WEBVTT - BrainStuff Classics: Why Are Mass Shootings Happening in U.S. Schools?

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeart Radio. Hey,

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<v Speaker 1>brain Stuff, Lauren Vogelbaum here with a classic episode from

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<v Speaker 1>the podcast archives. This is one that we originally ran

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<v Speaker 1>in March in the way of the shooting at Marjorie

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<v Speaker 1>Stoneman Douglas High School. It's about the prevalence of mass

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<v Speaker 1>shootings in schools and what some solutions might be. It's

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<v Speaker 1>still relevant today, so I wanted to air it again. Hi,

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<v Speaker 1>brain Stuff, Lauren Vogelbaum Here, I've got a serious one

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<v Speaker 1>for you today. We're talking about mass shootings in the

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<v Speaker 1>United States and why they seem to be happening so

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<v Speaker 1>frequently at schools. We're not getting graphic, but listener discretion

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<v Speaker 1>is advised. On Valentine's Day this year, seventeen people, including

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<v Speaker 1>students and teachers, were killed by a nineteen year old

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<v Speaker 1>former student at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

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<v Speaker 1>This was the tenth mass school shooting in the United

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<v Speaker 1>States in the past five years. A mass shooting is

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<v Speaker 1>generally defined as one where at least four people are

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<v Speaker 1>killed in single incident, and once again Americans are left

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<v Speaker 1>asking ourselves why lost in the noisy debate over gun

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<v Speaker 1>control and mental health screening is another confounding question, why schools.

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<v Speaker 1>Why does so many troubled young men choose schools as

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<v Speaker 1>the place to act out their violent and vengeful fantasies,

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<v Speaker 1>And what, if anything, could schools do to avoid becoming

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<v Speaker 1>the next Columbine Sandy Hook or Stoneman Douglas. We spoke

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<v Speaker 1>with Brian Warnick, a professor of educational ethics and policy

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<v Speaker 1>at the Ohio State University who co authored a paper

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<v Speaker 1>on the meaning and motivations behind targeted school shootings. Even

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<v Speaker 1>though many associate gun violence in America with poor inner

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<v Speaker 1>city communities, mass school shootings almost always occur in upper

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<v Speaker 1>middle class, suburban schools. That's where the status tournament takes place,

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<v Speaker 1>explains Warnick. He said, suburban schools do a lot of

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<v Speaker 1>things to select winners and losers in ways that go

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<v Speaker 1>beyond academics. Think the adelation of athletics and the crowning

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<v Speaker 1>of homecoming kings and queens. He continued, the way we

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<v Speaker 1>see it, when schools set themselves up as judges in

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<v Speaker 1>the social status tournament, the resentment will sometimes be directed

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<v Speaker 1>against the school itself. He notes that in the book

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<v Speaker 1>Hollywood goes to the movies. Sociologist and author Robert Bulman

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<v Speaker 1>says that while Hollywood films set in urban schools focus

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<v Speaker 1>on heroic teachers and academic achievement, films set in suburban

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<v Speaker 1>settings focus on student journeys of self discovery in the

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<v Speaker 1>same vein many suburban school shooters see what they are

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<v Speaker 1>doing is acts of self expression. Warnick said. There's a

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<v Speaker 1>different value system at play in suburban schools. It's called

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<v Speaker 1>expressive individualism. What we see in movies and TV is

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<v Speaker 1>students engaged in this process of self discovery, breaking through

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<v Speaker 1>norms of the school, breaking through social cliques. Self discovery

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<v Speaker 1>and individual expression aren't necessarily bad things, says Warnic, But

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<v Speaker 1>for certain troubled young men who harbor deep resentment of

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<v Speaker 1>the system that rejected them, there's no better way to

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<v Speaker 1>express their true, tortured selves than through a dramatic act

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<v Speaker 1>of violence. And the higher the body count, the more

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<v Speaker 1>powerful the message be. We also spoke with Cheryl Johnson,

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<v Speaker 1>a professor of criminal justice at Cincinnati's Xavier University, where

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<v Speaker 1>she has studied whether increased security measures, namely armed guards

