[House Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
ENGAGING THE COMMUNITY: PERSPECTIVES ON SCHOOL SECURITY
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON
EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS,
RESPONSE, AND RECOVERY
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
SEPTEMBER 26, 2019
__________
Serial No. 116-38
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
40-454 PDF WASHINGTON : 2020
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COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi, Chairman
Sheila Jackson Lee, Texas Mike Rogers, Alabama
James R. Langevin, Rhode Island Peter T. King, New York
Cedric L. Richmond, Louisiana Michael T. McCaul, Texas
Donald M. Payne, Jr., New Jersey John Katko, New York
Kathleen M. Rice, New York Mark Walker, North Carolina
J. Luis Correa, California Clay Higgins, Louisiana
Xochitl Torres Small, New Mexico Debbie Lesko, Arizona
Max Rose, New York Mark Green, Tennessee
Lauren Underwood, Illinois Van Taylor, Texas
Elissa Slotkin, Michigan John Joyce, Pennsylvania
Emanuel Cleaver, Missouri Dan Crenshaw, Texas
Al Green, Texas Michael Guest, Mississippi
Yvette D. Clarke, New York Dan Bishop, North Carolina
Dina Titus, Nevada
Bonnie Watson Coleman, New Jersey
Nanette Diaz Barragan, California
Val Butler Demings, Florida
Hope Goins, Staff Director
Chris Vieson, Minority Staff Director
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SUBCOMMITTEE ON EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS, RESPONSE, AND RECOVERY
Donald M. Payne Jr., New Jersey, Chairman
Cedric Richmond, Louisiana Peter T. King, New York, Ranking
Max Rose, New York Member
Lauren Underwood, Illinois Dan Crenshaw, Texas
Al Green, Texas Michael Guest, Mississippi
Yvette D. Clarke, New York Dan Bishop, North Carolina
Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi (ex Mike Rogers, Alabama (ex officio)
officio)
Lauren McClain, Subcommittee Staff Director
Diana Bergwin, Minority Subcommittee Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Statements
The Honorable Donald M. Payne Jr., a Representative in Congress
From the State of New Jersey, and Chairman, Subcommittee on
Emergency Preparedness, Response, and Recovery:
Oral Statement................................................. 1
Prepared Statement............................................. 3
The Honorable Peter T. King, a Representative in Congress From
the State of New York, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on
Emergency Preparedness, Response, and Recovery:
Oral Statement................................................. 4
Prepared Statement............................................. 4
The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Mississippi, and Chairman, Committee on
Homeland Security:
Prepared Statement............................................. 5
Witnesses
Ms. Lauren Hogg, Co-Founder, March For Our Lives:
Oral Statement................................................. 6
Prepared Statement............................................. 8
Mr. Jared Maples, Director, Office of Homeland Security and
Preparedness, State of New Jersey:
Oral Statement................................................. 12
Prepared Statement............................................. 14
Ms. Kathy Martinez-Prather, Director, Texas School Safety Center:
Oral Statement................................................. 17
Prepared Statement............................................. 19
Mr. Max Schachter, Founder and CEO, Safe Schools for Alex:
Oral Statement................................................. 21
Prepared Statement............................................. 23
For the Record
The Honorable Ted Deutch, a Representative in Congress From the
State of Florida:
Statement of Tony Montalto, President, Stand with Parkland--The
National Association of Families for Safe Schools............ 46
The Honorable Donald M. Payne Jr., a Representative in Congress
From the State of New Jersey, and Chairman, Subcommittee on
Emergency Preparedness, Response, and Recovery:
Statement of Jay M. Brotman, American Institute of Architects
(AIA)........................................................ 52
Joint Letter From the Dignity in Schools Campaign and NAACP
Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc...................... 55
Letter From Everytown for Gun Safety........................... 58
Letter From the National Association of School Psychologists... 61
Statement of James ``Mo'' Canady, Executive Director, National
Association of School Resource Officers (NASRO).............. 67
Standards and Best Practices for School Resource Officer
Programs..................................................... 68
Letter From Sandy Hook Promise................................. 81
Appendix
Questions From Chairman Donald M. Payne, Jr. For Kathy Martinez-
Prather........................................................ 85
ENGAGING THE COMMUNITY: PERSPECTIVES ON SCHOOL SECURITY
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Thursday, September 26, 2019
U.S. House of Representatives,
Committee on Homeland Security,
Subcommittee on Emergency Preparedness,
Response, and Recovery,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:06 a.m., in
room 310, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Donald M. Payne,
Jr. (Chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Representatives Payne, Richmond, Rose, Underwood,
Green, Clarke, King, Joyce, Crenshaw, and Guest.
Also present: Representatives Jackson Lee and Deutch.
Mr. Payne. The Subcommittee on Emergency Preparedness,
Response, and Recovery will come to order.
The subcommittee is meeting today to receive testimony on
``Engaging the Community: Perspectives on School Security.''
Good morning and thank you, everyone who is here today.
The subcommittee is meeting to discuss community
perspectives on school safety and how the Federal Government
can better support local stakeholders in making our children
safer.
I want to thank the witnesses for participating in today's
hearing. Ms. Lauren Hogg's and Mr. Max Schachter's testimonies
are ones the American public needs to hear and ones that
Members of Congress should take to heart as we go about our
work. A special thank you to you both for sharing your
experience with us.
The Chair would also like to acknowledge Congressman
Deutch, who does not sit on this committee but who represents
Parkland, Florida, and has been a champion for measures to
improve school safety.
I ask unanimous consent to allow Congressman Deutch to sit
and question the witnesses at today's hearing.
Without objection, it is so ordered.
I am glad this hearing can build upon the school safety
field hearing this subcommittee held last year in New Jersey.
The 2019-2020 school year is well under way, and our kids are
at risk from violence every day. As a parent of triplets, all
too often I watch the news and I am terrified by what I see and
hear. Tragically, school violence has taken the lives of too
many American children and educators.
Now, 20 years since the Columbine High School massacre,
which left 13 victims dead, our children are still incredibly
vulnerable while attending school. Since Columbine and even
before, our Nation has been rocked by a tragic cycle of school
shootings. The 2012 Sandy Hook shooting left a staggering 20
children and 6 adults dead, yet Congress fell short of passing
legislation to combat gun violence in schools. In 2018, there
were 24 shootings in K-12 schools around the country, including
the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in
Parkland, Florida, that left 14 children and 3 teachers dead
and a shooting at Santa Fe High School in Santa Fe, Texas, that
claimed 10 victims.
The threat to our students continues. During the first half
of 2019, there were 22 school shootings. Just last week, a
teenager was arrested in Washington State for planning to
attack a school on the 21st anniversary of Columbine. Still,
the response from the Trump administration and the Republican-
controlled Senate has been wholly inadequate.
After Parkland, Congress passed the Stop School Violence
Act to provide funds for schools looking to improve their
safety infrastructure. However, it is important to remember
that school infrastructure is only one part of the solution to
keep our children safe. More must be done.
In 2018, 113 people were killed or injured in school
shootings in the United States. In the same year, at least
1,200 children were killed by gun violence around the country.
Gun violence must be addressed both inside and outside of
schools to really improve the safety of children in America. We
cannot truly improve safety for children until we address these
threats regardless of where they happen.
That is why the Democratic-controlled House has passed and
moved multiple pieces of legislation aimed at making our
children and our country safer, including universal background
checks and grants for States who use red-flag laws.
Additionally, I am proud that on April 1, 2019, the House
passed my bill, the CLASS Act, which would establish a council
within DHS to ensure the Department coordinates its school
safety activities. I hope the Senate will finally act on these
measures, as the American public awaits a meaningful
Congressional response.
Like the Senate, the Trump administration has failed to
consider serious solutions to address school safety. Last year,
the administration's Federal Commission on School Safety
published a report that included no new proposals for Federal
policy or funding to make schools safer. Instead, it promoted
arming school personnel, a policy that both students and
educator groups oppose.
Perhaps the only positive outcome from the Commission's
work was the decision to establish a Federal safety
clearinghouse, which the Department of Homeland Security is
leading, along with the Departments of Education, Justice, and
Health and Human Services. This committee will be following the
roll-out of the clearinghouse later this year.
I am interested to hear from the witnesses how such a tool
might be useful to them in their work to improve school safety.
Additionally, yesterday, the administration published a new
planning guide to help school districts develop and maintain
and customize emergency operation plans. While such guidance
may be useful for districts, it does not address the root
problems leading to violence in schools, nor does it provide
school districts that are stretched thin new resources to fill
their school safety needs.
Our children are experiencing a new normal and one that
troubles me. Active-shooter drills are the new normal in
schools, and while I recognize the importance of them, I am
saddened that our country has come to a place where they are
necessary.
We must do more to ensure that school violence and
shootings are a thing of the past and our kids feel safe when
learning. We must do more to protect the next generation. This
country, communities like the ones I serve, and our kids are
counting on us. Citizens from across the country are speaking
loudly about the need for progress on this subject matter, and
we must do our best to respond.
[The statement of Chairman Payne follows:]
Statement of Chairman Donald M. Payne, Jr.
September 26, 2019
The subcommittee is meeting to discuss community perspectives on
school safety, and how the Federal Government can better support local
stakeholders in making our children safer. I thank the witnesses for
participating in today's hearing. Ms. Lauren Hogg and Mr. Max
Schachter's testimonies are ones the American public needs to hear and
ones that Members of Congress should take to heart as we go about our
work. A special thank you to you both for sharing your experience with
us. I am glad this hearing can build upon the school security field
hearing this subcommittee held last year in New Jersey. The 2019-2020
school year is well under way, and our kids are at-risk from violence
every day. As a parent of triplets, all too often I watch the news and
I am terrified by what I see and hear.
Tragically, school violence has taken the lives of too many
American children and educators. Now, 20 years since the Columbine High
School massacre, which left 13 victims dead, our children are still
incredibly vulnerable while attending school. Since Columbine and even
before, our Nation has been rocked by a tragic cycle of school
shootings. The 2012 Sandy Hook shooting left a staggering 20 children
and 6 adults dead, yet Congress fell short of passing legislation to
combat gun violence in schools. In 2018, there were 24 shootings in K-
12 schools around the country, including the shooting at Marjory
Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida that left 14 children
and 3 teachers dead, and the shooting at Santa Fe High School in Santa
Fe, Texas that claimed 10 victims. The threats to our students
continue. During the first half of 2019, there were 22 school
shootings. Just last week, a teenager was arrested in Washington State
for planning to attack a school on the 21st anniversary of Columbine.
Still, the response from the Trump administration and the Republican-
controlled Senate has been wholly inadequate. After Parkland, Congress
passed the STOP School Violence Act to provide funds for schools
looking to improve their safety infrastructure. However, it is
important to remember that school infrastructure is only one part of
the solution to keep our children safe--more must be done. In 2018, 113
people were killed in school shootings in the United States. In the
same year, at least 1,200 children were killed by gun violence around
the country. Gun violence must be addressed both inside and outside of
schools to really improve the safety of children in America.
We cannot truly improve safety for children until we address these
threats, regardless of where they happen. That is why the Democratic-
controlled House has passed or moved multiple pieces of legislation
aimed at making our children, and our country, safer, including
universal background checks and grants for States who use red flag
laws. Additionally, I am proud that on April 1, 2019, the House passed
my bill, the CLASS Act, which would establish a council within DHS to
ensure the Department coordinates its school safety activities. I hope
the Senate will finally act on these measures, as the American public
awaits a meaningful Congressional response. Like the Senate, the Trump
administration has failed to consider serious solutions to address
school safety. Last year, the administration's Federal Commission on
School Safety published a report that included no new proposals for
Federal policy or funding to make schools safer. Instead, it promoted
arming school personnel, a policy that both student and education
groups oppose.
Perhaps the only positive outcome from the Commission's work was
the decision to establish a Federal school safety clearinghouse, which
the Department of Homeland Security is leading along with the
Departments of Education, Justice, and Health and Human Services. This
committee will be following the roll out of the clearinghouse later
this year. I am interested to hear from the witnesses how such a tool
might be useful to them in their work to improve school safety. Our
children are experiencing a new normal, and one that troubles me.
Active-shooter drills are the new normal in schools, and while I
recognize the importance of them, I am saddened that our country has
come to a place where they are necessary. We must do more to ensure
that school violence, and shootings, are a thing of the past, and our
kids feel safe when learning. We must do more to protect the next
generation. This country, communities like the ones I serve, and our
kids are counting on us. Citizens from across the country are speaking
loudly about the need for progress on this subject matter and we must
do our best to respond.
Mr. Payne. With that, now I recognize the Ranking Member of
the subcommittee, the gentleman from New York, Mr. King, for an
opening statement.
Mr. King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
At the outset, let me also commend Congressman Deutch for
his efforts on this and his dedication both before and ever
since the tragedy in his district.
So I want to commend you for that.
Mr. Chairman, I have a prepared statement. I just want to
introduce this into record. This is a vital issue, and I would
just as soon go and, you know, hear the witnesses' own
testimony. I will submit my statement for the record.
[The statement of Ranking Member King follows:]
Statement of Ranking Member Peter T. King
Sept. 26, 2019
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to welcome today's witnesses and
thank them for their time.
Over the last several decades, our Nation has witnessed egregious
acts of violence in schools. The tragedy of these events is felt
Nation-wide and we collectively begin asking ourselves, ``How did this
happen?'' and ``Why did this happen?''
After the events at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School last year,
President Trump established the Federal Commission on School Safety to
provide recommendations to keep kids safe at schools.
