get there

Lights out, locked door, kids out of sight being quiet, may fool perp into thinking nobody in room.

On the minus side;
If perp not fooled, kids on a platter.

Feels like kids being told to stick their heads in the sand. Not emotionally satisfying.

Can't say for sure what the answer is, except maybe don't constantly wave it in people's faces over and over.

It seems part of the human condition that particular individuals perform homicidal acts for their own pleasure. Violence, even lethal, at schools is nothing new. Just overwhelming constant media coverage is. School shootings seem to be more common than in previous generations, but previous generations didn't have "gun free zones" and an "all we can do is hide" mentality.

Even with school shootings seeming to be happening all the time, they are sitll actually a statistical rarity. Think of how many schools there are. Hundreds of thousands? I believe that downplaying the seemingly endless rehashing of such incidents in the popular media would reduce the number of "copycat" incidents. So would allowing faculty to be armed if they chose. Not required. A matter or individual choice, just not automatically prohibited.

Back in the days when schools had rifle teams a school shooting meant a target match.

[Billy Sparks]

Does anyone remember the school shooting in Jonesboro Ark.? There the shooters, two kids, one pulled the fire alarm and the other one shot the kids as they exited the building. Also comparing the shooting in the basically one room school in Penn. to a shooting in a multi room, multi floor, spread out structure is really comparing apples to pineapples.

[Bill T]

"Here is the deal: Require all public school teachers to carry a pistol that's at least 9mm with two spare magazines. Then wait and see how mayny school shootings happen after the law is in place."

The best solution yet, and the ONLY one that will work. I'm sure theres room in the budget for Some Glocks and ammo. Bill T.

[Double Naught Spy]

Didelphis, so you think by locking down and being safe inside rooms that there is more danger than by tossing kids out the windows? What do you do for all the kids on the 2nd and 3rd floors?

You seem worried that a lock down gives the bad guys time to roam the halls and do something really nasty. You seem to have forgotten that tossing the kids out the windows exposes them to other threats. Maybe you have failed to consider that putting the kids outside may be just what the bad guys want. See http://www.cnn.com/US/9803/24/school.shooting/

[Crosshair]

At my college all the rooms have glass windows next to the door, so a lockdown is pointless. They will get into the rooms and class schedules are public information, they will know what rooms have people in them. Even the teacher knew this was dumb. I even said in class. "To hell with that, I'm putting my laptop (An 8 pound klunker) through the outside window (A 4 by 8 foot window no less) and hauling ass out of here. Everyone, including the teacher agreed with me on that one. There is a heck of alot more cover in the parking lot 40 feet away than there is in the classroom.

There needs to be more planing than just. "Lock up". There needs to be a dynamic plan. Things such as zig-zag when running, proper use of cover, and cover vs consealment need to be taught.