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<v Speaker 1>on campus, locked down buildings, and metal detectors, are an

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<v Speaker 1>effective means of preventing school shootings. She found that although

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<v Speaker 1>beefed up security made to ter overall crime and violent

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<v Speaker 1>crime in schools, there's little evidence to show that those

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<v Speaker 1>measures alone can thwart a mass shooting. First, school shootings

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<v Speaker 1>are just too statistically rare to gauge the efficacy of

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<v Speaker 1>different security methods, and second, there's anecdotal evidence that even

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<v Speaker 1>the best security methods can fail. There were armed school

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<v Speaker 1>guards a Columbine, the Sandy Hook shooters shot through glass

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<v Speaker 1>panes to bypass locked doors, and in two thousand five,

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<v Speaker 1>a student in Red Lake, Minnesota, passed through his school's

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<v Speaker 1>metal detector before killing an unarmed guard who tried to

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<v Speaker 1>stop him, along with seven other people, including himself. There's

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<v Speaker 1>also concerned that militarizing schools with armed guards and security

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<v Speaker 1>checkpoints contributes to the idea that the school is an

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<v Speaker 1>unsafe place where violence is almost expected. Johnson's seventeen paper,

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<v Speaker 1>obviously written before the February Parkland incident, pointed out that

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<v Speaker 1>the raw number of homicides at U schools each year

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<v Speaker 1>since Columbine in nine had actually decreased or remained stable

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<v Speaker 1>over the years. One of the best ways to prevent

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<v Speaker 1>school shootings, both Johnson and Warnick agree is to encourage

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<v Speaker 1>people to speak up when they suspect that a classmate, friend,

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<v Speaker 1>or family member is contemplating something terrible. A day before

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<v Speaker 1>the Parkland shooting, a grandmother in Washington State called nine

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<v Speaker 1>one when she found her eighteen year old grandson's handwritten

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<v Speaker 1>plans for a gruesome school attack involving homemade explosives. Johnson said,

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<v Speaker 1>that's a school shooting we're not talking about today, citing

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<v Speaker 1>a report from the Secret Service and the Department of

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<v Speaker 1>Education that a percent of school shootings at least one

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<v Speaker 1>other person knew about the plans. In fifty nine percent,

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<v Speaker 1>two or more people had information about the attacks before

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<v Speaker 1>they occurred. Warnick said, usually when school shootings are prevented,

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<v Speaker 1>it's when students trust the teachers enough to share that

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<v Speaker 1>information with them. If we could really build up schools

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<v Speaker 1>as places of trust where children feel like they have

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<v Speaker 1>adults who care about them, that would facilitate the communication

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<v Speaker 1>that's been proven to prevent school shootings. Of course, speaking

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<v Speaker 1>up hasn't always been fool proof. We now know that

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<v Speaker 1>the FBI received a tip about the Parkland shooter dating

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<v Speaker 1>back to September seventeen for making disturbing comments on YouTube,

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<v Speaker 1>but he was never detained or even questioned. A second

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<v Speaker 1>person contacted the FBI on January five to report their

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<v Speaker 1>concerns and to warn them about the shooters guns and

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<v Speaker 1>desire to kill, but the FBI has admitted that the

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<v Speaker 1>proper protocols to follow up were left un followed. Instead

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<v Speaker 1>of school districts spending money on expensive and unproven security solutions,

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<v Speaker 1>Brian Warnick suggests they hire more teachers and counselors to

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<v Speaker 1>shrink class sizes and encourage more meaningful interactions between staff

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<v Speaker 1>and struggling students. He'd also like to see more creative

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<v Speaker 1>outlets like art, literature, and music classes, which often get

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<v Speaker 1>from type budgets for safe individual expression. Today's episode is

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<v Speaker 1>based on the article why do mass shootings keep Happening

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<v Speaker 1>in US Schools? On how stuff Works dot Com written

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<v Speaker 1>by Dave Rus. Brain Stuff is production of I Heart

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<v Speaker 1>Radio in partnership with how stuff works dot Com, and

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<v Speaker 1>it's produced by Tyler Klang. Four more podcasts from my

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<v Speaker 1>heart Radio visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

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