This Commission brought together members of the Department of
Education, the Department of Justice, the Department of Health and
Human Services, and the Department of Homeland Security. The Commission
was tasked to provide a view on how to keep our Nation's schools safe.
After almost a year of review, the Commission developed its final
report that provides comprehensive recommendations on what we can do to
better protect students, teachers, and our Nation's schools.
School security has always been a local issue. Those situated in
and around our schools are logically the best suited to evaluate the
needs of the schools they serve. Still, the sad reality is that many
schools don't have adequate security plans in place or don't regularly
practice school safety drills.
The Commission recommended in its final report that a public
clearinghouse of resources be developed to assist parents, teachers,
administrators, and local officials with best practices. This one-stop-
shop could provide parents with information on how to talk to their
children about school safety or principals with tools to assess the
security of their buildings.
I'm happy to hear this new clearinghouse website is in development
and will be operational soon.
Within this new clearinghouse, users will be able to find a list of
existing Federal grants and programs available to State and local
governments. These grants from DHS, DOD, HHS, and the Department of
Education help fund things like mental health programs, school resource
officer training, and the development of emergency operating plans.
There's still more that needs to be done. Children should never
fear going to school. They should be focused on their academic success
and not on whether they will be a victim of violence. I hope that the
testimony we hear today provides insight into what we can to do protect
students in the future.
I want to again express my appreciation for our witnesses being
here today. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Payne. Thank you.
With that, I now recognize the Chairman of the full
committee, Mr. Thompson--who is not here yet. OK.
Other Members of the subcommittee are reminded that, under
the committee rules, opening statements may be submitted for
the record.
[The statement of Chairman Thompson follows:]
Statement of Chairman Bennie G. Thompson
September 26, 2019
I want to take a moment to specifically thank Lauren Hogg and Max
Schachter for being here today. What you both went through is something
no person in our country should have to, but, sadly, it happens all too
often. I commend you for being able to take your pain and turn it into
action so other people may not have to go through what you and your
loved ones did. Your bravery and courage does not go unnoticed.
It has been 20 years since the Columbine High School massacre,
where 13 people lost their lives, and schools remain vulnerable to
attack. In 2007, I chaired a full committee hearing after the Virginia
Tech shooting to learn more about protecting our Nation's schools. We
sit here today, over 12 years later, grappling with the same issues
while the country has experienced tragedy after tragedy. The names
Sandy Hook Elementary School, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, and
others are forever in our memories because of the tragic shootings
within their walls. These tragedies not only senselessly take innocent
lives but do so much to inhibit focus and learning by invoking fear and
anxiety among students, faculty, and staff, alike.
Despite the obvious need for improved school security measures, the
sad truth is that the Federal Government has not done enough to address
school security concerns and keep weapons out of the hands of those who
would do our children harm. It has become increasingly clear that we
cannot depend on the Trump administration to make meaningful progress
on issues related to school security. The Federal School Safety
Commission did not seriously consider the issue of guns--though guns
are the weapon of choice in instances of deadly school violence. In
addition, the Trump administration and Republican leadership in the
Senate refuse to come to the table with the House to take common-sense
steps to mitigate gun violence in schools. Several States are working
to help address these shortcomings and by-passing gun safety laws and
making other significant investments in school security improvements. I
hope that Congress and the White House can be a help rather than a
hindrance to those efforts.
I applaud the Emergency Preparedness, Response, and Recovery
Subcommittee for the work it continues to do on these efforts. In
addition to holding this hearing and a field hearing in New Jersey,
Chairman Payne has introduced legislation to make a positive impact on
school security, like H.R. 1593, the CLASS Act, which would ensure that
the Department of Homeland Security's various school security
initiatives are coordinated. This measure passed the House in April. I
look forward to continuing the important discussion today on what more
Congress can do to enhance school security in America and appreciate
all those joining us.
Mr. Payne. OK. I want to welcome our panel of witnesses.
Our first witness, who may be the youngest witness to
appear before this subcommittee, is Lauren Hogg, co-founder of
March for our Lives and a survivor of the school shooting at
Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
Although she may be young, Ms. Hogg is undoubtedly and
unfortunately an expert on this topic. I am thankful she is
here testifying for her first Congressional hearing to share
her experiences.
Next we have Mr. Jared Maples, the director of New Jersey's
Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness. Mr. Maples has
appeared before this subcommittee numerous times, and I thank
him for coming back.
Next we have Ms. Kathy Martinez-Prather, who is the
director of Texas School Safety Center, which is a part of the
Texas State University and has been focused on improving school
safety in Texas for the past 20 years.
Last, we have Mr. Max Schachter. He is the founder and CEO
of Safe Schools for Alex, an organization he founded after
losing his son to the school shooting in Parkland, Florida.
Again, thank you for being here today.
Without objection, the witnesses' full statements will be
inserted into the record.
I now ask each witness to summarize his or her statements
for 5 minutes, beginning with Ms. Hogg.
STATEMENT OF LAUREN HOGG, CO-FOUNDER, MARCH FOR OUR LIVES
Ms. Hogg. Chairman Payne, Chairman Thompson, Ranking Member
King, Ranking Member Rogers, and Members of the subcommittee,
thank you all for allowing me the opportunity to give a
student's perspective on school security.
My name is Lauren Hogg, and I am a co-founder of March for
our Lives, as you just heard, a junior in high school, and
simply a concerned student who just wants to survive high
school, both metaphorically and literally. I hope that this
testimony aids in your efforts to protect students from all ZIP
Codes and all races from going through what myself and my
classmates have in the wake of a school shooting.
I want to preface my testimony by saying that, although I
am honored to be here today, I would not be here if not for the
horrendous events that took place on February 14, 2018 at my
high school, Marjory Stoneman Douglas. Thirty-four of my
classmates, my friends, and my teachers and coaches were
injured, 17 of them fatally shot with an AR-15 in our hallways.
Additionally, although I am here today using my own
experience as evidence against the militarization of schools, I
am here not to ask for your sympathy; I am here to ask for your
consideration and your action.
I was born after Columbine, and I was 9 years old when
Sandy Hook occurred, so for most of my life, I have been force-
fed the importance of school security. I still remember the
first week back to school after the Sandy Hook shooting took
place. I was in fourth grade, and I remember spending the first
hour of school watching my teacher's shoes on the rainbow
carpet as she tried, to no avail, to explain what a Code Red
drill was to a room of rowdy fourth-graders.
As blood-chilling as the explanation of new security
measures was, I never thought twice about them until 4 years
later when my friend Alaina posed a question about why we were
having the drills in the first place.
In eighth grade, Alaina Petty sat in front of me in our
American History class. If I am being honest, we never really
talked about school security in the context of preventing mass
shootings until one day when our friend Austin returned to
school after surviving the Fort Lauderdale shooting that
previous week. Together, our little friend group contemplated
the effectiveness of our school safety procedures while
standing in the adjacent corner of our classroom every 3
months.
Nearly a year later, the three of us were at school as
nervous freshmen on Valentine's Day when, once again, we went
through the Code Red drill. The only difference was that, this
time, only 2 of us made it home. Alaina was 14 years old when
she was murdered.
The week after Valentine's Day was full of many things. It
was full of tears, it was full of funerals, and it was full of
much talk around school security.
I will never forget the first morning back at school. When
we first arrived to the walkway and to our campus, we were
welcomed back by what seemed like every armed security officer
in the whole county. It was truly a sea of black and blue
uniforms. They thought they were making us feel safe, and for
that I am eternally grateful. But the sight of yet another man
holding a gun was enough to make many of us feel sick. Our
school, which once was considered a safe haven of learning by
many of us, was turned into a place of imprisonment.
Additionally, much like our National incarceration system,
our school, when flooded with resource officers that ironically
were considered safety precautions, became a place where my
black and brown classmates were disproportionately penalized
and targeted at nearly 3 times the rate of us white students.
Simply put, schools, when overmilitarized and made to seem
like prisons, embed in us students the idea that violence is
something to be expected at school. That is no mindset for any
child to learn in.
Following the tragedy at my high school, numerous
individuals, including the Secretary of Education, looked to
increase the presence of firearms in schools. I, as an
individual and as a representative of March for our Lives,
strongly oppose the notion that arming teachers will make our
schools safer.
There is a fine line between proper security and
militarization, and as you examine this line, I urge you to
consult those most affected: Students. Having me here as a
witness is an important first step, but students must continue
to be consulted.
As you examine that line, I urge you to consider
noninvasive, proactive measures, not simply punitive, reactive
measures. We need to invest in mental health resources of
trained mental health professionals rather than relying solely
on academic counselors.
To those who suggest the solution is to simply hire more
school resource officers or to arm SROs, let me remind you that
the armed SRO at my high school did nothing as 17 of my
classmates and teachers were murdered. That SRO has, in fact,
been charged with child neglect for his inaction. It was our
unarmed football coach, Aaron Feis, who protected my classmates
and lost his life in the process.
Furthermore, school safety cannot be addressed fully
without addressing our Nation's gun violence epidemic. Given
this, I encourage all of you to look into March for our Lives'
comprehensive, bold plan, ``A Peace Plan for a Safer America.''
Instead of promoting certain punitive safety measures that
I would describe as putting a bandaid on a student's bullet
wounds, I ask of you to think of what is actually beneficial to
us students. I hope with all of my being that gun violence
prevention legislation is passed so that perhaps we won't have
to be having 16-year-olds speaking at hearings on school
safety.
Altogether, I hope that when it comes to school security, I
won't have to someday hear a student half my age claim that
they were born after Marjory Stoneman Douglas and grew up in an
environment where they were force-fed the importance of school
security until they went through a mass shooting of their own.
Us students are tired of being tired. Our future, the
future of this country is at stake. The future of this
country's safety is now in your hands.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Hogg follows:]
Prepared Statement of Lauren Hogg
September 26, 2019
Chairman Thompson, Chairman Payne, Ranking Member King, Ranking
Member Rogers, and Members of the subcommittee, thank you all for
allowing me the opportunity to give a student's perspective on school
security. My name is Lauren Hogg and I am a cofounder of March For Our
Lives, a junior in high school, and a concerned student who just wants
to survive high school both metaphorically and literally. I hope that
this testimony aids in your efforts to protect students from all ZIP
codes and all races from going through what myself and my classmates
have in the wake of surviving a school shooting.
I want to preface my testimony by saying that although I am honored
to be here today, I would not be here if not for the horrendous events
that took place on February 14, 2018 at my high school, Marjory
Stoneman Douglas. Thirty-four of my classmates, friends, teachers, and
coaches were injured, 17 of them fatally shot with an AR-15. Thankfully
many of my classmates and I made it home that day, but we carry with us
the weight of what I call active trauma. Imagine it as the recurring
stages of grief every time yet another senseless shooting happens. It
deeply saddens me to say that this heaviness will be something that
stays with us the rest of our lives.
I was born after Columbine and I was 9 years old when Sandy Hook
occurred, so for most of my life I have been force-fed the importance
of school security. I still remember the first week back to school
after the Sandy Hook shooting. I was in fourth grade and I remember
spending the first hour of school watching my teacher's shoes on the
rainbow carpet as she tried--to no avail--to explain what a code red
drill was to a room of 4th-graders. As blood-chilling as the
explanation of new security measures was I never thought twice about
them until 4 years later when my friend Alaina posed a question about
why we were having the drills. In 8th grade Alaina Petty sat in front
of me in American History. If I am being honest, we never really talked
about security at school in the context of preventing mass shootings
until one day when our friend Austin returned to school after surviving
the Fort Lauderdale airport shooting. Together our little friend group
contemplated the effectiveness of our school safety procedures while
standing in the adjacent corner of our classroom every 3 months. Nearly
a year later, the 3 of us were at school as nervous freshman on
Valentine's Day when we once again went through a code red drill; the
only difference was that only 2 of us made it home this time. Alaina
was 14 years old when she was killed.
The week after Valentine's Day was full of many things, it was full
of tears, it was full of funerals, and it was full of much talk around
school security. I'll never forget the first morning back at school.
When we first arrived to the walkway into our campus, we were welcomed
back by what seemed like every armed police officer in the county. It
was truly a sea of black and blue uniforms, they thought they were
making us feel safe and for that I am grateful, but the sight of more
men carrying guns made many of us feel sick not secure.
When we finally made it through the newly-implemented single
entrance after waiting in a line of students at a school of nearly
4,500, we were greeted with things that we had never previously
experienced at school. There were checkpoints, clear backpacks, and new
smiling faces of School Resource Officers (SRO's) holding guns in one
hand and waving us in with the other. Also I feel as though it is
pertinent to know that, almost every safety implementation was put in
place without the consultation of even a single student. Our
administrators were our leaders, supposed to represent and implement
what we as students feel, but much like political leaders so often do,
forgot to listen to their constituents before speaking on behalf of
them.
Our school which once was considered a safe haven of learning by
many of us, was turned into a place of imprisonment. Additionally, much
like our National incarnation system, our school when flooded with
resource officers that ironically were considered safety precautions
became a place where my black and brown classmates were
disproportionately penalized and targeted at nearly 3 times the rate of
us white students \1\ (Appendix A). Simply put, schools when over-
militarized and made to seem like prisons instead of places of
learning, embed in us students the idea that violence is something to
be expected at school, and that is no mindset for a child to learn in.
