Preventing, Intervening, and Recovering from School Shootings, and other Traumatic Events
Preventing, Intervening, and Recovering from
SCHOOL SHOOTINGS
and Other Traumatic Events
SCOPE AND SEQUENCE
What Is Preventing, Intervening, and Recovering from School Shootings and Other Traumatic Events?
Based on research studies and the emerging best practices utilized at dozens of actual shooting sites across the country, this manual provides a practical guide for schools to develop a comprehensive prevention and crisis response to a school or community shooting. The blueprint contained within this manual will be invaluable when responding to a traumatic event of any magnitude. School Shootings comprises two key components:
• Detailed options: Many schools already have prevention and/or crisis response plans, but this manual helps schools review their current plans against potential alternatives and additional detailed options. The goal is not to re-create a plan from scratch, but to improve on that plan based on the experience of schools that have been through an actual school shooting.
• Practical tools: Included on this manual’s flash drive are specific electronic forms for every aspect of a school’s prevention and/or crisis response plan. The forms include planning guides, immediate response reminders, information for family members, and long-term planning goals, as well as strategies on how to create task forces.
Why Is It Important to Address School Shootings and Other Traumatic Events?
While the number of deaths by school-associated homicides varies from year to year, the number of multiple-victim school-associated incident rates increased significantly from July 2009 to June 2018.1 The time between those shooting incidents has diminished, with tragedies happening more frequently, as the average number of days between shootings has dropped over time.
Additionally, many individuals, when talking about school shootings and victims of school shootings, only think of those assaulted during school hours, in school facilities. Often victims are injured or killed on the way to or from a school building or at a school sponsored function. The other distinction in tracking school shootings is mass shootings versus single-victim shootings. Between 1994 and 2016, 90 percent of school shootings involved a single victim. Mass school shootings of four or more victims accounted for 18.6 percent of homicide victims during the same time period.3
Schools are still a relatively safe environment for our children, but none of these statistics convey the long-term impact on lives and even deaths by suicide or other means that happen as an after effect of these few school shootings. To understand the true tragedy of a school shooting, that research has yet to be done. And while it is easy to recite seemingly small numbers of school-related deaths, every loss is an inestimable tragedy to a victim’s family, friends, and community.
What Are the Goals of School Shootings?
The goals of this manual are to
• help schools create a comprehensive prevention plan and crisis response plan
• reduce trauma after a fatal event
• help schools and communities develop a long-term recovery plan
Who Is the Intended Audience?
Planning for and responding to trauma requires a multidimensional approach. The more individuals and community groups included in the initial planning process, the better the response, and the better the health and well-being of students, staff, and community alike. Consider involving the following personnel and organizations when implementing the recommendations of School Shootings:
• school staff, leadership, and partners
• mental health professionals, agencies, and organizations
• local, state, and national government officials
• first responders and law enforcement agencies
• community and government emergency planning organizations
• foundations and relief agencies
Is School Shootings Research Informed?
This manual summarizes some of the best research available on prevention, intervention, response, and recovery, with examples of emerging best practices established through actual shooting recovery sites. While many treatment and prevention strategies have been researched and tested using the most scientific processes available, establishing “best practice” recognition for many of the insights offered in School Shootings is difficult based on the low incident rate of mass school shootings in the United States. The gold standard of having a comparative control group to help establish best practice isn’t practical in these situations. Nevertheless, it is clear what has helped primary and secondary victims address their trauma and recover their lives over time; those emerging best practices are shared in School Shootings.
This manual also provides insights into what specific interventions have worked and what interventions haven’t been as effective or still need more development. School Shootings summarizes the similarities in responses between different shooting events that have the potential to be considered emerging best practices. The manual explores many individual examples of how communities worked together to restore their school and bring back a sense of safety and hope.
School Shootings also uses research to describe the physical and mental response to trauma, shedding light on why particular interventions may be instrumental in recovery.
School Shooting Components
The following is a brief description of each component of the School Shootings offerings.
Manual
The 168-page manual provides practical guidance for developing or revising a prevention plan and crisis response to a school or community shooting or other traumatic event to be as comprehensive as possible. The manual provides a thorough, hands-on approach to critically timed needs, with specific information on how to respond in the minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and even years after a school tragedy. These are not broad guidelines but well-defined protocols based on what has worked and what may work for your school. The manual is divided into four parts:
Part 1: Understanding School Shootings
Introduction to School Shootings Overview of This Manual
Part 2: Prevention and Early Intervention
Prevention Using Safety Precautions
Prevention within Schools and Communities
Part 3: Crisis Planning and Response
Crisis Preparations and the First Minutes After
The First Hours After
The First Days After
The First Weeks, Months, and Years After
Part 4: Recovery
Long-Term Community Recovery
Planning Forms
Included with the manual are more than 70 specific forms for every aspect of a school’s crisis response and prevention planning. The forms provide planning guides, immediate response reminders, parent/caregiver information, and guidance for setting long-term goals. Below are some examples of the forms included on the manual’s flash drive:
• Prevention Program Resources Survey
• Active Shooter Training Review
• Mental Health Early Assessment and Intervention
• Preparation for Crisis Response: The School Crisis Team, Planning for the First Minutes
• Crisis Response, The First Minutes: School Shooting or Traumatic Event Checklist
• Crisis Response, The First Hours: The Media Team, First Press Conference Checklist
• Crisis Response, The First Hours: The Mental Health Trauma Team, Crisis Response Checklist
• Crisis Response, The First Days: The School Crisis Team, First Day of School Checklist
• Long-Term Recovery: School and Community Recovery Collaborative
PowerPoint Presentation
Hosting an informational PowerPoint presentation session is a great way to build the multidisciplinary approach, and the school and community support, needed to build comprehensive prevention and crisis response plans. The provides an overview of the School Shootings model and increases school and community understanding of why prevention and crisis response planning are critical components to student safety and well-being.