Following the tragedy at my high school, numerous individuals,
including the Secretary of Education looked to increase the presence of
firearms in schools. I, as an individual, and as a representative of
March For Our Lives strongly oppose the notion that arming teachers
will make schools safer.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Lopez, German. ``Black Kids Are Way More Likely to Be Punished
in School than White Kids, Study Finds.'' Vox.com, Vox, 5 Apr. 2018,
https://www.vox.com/identities/2018/4/5/17199810/school-discipline-
race-racism-gao.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is a fine line between proper security and militarization. As
you examine this line, I urge you to consult those most affected:
Students. Having me here as a witness is an important first step, but
students must continue to be consulted. As you examine that line, I
urge you to consider non-invasive proactive measures, not simply
punitive reactive measures. We need to invest in mental health
resources of trained mental health professionals, rather than relying
solely on academic counselors or School Resource Officers (SRO's). Such
academic counselors usually tell us they don't have time to speak about
mental health, or that they have to focus on what they consider more
important things like getting into college.
To those who suggest that the solution is to simply hire more
School Resource Officers or to arm SRO's, let me remind you that the
armed SRO at my high school did nothing as 17 of my classmates and
teachers were murdered. That SRO has in fact been charged with child
neglect for his inaction.\2\ It was our unarmed football coach, Aaron
Feis, who protected my classmates and lost his life in the process.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ ``Ex-SRO Charged with Child Neglect for `Inaction' during
Parkland Massacre.'' WFLA, 4 June 2019, https://www.wfla.com/news/
florida/ex-sro-charged-with-child-neglect-for-inaction-during-parkland-
massacre/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Furthermore, school safety cannot be addressed fully without
addressing our Nation's gun violence epidemic. Given this I encourage
you all to look into March For Our Lives' comprehensive bold plan, A
Peace Plan For A Safer America (Appendix B).
Instead of promoting certain punitive safety measures that, which
constitutes putting a BandAid on a bullet wounds, I ask you to think of
what is actually beneficial to students. I hope with all of my being
that gun violence prevention legislation is passed so that perhaps
someday we won't have to be having hearings on school safety. All
together I hope that when it comes to school security I won't have
someday hear a student half my age claim that they were born after
Marjory Stoneman Douglas and grew up being force-fed ineffective safety
procedures until the day that they went through mass shooting of their
own. Us students are tired of being tired. Our future, and the future
of this country is at stake. The future of this country's safety is in
your hands.
Thank you.
Appendix A
ACLU illustrates how school disciplinary policies
disproportionately impact black students.
Appendix B.-- March For Our Lives' Peace Plan for a Safer America
executive summary
Every day in America, more than 100 lives are taken by the deadly
epidemic of gun violence.\3\ Among young people, gun violence has
become a top cause of death, second only to drug overdoses.\4\ It has
many root causes, including hate, poverty, and despair. It's a deeply
intersectional issue, inextricably bound with our long journey for
racial justice, economic justice, immigrant rights, and the rights of
our LGBTQ allies. And it's amplified by the societal belief that a gun
can solve our problems. Gun violence is destroying our generation. This
is simply unacceptable. That's why, as survivors and students of March
For Our Lives, we believe it's time for a Peace Plan for a Safer
America.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\3\ Mervosh, Sarah. ``Nearly 40,000 People Died From Guns in U.S.
Last Year, Highest in 50 Years.'' The New York Times, The New York
Times, 18 Dec. 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/18/us/gun-
deaths.html.
\4\ Parsons, Chelsea, et al. ``America's Youth Under Fire.'' Center
for American Progress, https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/guns-
crime/reports/2018/05/04/450343/americas-youth-fire/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The next President must act with a fierce urgency to call this
crisis what it is: A National public health emergency. They must
acknowledge that the level of gun violence in the United States is
unprecedented for a developed nation\5\--and only bold, new solutions
can move the needle on the rates of gun injuries and deaths. They must
recognize that gun violence has many faces in our communities, from
rural suicides to intimate partner violence to urban youth violence to
violence driven by white supremacist ideologies. And they must commit
to holding an unpatriotic gun lobby and gun industry accountable not
just for weakening our Nation's gun laws, but also for illegal behavior
in self-dealing \4\ that offends and contradicts America's vast
majority of responsible gun owners.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\5\ Parsons, Chelsea, et al. ``America's Youth Under Fire:
America's Youth Under Fire.'' American Progress, Center For American
Progress, 2 May 2018, https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/guns-
crime/reports/2018/05/04/450343/americas-youth-fire/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
We believe in C.H.A.N.G.E.--6 bold steps that the next Presidential
administration and Congress must take to address this National gun
violence epidemic:
1. CHANGE THE STANDARD OF GUN OWNERSHIP.--Advocate and pass
legislation to raise the National standard for gun ownership: a
National licensing and registry system that promotes responsible gun
ownership; a ban on assault weapons, high-capacity magazines, and other
weapons of war; policies to disarm gun owners who pose a risk to
themselves or others; and a National gun buy-back program to reduce the
estimated 265-393 million firearms in circulation by at least 30
percent.
2. HALVE THE RATE OF GUN DEATHS IN 10 YEARS.--Mobilize an urgent
and comprehensive Federal response: Declare a National emergency around
gun violence and announce an audacious goal to reduce gun injuries and
deaths by 50 percent in 10 years, thereby saving up to 200,000 American
lives.
3. ACCOUNTABILITY FOR THE GUN LOBBY AND INDUSTRY.--Hold the gun
lobby and industry accountable for decades of illegal behavior and
misguided policies intended to shield only themselves; reexamine the
District of Columbia v. Heller interpretation of the Second Amendment;
initiate both FEC and IRS investigations into the NRA, and fully repeal
the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act.
4. NAME A DIRECTOR OF GUN VIOLENCE PREVENTION.--Appoint a National
Director of Gun Violence Prevention (GVP) who reports directly to the
President, with the mandate to operationalize our Federal goals and
empower existing Federal agencies such as the Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), the Department of Health and
Human Services, and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC)--agencies
that have all been structurally weakened by the gun lobby. The National
Director of GVP would begin by overseeing a downpayment of $250 million
in annual funding for research by the CDC and other Federal agencies on
gun violence prevention.
5. GENERATE COMMUNITY-BASED SOLUTIONS.--Fully fund targeted
interventions addressing the intersectional dimensions of gun violence,
including community-based urban violence reduction programs, suicide
prevention programs, domestic violence prevention programs, mental and
behavioral health service programs, and programs to address police
violence in our communities.
6. EMPOWER THE NEXT GENERATION.--Automatically register eligible
voters and mail voter registration cards to all Americans when they
turn 18. Create the ``Safety Corps,'' a Peace Corps for gun violence
prevention. The younger generations are disproportionately affected by
gun violence. They should have a say in how their country solves this
epidemic.
To read the Peace Plan in its entirety, visit
www.marchforourlives.com/peace-plan.
Mr. Payne. Thank you for your testimony.
I now recognize Mr. Maples to summarize his statement for 5
minutes.
STATEMENT OF JARED MAPLES, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF HOMELAND
SECURITY AND PREPAREDNESS, STATE OF NEW JERSEY
Mr. Maples. Chairman Payne, Ranking Member King, Members of
the committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify before
you today. It is an honor to speak with you and share the work
my office is doing to keep the residents and visitors to New
Jersey safe, especially with regard to educational
institutions.
The New Jersey Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness
is tasked with coordinating counterterrorism, resiliency, and
cybersecurity efforts across all levels of government, law
enforcement, nonprofit organizations, and the private sector.
We are charged with bolstering New Jersey's resources for
critical infrastructure protection, preparedness, training, and
Federal grants management.
Attacks against children and staff in what should be the
safe haven of education is perhaps the most jarring threat we
face. Recent incidents at schools across the country serve as
stark reminders that schools are often targeted by those
seeking to commit acts of violence.
For example, law enforcement in New Jersey, with the
assistance of authorities in Delaware, prevented a potential
school shooting this past June when we arrested a man
possessing a loaded firearm and additional ammunition at an
elementary school in Westfield, New Jersey.
The safety of our children and those charged with their
care are paramount. We must do all that is necessary to provide
students and staff with a sense of comfort and security in
their learning environments. Parents and guardians deserve the
peace of mind that their children will return to them at the
end of the school day.
For that reason, Governor Murphy's administration is in
sync on combining our resources to ensure the protection of our
children. My office's work to protect our students would not be
possible without the strong partnerships we have with local,
State, and Federal agencies.
We are proud of the collaborative progress we continue to
make as a State in strengthening security throughout all our
institutions, including in education. However, we recognize
that our work is never complete, and continual improvement is
the only way to succeed in protecting New Jersey and the
country.
While we provide details on our on-going efforts, please be
mindful that we will always seek to continue to improve our
approach toward preventing these incidents from occurring in
the first place. A focus on prevention is key in stopping an
incident before it starts and avoiding the need to employ
response tactics. It is our goal to be first preventers as well
as first responders and make certain our communities embrace a
culture of preparedness that invests equally in both practices.
Heightened awareness from citizens and law enforcement,
combined with a New Jersey Attorney General directive that
calls for local law enforcement agencies who receive tips about
suspicious activity to immediately notify my office's
counterterrorism watchdog unit, led to an unprecedented
increase in school-related reports to the NJSAR System.
Additionally our office, along with the FBI Newark field
office, created high-level thresholds and notification
protocols to ensure that all threat-to-life leads, particularly
ones that involve schools, are immediately actioned to the
appropriate municipal, county, State, and Federal law
enforcement entities, which allows for a more standardized and
faster analysis and expeditious action to mitigate threats.
We will continue to prioritize the identification of
suspicious activity as well as ensure there is a clear path for
reporting and addressing issues before an incident can occur
through a whole-of-Government approach. We will expand
innovative efforts through measures such as training school
personnel, including administrators, faculty, school resource
officers, custodians, and bus drivers, and the community as a
whole on how to recognize and report suspicious activity.
My agency also collaborated with the Department of
Education and University Hospital to provide in-person training
for school safety specialists and to distribute more than
18,000 bleed-control kits to school districts throughout New
Jersey.
Through unannounced active-shooter drills throughout the
State, we can test and gauge the effectiveness of both plans
and action of students, faculty, and staff in an environment
that is controlled but realistic. We also continue to conduct
large-scale active-shooter exercises for K-12 schools, ensuring
that everyone, including schoolchildren, know what actions to
take if they face emergency situations.
With that in mind, New Jersey colleges and universities
participate in a quarterly Mass Gathering Working Group that is
aimed at identifying and addressing those common
vulnerabilities and filling any capability gaps at locations
where students gather throughout the State.
We created a School Security subcommittee on the State's
Domestic Security Preparedness Task Force, which I chair, to
coordinate best practices across State agencies and relevant
stakeholders and integrate with National priorities and local
needs.
Last, my office and the New Jersey State Police, in
coordination with county and local partners, conduct physical
security assessments at schools as well as provide training to
local law enforcement agencies to increase the capability to
conduct assessments across the State.
One of the biggest safety and security challenges facing
many educational institutions throughout New Jersey is funding.
Legislation introduced by Chairman Payne, H.R. 6920, would
provide dedicated Federal funding under current grant funding
programs of at least $90 million every year that is earmarked
strictly for school security.
This funding would greatly assist schools throughout the
country, including New Jersey, adding resources that would
enable schools to meet the very goals we have set out to
achieve in the areas of prevention and response.
In conclusion, efforts such as the Mass Gathering Working
Group, committee outreach initiatives, and the countless
trainings and exercises our office conducts each year highlight
that we will do all that is necessary to ensure the safety and
security of the residents and visitors of New Jersey,
protecting them from terrorist threats to our public spaces. We
remain dedicated to continuing these efforts, to further
collaborating with our partners, and to work toward addressing
threats with a focus on prevention.
Chairman Payne, Ranking Member King, and distinguished
Members of the subcommittee, I thank you again for the
opportunity to testify today. I look forward to your questions
and yield back to the Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Maples follows:]
Prepared Statement of Jared M. Maples
September 26, 2019
introduction
Chairman Payne and Ranking Member King, thank you for the
opportunity to testify before you today.
It is an honor to speak with you and share the work my office is
doing to keep the residents and visitors of New Jersey safe, especially
with regard to educational institutions.
The New Jersey Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness
(NJOHSP) is tasked with coordinating counterterrorism, resiliency, and
cybersecurity efforts across all levels of government, law enforcement,
nonprofit organizations, and the private sector. NJOHSP is charged with
bolstering New Jersey's resources for counterterrorism, critical
infrastructure protection, preparedness, training, and Federal grants
management.
New Jersey faces a complex, diverse, and fluid security environment
with real, pervasive, and evolving threats. However, attacks against
children and staff in what should be the safe haven of education is
perhaps the most jarring threat we face. Recent incidents at schools in
Parkland, Florida, and Santa Fe, Texas, serve as stark reminders that
schools are often targeted by those seeking to commit acts of violence.
Law enforcement in our own State of New Jersey--with the assistance of
authorities in Delaware--prevented a potential school shooting this
past June when they arrested a man possessing a loaded firearm and
additional ammunition at an elementary school in Westfield.
The safety of our children and those charged with their care are
paramount. We must do all that is necessary to provide students and
staff with a sense of comfort and security in their learning
environments, and parents and guardians deserve the peace of mind that
their children will return to them at the end of the school day. For
that reason, all State leaders are in sync on combining our resources
to ensure the protection of our children.
njohsp actions
NJOHSP's work to protect our students would not be possible without
the strong partnerships our Office has with the New Jersey Department
of Education, New Jersey Office of the Secretary of Higher Education,
New Jersey Office of Emergency Management, community members, and
local, State, and Federal law enforcement agencies.
Our office is proud of the collaborative progress we continue to
make as a State in strengthening security throughout all our
institutions, including in education. However, we recognize that our
work is never complete, and continual improvement is the only way to
succeed at protecting New Jersey and the country. While we provide
details on our on-going efforts, be mindful that we always seek to
improve our approach toward preventing these incidents from occurring
in the first place.
A focus on prevention is key in stopping an incident before it
starts and avoiding the need to employ response tactics. It is our goal
to be first preventers instead of just first responders and make
certain our communities embrace a culture of preparedness that invests
equally in both practices.
Following the tragic shooting at a high school in Parkland,
Florida, in February 2018, heightened awareness from citizens and law
enforcement--combined with the New Jersey Attorney General Directive of
March 26, 2018, that calls for local law enforcement agencies who
receive tips about suspicious activity related to terrorism or
threatened acts of violence, including toward schools, to immediately
notify their County Counterterrorism Coordinator and our Office's
Counterterrorism Watch Unit--led to an unprecedented increase in
school-related reports to the New Jersey Suspicious Activity Reporting
System.
As a result of this surge in school-related suspicious activity
reports, our office analyzed these incidents last year and shared
recommendations through an intelligence report that included input from
the New Jersey Department of Education and the Regional Operations
Intelligence Center, the State's fusion center. The report, distributed
to school and police officials State-wide and briefed to hundreds of
law enforcement and school security specialists, resulted in
improvements to our reporting system to allow for more standardized and
faster analysis and expeditious action to mitigate threats.
Additionally, our office, along with the FBI Newark Field Office,
created high-level thresholds and notification protocols to ensure that
all ``threat to life'' leads, particularly ones that involve schools,
are immediately actioned to the appropriate municipal, county, State,
and Federal law enforcement entities.
We will continue to prioritize the identification of suspicious
activity, as well as ensure there is a clear path for reporting and
addressing issues before an incident can occur.
We will expand innovative efforts through such measures as training
school personnel--including administrators, faculty, school resource
officers, Special Law Enforcement Officers, custodians, and bus
drivers--and the community as a whole on how to recognize and report
suspicious activity.
We will continue to work alongside the Department of Education to
help school leadership address school threats and the importance of
reporting suspicious activity with students and their parents and
guardians.
We remain committed to a whole-of-government approach, working with
other departments and agencies within the State administration to
provide comprehensive active-shooter response training, including ways
to spot pre-incident indicators and pathways to report those
indicators.
Our partners in the New Jersey State Police, Department of
Education, Department of Human Services, Department of Health,
Department of Children and Families have achieved tremendous success as
they built response capabilities that are second-to-none.
NJOHSP also collaborated with the Department of Education and
University Hospital to provide in-person training for school safety
specialists and to distribute more than 18,000 bleed control kits to
school districts throughout the State.
Through unannounced active-shooter drills across the State, we can
test and gauge the effectiveness of both plans and actions of faculty
and staff in an environment that is controlled, but realistic. We also
continue to conduct large-scale active-shooter exercises for K-12
schools.
Expanding security capabilities is an on-going focus, with
particular attention paid to mass gatherings; understanding common
vulnerabilities of these areas and events where large numbers of people
gather; and ensuring that everyone, including schoolchildren, know what
actions to take if they face emergency situations.
With that in mind, New Jersey colleges and universities participate
in quarterly Mass Gathering Working Group meetings aimed at identifying
and addressing those common vulnerabilities and filling any capability
gaps at locations where students gather throughout the State.
We want to not only make certain that we reinforce security
measures of buildings, but also that those inside the buildings are
empowered to safely respond to any incident. Training models and
traditional planning assumptions must continue to expand in accordance
with changing tactics and afford the capability to deviate from plans
in the event of an unexpected scenario.
We created a School Security subcommittee on the State's Domestic
Security Preparedness Task Force, which I chair, to coordinate best
practices across State agencies and integrate with National priorities
and local needs. Members of the subcommittee include the New Jersey
Department of Education's Office of Student Support Services,
University Hospital, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and the
FBI.
In 2018, with a grant from the Bureau of Justice Assistance STOP
School Violence Prevention and Mental Health Training Program, the
Department of Education and the New Jersey Department of Human Services
Disaster and Terrorism Branch, in partnership with Sandy Hook Promise,
facilitated training programs to schools across the State that focus on
identifying warning signs of violence and taking action before an
incident occurs.
Last, NJOHSP and the New Jersey State Police, in coordination with
county and local partners, conduct physical security assessments at
schools, as well as provide training to local law enforcement agencies
to increase the capability to conduct assessments across the State.
NJOHSP is currently developing a methodology to conduct common
vulnerability analyses from the physical school security assessment
findings.
njccic actions
The New Jersey Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Cell
(NJCCIC), a component organization within NJOHSP, is charged with
leading and coordinating New Jersey's cybersecurity efforts while
building resiliency to cyber threats throughout the State.
In March 2019, the NJCCIC hosted a Cybersecurity Symposium for
public-sector organizations, including those with limited cybersecurity
resources, such as school systems and districts. The purpose of this
conference was to provide attendees with practical strategies, tactics,
resources, and tools to help manage cyber risk in their respective
organizations and become more resilient to cyber attacks. One key
takeaway from the symposium was hearing from IT administrators in
school systems about lacking cybersecurity resources.
Over the past year, the NJCCIC has conducted 26 Cybersecurity
Threat and Risk Mitigation Briefings for K-12 and higher education
schools throughout New Jersey. In October, NJCCIC Director Michael
Geraghty is providing a cybersecurity briefing at the annual New Jersey
School Boards Association conference.
Over the past 2 years, the NJCCIC has received and/or responded to
166 cybersecurity incidents (38 in 2018 and 128 to date in 2019)
affecting New Jersey K-12 schools and higher education institutions.
The NJCCIC is continuously working to encourage institutions to report
incidents so that we may identify patterns and trends, as well as
provide risk mitigation strategies that would help the school community
at large thwart emerging threats.
h.r. 6920, the ``school security is homeland security grant act of
2018''
One of the biggest safety and security challenges facing many
educational institutions throughout New Jersey is funding. While the
importance of enhancing security efforts and resources is shared by
all, it is often difficult for schools to make the necessary financial
commitment to provide both appropriate and effective safety measures
for their facilities.
Legislation introduced by Chairman Payne--H.R. 6920, The ``School
Security is Homeland Security Grant Act of 2018''--would provide
dedicated Federal funding under current grant funding programs of at
least $90 million every year that is earmarked strictly for school
security.
This funding would greatly assist schools throughout the country,
including New Jersey, in enhancing the presence of security personnel
at their facilities and in the acquisition of target-hardening
equipment to secure those facilities.
This added resource would enable schools to meet the very goals we
have set out to achieve in the areas of prevention and response.
Through added security equipment, personnel, and trainings, schools
would increase their preparedness level exponentially to confront
threats.
conclusion
While mass gathering events and areas provide numerous benefits to
the public, such as fun, valuable learning experiences and a sense of
community, we cannot overlook the need for safety and security in these
areas. Those who wish to do harm at a heightened scale will continually
target these types of locations. Schools, colleges, and universities
are included in this trend and must remain a constant focus as we look
to secure mass gathering facilities that also encompass amusement
parks, arenas, casinos, and stadiums.
Efforts such as the Mass Gathering Working Group, community
outreach initiatives, and the countless trainings and exercises our
Office conducts each year highlight that we will do all that is
necessary to ensure the safety and security of the residents and
visitors throughout New Jersey, protecting them from terrorist threats
to our public spaces.
We remain dedicated to continuing these efforts; to further
collaborating with our law enforcement partners at the local, county,
State, and Federal levels; and to work toward addressing threats with a
focus on prevention.
Chairman Payne, Ranking Member King, and distinguished Members of
the subcommittee, I thank you again for the opportunity to testify
today.
I look forward to your questions and yield back to the Chairman.
Mr. Payne. Thank you for your testimony, sir.
I now recognize Ms. Martinez-Prather to summarize her
statement for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF KATHY MARTINEZ-PRATHER, DIRECTOR, TEXAS SCHOOL
SAFETY CENTER
Ms. Martinez-Prather. Chairman Payne, Ranking Member King,
and Members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to
testify today on the topic of school safety and for your
leadership in making school safety a priority and a critical
part of the educational agenda for all of our schools across
the country.
I am the director of the Texas School Safety Center at
Texas State University, and I am here to discuss the efforts of
the Center to support schools in effectively carrying out
school safety mandates and best practices in Texas, the
importance of prevention efforts in developing a comprehensive
approach to school safety, and the impact that community
violence also has in our schools.
As you are aware, every day, our schools face challenges
that have the potential to impede the learning process for our
students. And these challenges can range from human-caused acts
of violence, to natural disasters, to more frequent safety
issues that our schools deal with every single day.
The tragic events in Santa Fe, Texas, and Parkland,
Florida, and countless others that have impacted our Nation's
schools continue to remind us that we have a lot of work to do.
We all need to continue to work and collaborate to ensure that
our students have a safe place to learn and thrive.
The Texas School Safety Center was created in 1999
following the Columbine school shooting. The Center is tasked
in the Texas Education Code and the Governor's Homeland
Security Strategic Plan to serve as the central clearinghouse
for the dissemination of school safety information, including
training, research, and technical assistance for all K-12
districts, charter schools, and community colleges across the
State.
The Center has a Governor-appointed board of directors that
represent practitioners such as teachers and principals,
superintendents, school board members, school-based law
enforcement, and parents, all who provide a diverse perspective
to inform the work that we do.
Texas has approximately 1,025 school districts that include
over 9,000 individual campuses, 700 charter schools, and 50
community colleges, all serving over 5.3 million students.
Texas schools are charged currently with several school
safety mandates. Some of those include the adoption and
implementation of a multi-hazard emergency operations plan;
providing for employee training in responding to an emergency;
conducting drills and exercises to prepare students and
employees, including substitute teachers, for responding to an
emergency; conducting an audit of all their district facilities
once every 3 years; and establishing a school safety and
security committee.
This last Texas legislative session, our State passed
significant school safety mandates to further enhance the
posture of safety in our Texas schools. Those mandates I will
highlight:
School districts, charter schools, and community colleges
must submit their multi-hazard emergency operation plans now
for review and verification to the School Safety Center, with
the opportunity for the Center to provide feedback and for the
school district to make corrective action.
Each school district also must now establish a behavioral
threat assessment team to serve each campus of the district.
Then a licensed architect will also be another school
safety board member to inform and prioritize the critical role
that school design plays to uphold the positive safe and
learning environment.
Our commissioner of education has to also adopt facility
standards for schools that provide for a safe and secure
learning environment.
On May 18, 2018, Santa Fe High School was the target of a
senseless attack, taking the lives of 10 people--8 students and
2 teachers. While the high school and school district as well
as community continue to recover from this tragic event, the
State of Texas also continues to make school safety a priority.
The Center knows that schools face many threats, hazards,
and vulnerabilities, and, although an active attack is rare,
the impact is no doubt catastrophic. That is why we take a
comprehensive approach to school safety. We provide training,
develop tools and resources for schools on how to prevent and/
or mitigate, as well as respond to, and recover from, any type
of threat or hazard that could arise.
School architecture and design is one of those key
mitigation strategies. To be clear, this is not about
installing cameras and metal detectors, although that may be
appropriate for some schools. This is about designing schools
to be learning spaces first, ones that contain minimally
invasive but effective security measures. This best practice
ensures that, whether a building is new or existing, its
physical features do not negatively impact teachers, students,
or the community at large.
The Center also stresses to schools the importance of
prevention efforts in the overall comprehensive approach to
school safety. As I mentioned earlier, Texas now requires
school districts to have behavioral threat assessment teams.
Responding to an active-shooter event or knowing what to do if
an intruder enters the bills are skills that students,
teachers, and administrators unfortunately need to practice and
perfect.
However, we know that educators are most interested in
being preventative and proactive, not reactive. After a violent
event occurs in our schools, educators, parents, community
members, and legislators want to know what we could have done
to have this event prevented.
Research of U.S. school shootings has shown that these
events can be prevented because the acts are typically planned
in advance, the actors tell others beforehand about their
violent plans, and the acts are often carried out because there
is a level of desperation or the view that violence is the only
option left to solve problems.
Behavioral threat assessment provides a proactive,
evidence-based approach for identifying individuals who may
pose a threat to themselves or others, intervening with
appropriate resources, and ultimately improving the safety and
well-being of the individual of concern, the situation, and the
school.
The goal of threat assessment is not to punish the child.
It is not intended to be an adversarial process, but to connect
them with the appropriate interventions they need so a threat
can be averted.
Last, I want to bring attention to the impact that
community violence has on schools. Most recently, on August 3,
2019, a gunman in El Paso, Texas, entered a Walmart and took
the lives of 22 people, including a student from a nearby
school district. Weeks later, on August 31, a gunman
senselessly killed 7 people throughout the Midland-Odessa
community, including a student from a nearby school district.
Although these were not school shootings, they had a
significant impact on the school districts in those
communities. As mentioned, 2 of those individuals killed were
students, and many others either friends or family members and
in some way connected to the school district.
In the aftermath that these acts of violence, many of the
school districts in these communities were provided resources
to assist with counseling for students, staff, and parents,
which in some districts still continues today.
I want to finally communicate that school safety is a
shared responsibility that involves school boards,
superintendents, principals, teachers, mental health
professionals, law enforcement, architects, State agencies and
organizations, parents, students, and policy makers.
By ensuring that our schools are safe and healthy learning
environments, we give our children the opportunity to excel
academically, emotionally, and socially.
Again, thank you for the opportunity to speak today, and I
look forward to answering any questions you may have.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Martinez-Prather follows:]
Statement of Kathy Martinez-Prather
September 26, 2019
Chairman Payne, Ranking Member King, and Members of the
subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today on the
topic of school safety and for your leadership in making school safety
a priority and a critical part of the educational agenda for all our
schools across the country. I am the director of the Texas School
Safety Center (TxSSC) at Texas State University, and I am here to
discuss the efforts of the TxSSC to support schools in effectively
carrying out school safety mandates and best practices in Texas, the
importance of prevention efforts in developing a comprehensive approach
to school safety, and the impact community acts of violence have on
schools.
As you are aware, every day our schools face challenges that have
the potential to impede the learning process for our students. These
challenges can range from human-caused acts of violence or natural
disasters to more frequent safety issues that educators confront daily.
The tragic events in Santa Fe, TX and Parkland, FL, and countless
others that have impacted our Nation's schools continue to remind us
that we have a lot of work to do and we all need to continue to work
and collaborate together to ensure that our students have a safe place
to learn every day.
background of txssc and school safety mandates
The Texas School Safety Center at Texas State University, was
created in 1999 following the tragic Columbine school shooting, and
authorized by the Texas Legislature in 2001. The TxSSC is tasked in the
Texas Education Code and the Governor's Homeland Security Strategic
Plan to serve as the clearinghouse for the dissemination of school
safety and security information, including training, research, and
technical assistance for K-12 school districts, community colleges, and
most recently--charter schools, in Texas. The Center has a Governor
appointed board of directors that represent practitioners such as
teachers, principals, superintendents, school board members, school-
based law enforcement officers, and parents--who all provide a diverse
perceptive to inform the work of the TxSSC.
As a research center, the TxSSC also engages in applied research
that informs guidance for school practitioners about effective best
practices in school safety. Our mission is to serve schools to create
safe, secure, and healthy learning environments. Texas has
approximately 1,025 school districts--that include over 9,000
individual campuses, 700 charter schools, and 50 community colleges--
all serving over 5.3 million students.
Texas schools are charged with several school safety mandates that
require:
The adoption and implementation of a multi-hazard emergency
operation plan
Providing for employee training in responding to an
emergency
Conducting drills and exercises to prepare students and
employees, including substitute teachers, for responding to an
emergency
Conducting an audit of their district facilities, at least
once every 3 years, and submitting their audit data to the
TxSSC
Establishing a school safety and security committee.
This last Texas Legislative Session--our State passed significant
school safety legislation to further enhance the posture of safety in
our Texas schools. Three of those mandates I will highlight:
School districts, charter schools, and community colleges
must submit their Multi-hazard Emergency Operations Plan for
review and verification to the TxSSC--with the opportunity for
the TxSSC to provide feedback and for the school district to
make corrective action.
Each school district must establish a behavioral threat
assessment team to serve each campus of the district.
A licensed architect will be a TxSSC board member to inform
and prioritize the critical role that school design plays to
uphold a positive and safe learning environment.
Since its inception, the TxSSC has provided training and developed
resources to stakeholders such as district and campus administrators,
teachers, school counselors, school board members, and school-based law
enforcement in areas such as emergency operations planning, multi-
hazard response protocols, drilling and exercising, the school safety
and security audit process, behavioral threat assessment, development
of MOUs, youth preparedness, bullying prevention, suicide prevention,
and internet safety, and specialized training to school-based law
enforcement--just to name a few.
prevention and mitigation efforts in school safety
On May 18, 2018, Santa Fe High School, located in Santa Fe, TX was
the target of a senseless active attack taking the lives of 10 people--
8 students and 2 teachers. While the high school and school district,
as well as the community continue to recover from this tragic event,
the State of Texas also continues to make school safety a priority.
The TxSSC knows that schools face many threats, hazards, and
vulnerabilities--and although an active attack is still rare--the
impact is no doubt catastrophic. That's why we take a comprehensive
approach to school safety. We provide training and develop tools/
resources for schools on how to prevent and/or mitigate as well as
respond to and recover from, any type of threat that could arise.
School architecture and design is one of those key mitigation
strategies. To be clear, this isn't about installing cameras and metal
detectors, although that may be appropriate for some schools. This is
about designing schools to be learning spaces first; ones that contain
minimally invasive but effective security measures. This best practice
ensures that whether a building is new or existing, its physical
features don't negatively impact teachers, students, or the community
at-large.
The TxSSC also stresses to schools the importance of prevention
efforts in the overall comprehensive approach to school safety. Modeled
after the State of Virginia legislation, Texas now requires school
districts to have behavioral threat assessment teams. Responding to an
active-shooter event or knowing what to do if an intruder enters the
building are skills students, teachers, and administrators
unfortunately need to practice and perfect. However, we know that
educators are most interested in being preventative and proactive, not
reactive. After a violent event occurs in our schools, educators,
parents, community members, and legislators want to know how it could
have been prevented.
Research of U.S. school shootings has shown that these violent
events can be prevented because the acts are typically planned in
advance, the actors tell others beforehand about their violent plans,
and the acts are often carried out because there is a level of
desperation or the view that violence is the only option left to solve
problems.
Behavioral threat assessment provides a proactive, evidence-based
approach for identifying individuals who may pose a threat to self or
others, intervening with appropriate resources, and ultimately
improving the safety and well-being of the individual of concern, the
situation, and the school.
The goal of threat assessment is not to punish a child, but to
connect them with the appropriate interventions they need so a threat
can be averted and that individual can be put on a path to success.
Keeping our schools safe involves not just effectively responding to
violent events, but working to prevent them as well. Behavioral threat
assessment management is a means to do just that.
impact of community violence on schools
Community acts of violence also have a significant impact on
schools. Most recently, on August 3, 2019, a gunman in El Paso, TX
entered a Walmart and took the lives of 22 people, including a student
from a nearby school district. Weeks later on August 31, a gunman
senselessly killed 7 people throughout the Midland/Odessa community,
including a student from a nearby school district. On November 5, 2017,
a gunman fatally shot and killed 26 people at the First Baptist Church
in Sutherland Springs, TX.
Although these were not school shootings, they had a significant
impact on the school districts in those communities. As mentioned, 2 of
the individuals killed were students and many others either friends or
family members of those in the school district. In the aftermath of
these acts of violence, many of the school districts in these
communities were also provided resources to assist with counseling for
students, staff, and parents, which in some cases still continues
today. It is important to understand that these acts of violence in the
community also impact schools. I have spoken with several of the
superintendents in these communities, who also knew I would be here
today, and what is paramount throughout these discussions is the desire
to engage in preventative strategies--specifically through the threat
assessment process--to avert acts of violence before they ever occur,
whether in our schools or in our communities.
School safety is a shared responsibility that involves school
boards, superintendents, principals, teachers, mental health
professionals, law enforcement, architects, school safety
professionals, various State agencies/organizations, parents, students,
policy makers, and the entire community. By ensuring that our schools
are safe and healthy learning environments, we give our children the
opportunity to excel both academically and socially.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today and I look
forward answering any questions you may have.
Mr. Payne. Thank you for your testimony.
I now recognize Mr. Schachter to summarize his statement
for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF MAX SCHACHTER, FOUNDER AND CEO, SAFE SCHOOLS FOR
ALEX
Mr. Schachter. My name is Max Schachter. My son Alex was
one of 17 people that were brutally murdered at Marjory
Stoneman Douglas High School last year. After I buried my son,
my priority was to make sure that my other 3 children were safe
in their schools.
I have spent the past year advocating for National school
safety best practices that can be recognized at the Federal
level and housed a school safety website and made available to
all schools. My goal is to make it as easy as possible for
schools to be as safe as possible.
I am pleased to see the President's Federal Commission on
School Safety report recommend development of this
clearinghouse, and the Department of Homeland Security, along
with other Federal agencies, have been working extremely hard
to implement this recommendation.
I recently reviewed a demonstration of the DHS new school
safety clearinghouse website. It is schoolsafety.gov. I was
extremely impressed as well. I hope once the website is
launched there will be an aggressive outreach campaign to
schools and school districts so they take advantage of this
information as quickly as possible.
Two areas that this committee can have the most impact are
in the areas of grants and emergency communications.
With regard to grants, grants can be used so--I understand
that FEMA preparedness grants can be used today by local
jurisdictions to support school safety enhancements. I
recommend this committee consider ways to ensure FEMA grant
dollars that are used for school safety are used to implement
the best practices identified on the DHS school safety
clearinghouse website and that they should be used on the most
basic safety enhancements before anything else. Expensive
technology upgrades should take a back seat to common-sense
measures that enhance security.
With regard to emergency communications, in Parkland, the
first-responder radios failed and were not interoperable,
delaying help for victims who were dying on the third floor,
waiting for medical attention. SWAT teams had to resort to
using hand signals to avoid shooting each other because their
radios failed.
The 9/11 Commission report highlighted this problem at the
Pentagon and at Ground Zero, and nearly 20 years later the same
problem plagued our first responders at my son's school. This
is not acceptable, and it has to stop.
Congress can't force all first-responder agencies to use a
single radio system, but you can incentivize agencies to become
instantly interoperable as soon as an incident happens
regardless of what radio system you are using.
In addition to grants and communications improvements, I
recommend Congress pass the EAGLES Act to reauthorize the U.S.
Secret Service's National Threat Assessment Center so that they
can expand the reach to help States develop threat assessment
programs. These programs can identify students that exhibit
concerning behavior and get them the help they need before they
commit acts of targeted violence.
I also support the TAPS Act, which would result in a DHS-
led process to develop threat assessment capabilities at the
broadest level across the United States. The Secret Service
uses threat assessment teams to protect the President. The
Capitol Hill police use threat assessment teams to protect you
in Congress. Our children deserve the same protection.
In my view, the reason school shootings have been an
epidemic for the last two decades is, No. 1, parents and
community members have a mindset that it can't happen here.
That false sense of security is partly due to the fact that
schools are not being honest with the public about violence on
their campus.
Additionally, schools are not successfully establishing a
positive culture and climate, as in many cases result in
bullying, which can lead to school mass murder. We need to do a
better job of teaching kids the tools to deal with their anger,
rejection, and failure later in life.
Florida has implemented laws to gain school district
compliance, but I believe the most effective strategy to doing
this is public pressure to make school districts prioritize
safety and security.
Unfortunately, there is no school safety rating system that
currently exists to tell parents whether or not their school is
safe. When parents go on-line to look at ratings of K through
12, many of them have an A rating. They don't realize that that
is just academics. Academics are important, but if the children
do not come home from their school every day, nothing else
matters.
The car industry's crash test rating has improved car
safety and decreased fatalities, but for parents, there is no
way to know if their child's school is safe. I believe a school
safety rating system would influence change Nation-wide.
It has been 20 years since Columbine, and children continue
to be murdered in their classroom. Unfortunately, we know that
the next school mass murderer is already out there. It is not a
question of if; it is a question of when. We know what can be
done to prevent it, and we know what must be done to mitigate
the risk of more lives lost.
Thank you very much, and I look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Schachter follows:]
Prepared Statement of Max Schachter
9/26/19
My name is Max Schachter, my son Alex was one of 17 people that
were brutally murdered at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School last
year. After I buried my son my priority was to make sure my other 3
children were safe in their schools. I could not afford to lose another
child. I said to law enforcement and school officials show me the best
practices, show me the school safety standards and they all told me
there were none. I couldn't understand how that was possible. We
developed fire codes after 92 children died in a school fire in 1958
and it has worked. No child has died in a school fire in 60 years. It
has been 20 years since Columbine and children and teachers continue to
be murdered in their classrooms.
I traveled the country and came to realize that in all of the
139,000 K-12 schools, each principal had to become a school security
expert. It made no sense to me that each school had to reinvent the
wheel. The idea that crystalized for me was the need to create National
School Safety Best Practices at the Federal level. Those best practices
would be housed on a clearinghouse website so that all schools had a
repository to find the most effective ways to secure their school.
I was pleased to see this idea highlighted in President Trump's
Federal Commission on School Safety report and the subsequent
development of the clearinghouse in DHS. I received an in-depth demo of
their new website SchoolSafety.gov several days ago and I was very
impressed. DHS hopes to have it live by the end of October. Once the
website has been launched there needs to be a huge outreach to schools
and school districts.
Once we have the best practices, we need to make sure that all
Federal grant dollars are being used to implement the newly-developed
best practices. For example, Broward County received $500,000 from COPS
for analytic cameras when they did not even have an active assailant
response policy. They were not training their teachers and staff what
to do in a school shooting. They did not identify safer corner of the
classrooms. They didn't have coverings for the windows to obscure the
sight line of the shooter. In order to move the needle, we have to make
sure schools are not just throwing money at the problem (analytic
cameras) but they're doing things in a systematic planned approach.
Unfortunately, we know we can't prevent 100 percent of these school
mass murders. But we know that we can absolutely mitigate a lot of risk
to students, teachers, and staff when they do happen. Every school can
do things TODAY to improve school safety. Many of those things are low-
cost or no-cost. Those measures will be on SchoolSafety.gov. Things
like developing a formal active assailant response policy, training
your teachers and students what to do in an emergency, train all staff
to lock doors, identify the safer corners in the classroom, If you have
an app for students to report threats advertise it, train your students
how to use it, make sure all teachers have the ability to block the
sightline of the window, make sure law enforcement has live real-time
access to school cameras during emergencies.
Other measures I support are implementing Stop The Bleed kits in
all classrooms and offices. That way your teachers and staff can be
first responders. SWAT will not arrive for over 30 minutes. if you do
not stop an arterial bleed within 5 minutes your chance of survival is
minute.
Given the fact that most school shootings take place in 4-5
minutes, immediate notification to law enforcement and the entire
school campus is paramount. The process in most K-12 schools takes way
to long and people die due to the time lapse.
One of best ways to prevent the next school shooting are threat
assessment teams. After the VA Tech shooting the State of Virginia
implemented the threat assessment program developed by the USSS
National Threat Assessment Center. As a result, they have not had a
school shooting since. I recommend all members to co-sponsor and pass
the EAGLES Act. It reauthorizes the U.S. Secret Service National Threat
Assessment Center so they will be able to expand their reach in order
to help other States develop threat assessment programs to identify
students that exhibit concerning behavior and to get them the help they
need before they commit acts of targeted violence. I support the TAPS
Act as well. The U.S. Secret Service uses threat assessments to protect
the President. The Capitol Hill Police uses threat assessment teams to
protect Congress. Our children deserve the same protection. Pass the
EAGLES Act!
In my view the main reason school shootings have been an epidemic
for the past 2 decades is two-fold. No. 1, parents and community
members have an ``it can't happen here'' mindset. That mindset lets
complacency set in and prevents them from having a security mindset.
Schools are not being honest about the violence on their campus and
there is no way for parents to know if their child's school is safe.
No. 2, schools are not successfully establishing a positive culture and
climate on their campus which results in bullying. Kids are not being
given enough tools to function after they graduate to deal with their
anger, rejection, failure, and crisis they will no question experience.
A prime example of the underreporting of campus violence can be
seen in in what Marjory Stoneman Douglas reported to the State for the
years 2014-2017. They reported No bullying, No harassment, and ZERO
Threat/Intimidation. We all know those numbers are bogus and far from
true. It's not just Broward County that is inaccurately reporting these
incidents. This is pervasive across the entire country. The result is a
false sense of security which leads to complacency in implementing
school safety best practices. School districts around the country must
ensure that each school accurately report all required incidents and
that under-reporting is eliminated. Unfortunately, there IS AN
incentive to underreport so the numbers look good.
On college campuses, the Federal Cleary Act imposes large financial
penalties for inaccurate reporting of campus crime statistics. In K-12
there is such no requirement. When the public goes on-line to look at
the ratings of K-12 many of them, including MSD, have an `A' rating.
The public does not understand that has nothing to do with the safety
of that institution. That is just academics. Academics are important,
but if children do not come home from school every day NOTHING else
matters. There is no school safety rating system currently to inform
parents and teachers whether or not their school has implemented best
practices to prevent and mitigate casualties during the next school
attack. Florida has implemented laws to gain school district
compliance, but I believe the most effective strategy is to use public
pressure to make school districts prioritize safety and security. I
believe we need a school safety rating system. The car industry's crash
test rating system has improved car safety and decreased fatalities.
But for parents there is nothing. No way to know if your child's school
is safe or not.
Broward County Public School pre-arrest diversionary program known
as PROMISE created a culture of leniency within its schools. This
prevented the judicial system from having an opportunity to address the
murderer's systematic violent behavior and resulted in him never being
arrested. He was able to accumulate 55 instances of disciplinary
action. Everyone is in favor of giving kids a ``second chance'' but not
55 of them. This disciplinary system prioritized the rights of the
murderer over the rights of every other child in his classes and
schools that he tormented, assaulted, and threatened. There were 69
documented incidents where the murderer threaten someone, engaged in
violence, talked about guns or other weapons. It was no surprise to
anyone on campus that he had committed this horrible act of violence.
He had been violent since age 3. There were an additional 43 instances
of law enforcement interaction with him outside of school. He was never
arrested. He had all the red flags of a future school mass murderer. He
was suicidal, homicidal, killed animals, mutilated their bodies,
obsessed with weapons, and when he turned 18 his mother bought him a
gun.
Broward County public schools used FERPA to not share information
and data with law enforcement. Their refusal to let law enforcement
have access to school cameras prevented law enforcement from having
live actionable intelligence inside the building. They waited 11
minutes to enter the building. Upon arriving law enforcement thought
the murderer was still inside. They did not go up to the third floor
for over 40 minutes to administer medical attention to the 10 kids that
had been shot and were dying. They had no idea the murderer had escaped
after 6 minutes.
There must be a conversation with the law enforcement about active-
shooter training. Broward Sheriff Office Active Shooter policy on 2/14/
18 was that officers MAY go toward the shooter as opposed to SHALL go
toward the shooter. During the interviews of BSO deputies some could
not remember if their last active-shooter training was 10 years ago or
20 years ago. That is probably because their training frequency was
only every 3 years. The SRO on campus Deputy Peterson underwent a
single, 1-hour active-shooter exercise in the 3 years leading up to the
mass shooting. They only had 5 trainers for a force of over 5k
officers. The SRO on campus arrived at the front of the building in 1
min 44 seconds. By then 24 people had been shot and or killed on the
first floor. After arriving to the front of the building the SRO heard
the gun fire. He then went and hid behind a concrete pillar for 48
minutes. He never entered the building. Active-shooter training builds
muscle memory. Unfortunately, during a mass casualty event people do
not rise to the occasion. they fall to their lowest level of training.
The other responding agency, Coral Springs Police Department, conducts
active-shooter training every year. Those officer in contrast went
right into the building. Eight Sheriff deputies heard gunshots and did
not attempt to enter the building. They are either under investigation,
reassigned, or retired. [sic] no active bulletproof vest wear policy
After Columbine, all responding officers were required to rapidly
deploy directly to the threat. Yet in Parkland, 8 deputies waited
outside for 11 minutes while kids and staff were being slaughtered. In
Parkland, first responder radios failed and were not interoperable,
delaying help for victims. SWAT teams had to resort to hand signals to
avoid shooting each other because their radios failed. Yet as a country
we haven't truly committed to solving the communications problems. We
can't force all agencies to use a single radio system, but we CAN make
it possible for them to communicate no matter what system they are
using. After Sandy Hook each school should have trained their students
and staff how to respond to active shooters. Sadly, many did not.
During the 2017-2018 school year, Marjory Stoneman Douglas did not hold
a single code red drill. Students and staff did not know what to do
when the murderer fired his AR-15 into classrooms and killing their
classmates. No staff member called a code red until 3 minutes after the
shooting had started. By then all 17 people were dead, including my
little Alex.
It has been 20 years since the Columbine massacre and children
continue to be murdered in their classrooms. We know the next school
mass murderer is already out there. The gun that he will use is already
out there. It is not a question of IF, it is a question of WHEN. We
know what can be done to prevent it, and we know what MUST be done to
mitigate the risk of more lives lost.
Attachment.--School Safety Measures Implemented in Florida Post the
Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Massacre
*Majority of measures were recommended by the Marjory Stoneman
Douglas High School Public Safety Commission after their 14-month
investigation into the 2/14/18 massacre. Their recommendations were
subsequently signed into law by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
*All measures are completed except for ones marked
gun safety
Created a legal process (Risk Protection Orders) that
requires people meeting certain criteria (threatened self-harm
or harm toward others) to surrender their firearms and
prohibits them from purchasing firearms.
Prohibits gun purchases by anyone under age 21 and requires
a 3-day waiting period for all gun purchases.
Authorizes law enforcement officers to seize firearms when
taking someone into custody under the Baker Act for threatened
harm toward another person.
guardian program
Created the Guardian Program and required that there be an
armed Safe School Officer (armed person) on every school
campus.
The legislature should expand the Guardian Program to
include all school personnel.
Law enforcement and guardian staffing should be sufficient
on each charter, elementary, middle, and high school campus to
provide immediate back-up and appropriate and timely response
to an active assailant situation. (Pending. Most schools have
one or two SROs or guardians, but most school districts still
prohibit any school staff from participating in the guardian
program.)
mental health
Expanded mental health Community Action Teams to focus on
people up to age 21 who have a history of criminal justice and
law enforcement involvement.
Expanded multi-agency network of mental health services in
K-12 schools.
Expanded mental health Mobile Response Teams focusing on
people up to age 25 who are in crisis and need intensive case
management until they are placed into services.
At registration, every student is required to disclose any
prior mental health referrals and schools are permitted to
refer students for mental health services.
Courts are required to report to the school superintendent
any child they refer to mental health services.
Mandated that mental health professionals report and warn
others of impending threats by their patients.
School mental health records must be placed in the student
record and follow the student when he/she transfers from school
to school and inter-district. Records are now required to be
transferred within 3 days and if a student is under care of a
Threat Assessment Team the transferring team is responsible to
ensure continuity of services until the receiving school's team
evaluates the student.
Students referred for mental health services must commence
treatment within 45 days. School-based treatment must begin
within 15 days and community treatment within 30 days.
Consider targeted mental health case management for people
in 13 to 25 age range.
School districts should coordinate mental health services
with community providers. (Pending, but law now permits
referrals by school providers to community-based providers).
prevention
Created FortifyFL app as a mobile suspicious activity
reporting tool and requires that all Florida schools promote
the app.
Every school in the State is required to have a Behavioral
Threat Assessment Team. The team is required to have certain
members, including a law enforcement officer.
FLDOE will provide all districts a standardized behavioral
threat assessment instrument and develop an on-line threat
assessment database.
Required the development of an Integrated Data Repository
and Social Media Monitoring tool.
Makes it a felony to threaten to kill someone without the
previous ``transmission'' requirement.
school hardening
Every classroom must have a designated safe area or hard
corner.
Require that all gates to school campuses are closed and
locked. When open the gates must be staffed. (Pending. Survey
shows compliance in 59/67 districts.)
All campuses should have single ingress and egress points.
(Pending)
Each classroom door should have an immediately available
opaque covering to block the line of sight from the outside.
(Pending)
Every school should have a policy requiring that classroom
doors be locked when occupied.
All law enforcement agencies in Broward County should have
live, real-time access to cameras in all Broward County
schools. (Pending. BSO has access and access is pending by
other agencies.)
Every school must have an effective communication system
through which all personnel may transmit and receive threat
notifications. (Pending. Survey shows some compliance but still
pending in many schools).
Required annual physical site security assessment of every
school in the State, and report to DOE using the Florida Safe
School Assessment Tool (FSSAT). In addition to the school
specific assessment and report, a separate district-wide report
is required annually.
Established School Hardening and Harm Mitigation Workgroup.
The workgroup must be comprised of school security subject-
matter experts and the workgroup must submit a report with
recommendations to DOE by August 1, 2020.
training/drills
Every school must conduct monthly active assailant drills.
Every school district and charter school must adopt an
active-shooter response plan and all school personnel must be
trained on the plan.
All school active assailant policies must make clear that
all staff are empowered to initiate an active-shooter response.
discipline policy/diversion program
School district ``zero tolerance'' policies cannot apply to
petty acts, except acts of violence, but when a student commits
more than one misdemeanor the Threat Assessment Team must
consult with law enforcement to determine if the act should be
``reported'' to law enforcement.
Include school diversion programs under the same auspices as
community juvenile diversion programs. (Not completed but DJJ
report just issued.)
broward sheriff's office
BSO should change its active assailant response policy from
``may'' to ``shall,'' requiring that deputies enter an active-
shooter situation to stop the threat.
BSO should increase the frequency and quality of its active
assailant response training.
radio/communications/9-1-1
Law enforcement agencies throughout Florida should be
required to have radio interoperability in each county and with
surrounding jurisdictions.
Police agencies should be required to share primary patrol
radio channels with other agencies.
All 9-1-1 centers should have direct radio communication
with all first responder agencies in their service area.
broward county public schools (bcps)
BCPS should conduct an internal investigation into the
actions and inactions of AP Jeff Morford (mishandling of the
Cruz threat assessment), Principal Ty Thompson and others.
(Pending).
Require that all school personnel report suspicious
incidents to a school administrator, that the incidents be
tracked, and their disposition documented.
BCPS should evaluate its threat assessment process.
florida department of education
Every school district is required to have a School Safety
Specialist to oversee school safety in the district.
Created the Office of Safe School (OSS) within the
Department of Education (DOE). OSS is responsible for
compliance and oversight of all school safety and security
matters throughout the State.
Establish a workgroup to recommend FERPA changes. (Pending.
The DOE analysis was just completed.)
Require mandatory use of the Florida Safe School Assessment
Tool (FSSAT) by all districts and schools.
Authorizes the FLDOE commissioner to oversee and require
compliance with all Florida school safety laws including
completion and submission of the FSSAT.
FL DOE commissioner and State BOE now has sanction authority
to ensure compliance with all mandated school safety
requirements.
CJSTC should require single officer response training. CJSTC
has not acted on this but FDLE has created the training.
(Pending.)
Mr. Payne. I would like to thank all the witnesses for
their testimony.
I will remind each Member that he or she will have 5
minutes to question the panel.
I will now recognize myself for questions.
Ms. Hogg, I want to take a minute before I ask my question
to show a video that March for our Lives put out about active-
shooter drills in schools and the reality of what kids are
going through today. For context, this is a real student and
was not scripted.
So let us play the video, please.
[Video shown.]
Mr. Payne. Ms. Hogg, can you tell the subcommittee what
goes through your mind when you see this video? What should
Congress be doing to help ensure kids are safe in schools,
rather than putting the responsibility on kids to become
experts in active-shooter situations?
Ms. Hogg. So I was grateful enough to be able to be part of
the creation team on this video. I remember, when I first saw
it, the first thing that came to mind is myself. I saw myself
in that little girl that was giving that training because that
was me; that has been me my whole life. As I said, I was born
after Columbine, and we learned those little rhymes, nursery
rhyme things, that are supposed to teach you how to try and
survive when somebody comes into your school to murder you.
Additionally, I think there are many things that can be
done that I addressed in my testimony. But I think, of course,
I will always say this: The first step, although it may be
difficult, is to address the gun violence epidemic.
Additionally, like I said, we must invest money into school
mental health resources. We cannot just say again or hear
again, from my perspective, Members of Congress say that they
are going to do something about mental health--because I
completely agree with that--but then do absolutely nothing.
I have seen what it is like. I am still in school. I think
for many people, many legislators, like yourselves, school is
different these days, probably, than when you went to school.
There are so many extended pressures, extra pressures, that we
deal with every single day. So I really would push mental
health. I think you need to have those conversations with
mental health professionals themselves to see what works best.
Yes, I think, like I said, with that video, all I saw was
myself growing up, because that was me, and that still is me,
and it will probably forever be me, because that is what I was
taught as I was learning my ABCs.
Mr. Payne. Thank you.
The Chair recognizes Mr. King.
Mr. King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Let me thank all the witnesses, especially Ms. Hogg and Mr.
Schachter, for being here today and trying to make something
positive out of something so horrible. So I want to thank you
for that.
Director Maples, let me lead off with you. First of all,
thank you for your work on homeland security from a neighboring
State. I know the work you are doing, and I am very
appreciative of that.
Mr. Maples. Thank you.
Mr. King. You mentioned training programs from grants. Do
you think those programs are successful in preventing violence?
Are schools implementing them?
Mr. Maples. So the training programs that we have existing
in New Jersey, one of the biggest focus areas for us is on that
preventive part. So we are really focusing on everything from
bus drivers, to custodians, to teachers, to students, as far as
if a classmate is demonstrating or a person they know in the
community is demonstrating behavioral indicators, that they
should report that.
So part of training becomes, No. 1, recognizing what those
behaviors are and, No. 2, where to go with the information in a
way that maintains everyone's rights but allows us to look into
it and work with mental health professionals, the school
district, the law enforcement part, et cetera.
So, from that perspective, we are implementing those across
the State----
Mr. King. Do you find the school districts are taking it
seriously?
Mr. Maples. We do. In New Jersey, we definitely have--I am
sure there are some outliers. There definitely are outliers.
But we continually work with them and with the Department of
Education to make sure that that training gets out there and
they are taking it seriously.
Mr. King. Mr. Schachter, along those lines--again, thank
you for your testimony. You basically discussed the lack of
concern that too many school districts have had. You have
spoken all over the country now. Do you find that the concern
is increasing? Is there still an apathy in certain districts,
thinking it is never going to hit them?
Mr. Schachter. It depends. If you have had a school
shooting in your community, you are hyper-vigilant, but many
schools districts around this country still think it is not
going to happen to them.
You know, there is no way for parents to know whether or
not your school is safe. There are so many things that we can
do today that are low-cost, no-cost that have been implemented
in Florida.
Just to give you an example, in Broward County, which is
the sixth-largest school district in the country, we didn't
even have a formal active assailant response policy. Marjory
Stoneman Douglas did not conduct a Code Red drill for several
years prior to the shooting. So they didn't train their
teachers, they didn't train their staff what to do in an
emergency. If, God forbid, an active shooter walks on your
campus, what is happening--what happened at Marjory Stoneman
Douglas is a lot of dead people. That needs to change.
So, you know, in Florida, we have mandated--we have come to
the realization that schools are not going to do the right
thing. They have failed to protect our children. In Florida, we
have mandated that schools implement drills. We have mandated
every one of them has to have an active assailant response
policy. They all have to train.
Training in a lockdown, which is what many schools are
doing, is just teaching the next school shooter exactly where
to go. We need to be training them and giving them options-
based training so that they have lots of different options if,
God forbid, something happens.
So, extremely happy that we have the school safety website
coming live, but we need more schools to be able to access that
information and make their schools safe. There is still a lot
of apathy in this country.
Mr. King. Is there any resistance, or is it just apathy?
Mr. Schachter. You know, I think----
Mr. King. A lot of people don't want to hear about it. I
remember, like, for instance, when the heroin epidemic was
starting, many schools didn't want to admit that there was a
heroin epidemic. They didn't want to admit it was in their
district. They were afraid of what was going to happen in the
next school budget or what the rating of the school would be.
Do you find any resistance like that when it comes to gun
safety?
Mr. Schachter. You know, there is a culture to underreport
violence on campus. Just to give you an example, in Broward
County, at Marjory Stoneman Douglas, between 2014 to 2017, they
reported zero assaults, zero threats, zero intimidation. These
are all not true and lies.
So we need accurate reporting of violence on campus.
Bullying can lead to mass murder. We need to be able to know
what is happening on our campus so we can help the children, we
can reduce violence on campus. That will make all children
safe, that will make communities safe.
It is a cooperative effort, so it is working with law
enforcement inside the community, inside the schools.
Mr. King. Thank you for your dedication and for your
eloquence.
Mr. Schachter. Thank you.
Mr. King. I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Payne. Thank you.
I now recognize the gentleman from New York, Mr. Rose.
Mr. Rose. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Hogg, thank you for showing the courage to come here
today.
Do you think we have done enough, Congress?
Ms. Hogg. I mean, I think if you would have done enough, we
wouldn't have to be having this conversation today, right? Just
to be frank with you.
I think if we did enough, I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't
have lost my friends. Lots of people back in my community in
Florida would not have lost their children or their loved ones.
I think there is much more that needs to be done.
I appreciate, as I stated in my testimony, you allowing me
to be here today, because that is the first step, but I think
there is a myriad of things that we need to work on, like I
said.
I believe part of school safety is implementing proactive
measures that include things like gun violence prevention. And
that something that is so often is not wanted to be something
that is talked about.
But I think we need to remember, I think one of the
greatest things you all can do as Congressmen and -women is
continue to have young people who are being affected by this be
at the forefront of these conversations.
Mr. Rose. I want to get a sense of what you and your
friends who went through this horrific crisis think about us in
Washington, DC.
If Parkland happened tomorrow, again----
Ms. Hogg. It might, at a different school.
Mr. Rose. It might.
Ms. Hogg. Yes.
Mr. Rose [continuing]. If Sandy Hook happened again
tomorrow somewhere else, do you think we would act?
Ms. Hogg. With regards to school safety?
Mr. Rose. And gun control.
Ms. Hogg. I hope one day you will.
Unfortunately, if that takes until people my age are in
your position, to have grown up learning school safety
procedures and losing loved ones to gun violence. If you guys
don't act, eventually I know things will happen. Because people
my age, who have been continuously traumatized by instances of
gun violence, whether that be with in regards to in-school or
out-of-school gun violence, and especially communities of
color, we are going to be the legislators, sitting in your
seats. We are going to be the ones who have lived through this.
We will have to make these changes.
Trying to imagine a world where school shootings aren't a
thing that happened to myself is like trying to describe a
color to a blind man. I mean, this has been my normal my whole
life. It is unfortunate, but it has.
I mean, I think if Sandy Hook or Stoneman Douglas happened
tomorrow, I am not sure if many of Congressmen, Congresswomen
today would do anything unless it was their own child or their
own loved one who was taken to gun violence.
Mr. Rose. Ms. Hogg, I don't think you and your friends at
this point have any reason to trust us.
I think--I share your sentiments. I don't know how much
more blood has to be spilled in this country, I don't know how
many more children have to be afraid to go to school, I don't
know how many more parents have to hug their kids before they
go to school, fearing that they are not going to come home,
before we do something.
This is as sad as it gets. You are right; it may have to
come to you and your friends replacing us up here before we
actually act.
Ms. Hogg, as you think about your teachers that you have
had, do you think that they are capable during another Parkland
of discharging a weapon in your defense?
Ms. Hogg. I think it is not their responsibility.
I come from a family of teachers. I think when they went to
college, when they went to school to become an educator, they
weren't thinking that part of their job was going to have to be
a security officer.
So, like I stated in my testimony once before, we had an
armed officer at my school, and when it came to that moment of
fight or flight, he went away.
So the idea that teachers having guns would solve this
issue is the same idea as giving another person a gun to solve
gun violence is the issue, if you know what I am saying.
When we hear those things, like, two guns will protect the
majority of people from one bad guy with a gun, that is kind of
just sounding like we are trying to turn every single
individual, or in this case every single teacher, into an armed
vigilante. That is something that no teacher should have to be.
Also, I just cannot imagine, if teachers were armed, the
amount of incidents that would take place, that would be them
killing a student who didn't happen to be the perpetrator of
the violence. I think there would just be more violence coming
out of that if teachers were armed.
Mr. Rose. Thank you, Ms. Hogg, for your testimony, and
thank you for your leadership. I wish there were more folks
around here like you.
Ms. Hogg. Thank you.
Mr. Payne. Thank you.
I now recognize the gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. Joyce.
Oh, I am sorry. He is gone.
I recognize the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Crenshaw.
Mr. Crenshaw. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, everyone, for being here.
Mr. Schachter, thank you for being here. You are doing a
great justice to your son's memory----
Mr. Schachter. Thank you.
Mr. Crenshaw [continuing]. By looking for the right
solutions to this.
You answered a lot of my questions because your testimony
was so exact. You mentioned the National best practices
clearinghouse and the schoolsafety.gov being a great first
step. But you said that there is going to be an issue with how
well we get that information out to schools. Do you have any
recommendations on the best way to do that?
I would like Ms. Martinez-Prather to also answer that
question. What is the next step--after Mr. Maples as well--what
is the next step after what are deemed to be pretty good next
steps or pretty good solutions already?
Mr. Schachter. The first thing that we are lacking is--you
know, at the end of October, that website is going to go live.
So, you know, there are going to be a lot of great resources on
that website. It is very interactive, so schools will be able
to go on there, answer a series of questions to see where they
are in the process of making their school safe. Then that
website will walk you through the process, it will tell you
where your gaps are, where your deficiencies are. Then it will
actually direct you to grant dollars.
To give you an example, one of the deficiencies that we
have currently is that a lot of our grant programs, they are
not implementing best practices. So what I would like to see is
that, once we have these best practices, once the website goes
live, tie those best practices to the grant dollars.
We want to make sure that schools are implementing the most
effective measures to make schools safe. We don't want schools
implementing just some shiny object that is not really going to
have an impact.
Mr. Crenshaw. So the issue isn't necessarily that there is
not enough grants or not the right grants; the issue is that we
are not tying that grant money to the right basic practices.
You mentioned this, too, about what are the basic measures,
not the fancy bells and whistles, but what are the basic
measures. Can you answer that as well?
That is the next question I have for you both, as well.
Thank you.
Mr. Schachter. So, as far as low-cost, no-cost measures,
for instance, just having a formal active assailant response
policy. I mean, to think that the sixth-largest school in the
country didn't have it, I am sure there are a lot of other
schools around this country that don't have a simple policy.
You know, to train your teachers and staff. These are low-
cost measures. Training your staff to lock your doors, to teach
with a locked door; identifying a safer corner in the classroom
that children know where to go in an emergency.
Then it is encouraging students to report violent threats.
Kids know, you know, who put something on Snapchat or
Instagram. We need to encourage them, see something, say
something, but, more importantly, do something with that
information that they know about.
Then one of the problems at Marjory Stoneman Douglas is,
law enforcement that responded did not have access to live,
actionable intelligence. The school district used FERPA to not
share cameras with law enforcement. So when they came on-scene,
they didn't know where the shooter was. It took them 11 minutes
to get into the first floor and 40 minutes to get to the third
floor to administer medical attention to the 10 kids that were
shot and dying on the third floor.
You know, as far as getting the word out, we need to work
with every State school safety center to get that information
out and populated as broadly as possible.
Mr. Crenshaw. OK. We have one of those right here.
Ms. Martinez-Prather, could you expand on that? Also tell
us about the threat behavioral assessments that Texas uses. Are
there any metrics or any successes there we could speak of?
Ms. Martinez-Prather. Yes, sir.
Well, regarding the Federal clearinghouse, what is great
about that is it is an interagency effort. So, oftentimes, from
a State perspective, you have multiple agencies working on this
effort in good faith, saying different things, and that
confuses school districts. Our role at the State level is to
bring all that together, synthesize it, incorporate Texas
considerations--because we have pretty comprehensive mandates
for schools to follow--and push that back out to school
districts.
So I think that it is great that all of the agencies are
working together on this effort. I think that is going to help
with clear lines of communication and guidance.
Texas really took a page from the State of Virginia in
passing its behavioral threat assessment legislation this
session with this idea of prevention really needing to have a
focus. It is part of that comprehensive piece.
In the Center, we focus on mitigation prevention primarily.
The idea here is, we are creating a culture of situational
awareness where students trust adults, they know they can go to
somebody, they know they are not snitching on another peer.
Because we know that they have that intel, they have that
information to share, and most oftentimes they don't, for
various reasons.
But knowing that they are able to report that information,
knowing that that individual is going to get help. We always
stress that it is not intended to be a means of engaging in
exclusionary discipline.
In Texas, there are going to be several pieces of data that
will have to be collected and which our State education agency
will be overseeing in terms of who is on that behavioral threat
assessment team, because the big focus here is that it has to
be multidisciplinary. It is not just the school principal. It
is not just the school counselor. You have your campus
administration, a law enforcement officer, a mental health
professional, a teacher. Depending on the situation, it is
fluid. You may bring in an ad hoc member that has a close
relationship with the students.
The idea here is that it captures pre-incident indicators
or alarming behaviors that may not just be leading to an act of
violence. It----
Mr. Payne. Thank you.
Ms. Martinez-Prather. Can be a student who is, you know,
threatening harm to themselves. It may be behaviors have
changed that show there may be a substance abuse problem. Maybe
there is trauma experienced at home. So how can we----
Mr. Payne. Please wrap up your answer, please.
Ms. Martinez-Prather. I am sorry? Oh, yes.
Mr. Payne. No, you can finish your answer.
Ms. Martinez-Prather. Sorry about that.
Mr. Crenshaw. We only get 5 minutes.
Ms. Martinez-Prather. It is a long answer, but that is
where Texas is going in terms of its threat assessment.
Mr. Crenshaw. OK.
Well, my time is up. Thank you all for being here. I am
sorry I didn't get to everyone. Thank you all for being here.
It takes a lot of guts, especially at a young age, to come
here. So thank you very much.
Mr. Payne. Thank you. Next we will recognize the gentlelady
from Illinois, Ms. Underwood.
Ms. Underwood. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Children should be free to live their lives and go to
school without the fear of gun violence. Unfortunately, this is
not a reality for the 58 million students who are in their
first weeks of a new school year. Just this Tuesday, students
from Courtland Elementary School in my district participated in
their first active-shooter drill of the year. This is one of
the many active-shooter drills and trainings students and
teachers will participate in this year to prepare for a day we
all hope will never come.
Mr. Schachter, thank you so much for being here to honor
your son and to protect communities around the country. Ms.
Hogg, thank you so much for joining us here today and sharing
your experience. Thank you for your leadership. You, your
brother, and your fellow advocates are an incredible
inspiration to me.
I also applaud March for Our Lives peace plan for a safer
America, which makes a number of recommendations to help ensure
our communities are safe from gun violence. When I reviewed
your plan, I was especially glad to see that it includes
expanding background checks and dedicating annual funding for
gun violence prevention research. Proposals that I am proud the
House has passed this year. These are just the first in a
series of necessary steps.
So Ms. Hogg in your testimony, you encourage investments in
mental health resources in schools. Can you tell us more about
why these investments are so important to students like you?
Ms. Hogg. Well, thank you for that. I feel kind-of hyped-
up. So I think I have said this, I am just going to reiterate
some things that I have said before. Like I said, we need
nonaggressive pro-actionary measures because when we put in
these measures, by that I mean, security measures and not
mental health measures, it is almost as if our students are
being punished for the ways of the world to protect us.
Punishment to protect is something that has been shown to be
ineffective.
Additionally, we must not be suffocated by school security
measures and by having mental--trained mental health
professionals there. I think that is helping, you know. I think
that is decreasing the amount of suffocation that these
increased security measures are causing.
I think when it comes to school security specifically,
mental health professionals can help us deal with the increase
of security due to the ways of the world, like I said, the lack
of action around gun violence prevention. I think specific
mental health counselors, not just guidance counselors--because
I cannot tell you the amount of times before even the shooting
that happened at my school, I went to my guidance counselor and
the ratio of guidance counselor to student number is something
that is outrageous to me.
I remember--I didn't do the math until after, and at a
school Marjory Stoneman Douglas was about 4,500 kids and there
were like 4 or 5 guidance counselors. So I remember my guidance
counselor did not know my name until after the shooting when I
went to her to ask for help and then again, I had to schedule
toward the end of the week because she said she was busy
because it was when spring was and she was trying to get kids
into college.
But really, mental health professionals have helped me so
much and even then, I mean, I had some difficulty with the
mental health professionals that were put in place at my school
as a reactive measure after the shooting that occurred. But we
have to ensure that, especially if it is in the post of a
school shooting, these people are trauma-trained.
Ms. Underwood. Yes.
Ms. Hogg. Because if you put a guidance counselor who
spends the majority of their time doing academic counseling
into a situation where kids have watched their friends be
murdered and bleed out on the floor next to them, it doesn't
work. Trying to get a kid into college and trying to explain to
the kid why they saw what they saw is something that is
impossible.
Ms. Underwood. Thank you.
Ms. Hogg. Thank you.
Ms. Underwood. The conversation around keeping our school
safe has to include a discussion on how we can ensure that
students feel safe again at school after the traumatic event as
you just described.
Last year The Washington Post had an analysis which found
that 187,000 students had been exposed to gun violence at
schools since Columbine. We are facing a future in which
hundreds of thousands of Americans will be carrying these
physical and mental scars for the rest of their lives.
Can you talk a little bit, and briefly, about the long-term
challenges that you and your classmates face in the aftermath
of the shooting? We touched on the trauma, but anything else
that you want to share with the committee today?
Ms. Hogg. Yes. I mean, additionally, when it comes to what
you guys can do to help in aiding in trauma, the first thing
you can do is address gun violence as an issue and take action
on that because, at least for my trauma, I know many other of
my friends and other victims of gun violence, every single week
when another shooting happens and we see it on the news whether
it be a mass shooting or a local shooting in a community
nearby, we are retraumatized.
We feel as though we are back in the moment that we went
through a shooting of ourselves and those stages of grief
restart every single week. Every single week--sorry I am
continuing on--but every single week I watch CBS Sunday Morning
and they usually address school shootings when they happen.
So every single Sunday for a long time--and that has been a
family tradition of mine since I was like 5 years old watching
that--I had to stop watching it because I would hear the
stories of the people that went through the school shootings
every single Sunday and I could no longer do it because I
wouldn't be ready to go to school the next day mentally.
So that is the first thing you can do, addressing gun
violence as an epidemic.
Ms. Underwood. Yes, Ms. Hogg. Thank you.
As a nurse I know it is not uncommon for people who have
lived through school shootings to experience post-traumatic
stress and other traumas. This is especially true for children
and we are going to work to address it. Thanks to all the
witnesses for being here.
I yield back my time.
Mr. Payne. Thank you. I now recognize the gentleman from
Mississippi, Mr. Guest.
Mr. Guest. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I also have an
experience with school shootings. As a prosecutor, I had the
opportunity to be involved in the investigation and preparing a
case for trial of one of the first school shootings in the
country, the Pearl High School shooting.
On October 1, 1997, Luke Woodham, early that morning,
killed his mother before going to school. He then concealed a
rifle in an overcoat, entered Pearl High School where he then
opened fire on multiple students killing Christina Menefee and
Lydia Dew and injuring 7 other students. I am also aware of the
mental health aspect because Luke Woodham also had mental
health issues and attempted at trial to claim that the jury
should find him not guilty by reason of insanity.
The jury rejected that claim, and even though the jury
found that he did suffer from mental illness, that that mental
illness did not arise to the level where he should not be held
responsible for his actions and Luke Woodham today is currently
serving 3 life sentences plus 140 years. But one of the actions
on that day was an action by one of the school administrators.
The school administrator who was there in school when the
school administrator heard gunfire, he immediately went to his
vehicle, he obtained his firearm, and he was able to apprehend
Luke Woodham before he left the campus that day. I will tell
you from my investigation and my working with law enforcement,
we believe and are very confident that his actions that day
saved additional lives.
Because of his prompt response, because there was
additional rounds of ammunition, Luke Woodham would have
continued this rampage if he would not have been apprehended
very quickly. I am aware that in response to Parkland that
recently earlier this year, the legislature in Florida passed a
law which was signed by the Governor that would allow school
officials in Florida to be armed.
It expands what they call in Florida the Guardian Program,
and that program, though, does set forth stipulations. Those
stipulations include, No. 1, that the school district must
approve the measures so, therefore, schools are not required to
do that, but schools have the option to opt in.
No. 2, teachers must volunteer for the program. No one is
required to participate, but teachers have the opportunity to
volunteer. They must undergo background checks, there must be
psychiatric evaluations, and there also must be specific
training by law enforcement to make sure that teachers are
trained.
So, Mr. Maples, my question to you is, do you believe that
the response by the Florida legislature in allowing school
districts to opt in to a system that I just referred to, do you
believe that should be part of this discussion that we are
having as it relates to school violence and school shootings?
Mr. Maples. So let me start out by saying this is an
incredibly complex issue, the school safety in general, and I
think that is pretty clear from the testimony and certainly
from all of your questions. As part of what we are trying to do
in New Jersey and that is the only thing I can answer to is the
New Jersey aspect of this, we are looking at every solution out
there whether it be the violence prevention, whether it be
measures like arming teachers. We are looking at everything.
But I will tell you that the very first steps--and I think
Mr. Crenshaw asked a question about what are the next steps
that we take, it has to be about that initial training exactly
what Mr. Schachter was talking about, adhering to those best
practices, the plan. No plan survives first contact. That is
something we used to say in my community and I worked at CIA
for most of my career protecting people. It is what I did and
no plan survives first contact.
We have to have a plan in place and until--one great
example is, you can have the best S.W.A.T. team in the world on
standby in the east wing of a school like Stoneman Douglas and
if somebody lets him in the back door on another wing, people
are going to die and it is an unfortunate consequence of that.
So we have to talk about locking the doors as Mr. Schachter
said. Teaching kids not to open the doors.
So I will tell you that while we looked at those, we really
want to make sure those fundamental foundational aspects are in
place, first and foremost. We will get to that conversation.
Mr. Guest. I would agree with you. Our first mission should
be that our children, when we put them on the bus or parents
drop them off at schools, that even before those children are
educated that they return home safely to their families and so
I understand that and I have worked with law enforcement and I
have worked with other groups to try to make our schools safe.
First and foremost, we want to be able to prevent anyone
from going on to the school to accomplish any act of violence,
and I understand that. There are multiple programs and we are
talking about prevention, but in the case where someone does
enter on to the school grounds and where there is an active-
shooter situation, do you believe that laws such as those
passed in Florida, should those be things that we are also
talking about? Should that be part of the discussion, the
overall global discussion on how we are going to protect our
children?
I have a sophomore in high school and every day when he
goes to school, I am confident he is going to return, but I
know just as you have talked about as well. We always say it is
not going to happen in our community. That is going to happen
some where else. That is not going to happen in my school.
I have seen first-hand it happen in my community. I know
about it and so my question is, once we get past the things
that we are going to try to do to, first of all, prevent is
arming teachers, should that be something that we should
consider as a last resort to make sure that we can stop the
shooting as quickly as possible?
Mr. Maples. Just to simply sum up, as part of looking at
addressing and everything, I think we should have the
conversation about everything. Whatever we can do to support
and protect our students, but recognizing that things like
training, things like real world pulling the trigger is a very
difficult thing to do and making sure that somebody's prepared
to do that and I think Ms. Hogg summed it up as far as teachers
are there to teach and so it can be a big challenge for them to
adopt a mind set that they are then a protector in that way
with a weapon, for example.
So yes, we should consider everything on the table and have
reasonable discourse about it 100 percent, but as a last
measure at the end of that conversation, once you hit the
fundamentals, then I think we should have that conversation,
again, very carefully because there are a lot of challenges
associated with it, if that makes sense.
Mr. Guest. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I apologize for
going over.
I yield back.
Mr. Payne. Thank you. The gentleman from Louisiana is
recognized, Mr. Richmond.
Mr. Richmond. Let me thank you, Mr. Chairman, for convening
this hearing today on a very complex but serious matter and I
will just respond to my colleague, Mr. Guest, that we are
really all just a product of our life experiences and they
shape how we think of things, and I know the conversation about
arming teachers.
I coached high school baseball and Mr. Schachter mentioned
interoperability and the ability to communicate. I would in my
life experience, I would have grave concern as a baseball coach
if there was an active-shooter situation about what happens if
I have a gun and the perpetrator has a gun and the police
officers get there and have to decide who is the good guy and
who is the bad guy.
In my experience, most times people, especially police,
assume that I am the bad guy and that would worry me, but I
don't think it is something that we can't have a conversation
about and I think interoperability is important and we went
through that after Hurricane Katrina where we lost 1,500 people
that we could not talk to each other. The fact that when these
incidents occur you can't talk to each other is very scary.
That part of the conversation is really about limiting the
carnage.
I really want us to focus on preventing it in the first
place and so when we have that conversation, I think there are
small steps we can take such as universal background checks,
things of that nature. Limiting the size of ammunition
magazines, if we are talking about limiting carnage.
But my question for you, Ms. Hogg, would be that do you
think students are ready for a see something, say something
approach, which has made this country safer in airports and to
terrorism and the question would be, do you think our students
are ready for approach like a see something, say something?
Ms. Hogg. First of all, thank you for that question. I
think it is really important in this conversation.
So I can speak on behalf of myself, but not every student,
of course. But for myself how I personally feel about the whole
idea of see something, say something, is that, although it is
important, although it can prevent major things like what
happened at my school, it puts a certain pressure on the
student as though it is our responsibility to take care of
these things. After something happens, like what happened at my
school, often times I feel as though students felt as though
they were being the ones being accountable for the Government
and police officers in action at my school.
So as much as I think it is important and I think it is a
good way, a good noninvasive, pretty noninvasive way of
preventing these things from happening, I genuinely do not
think it is drastic enough.
Additionally, much like what happened with increased
security at places like airports and everywhere else after
everything that happened in September 2001, I think we need to
acknowledge that there are always--when you have that situation
see something, say something, there is going to be personal
biases that are injected into the minds, the souls of
individuals who are being the ones who are supposed to be
seeing something and saying something.
I think that leads to a lot of danger within regards to
whether that be a student seeing something and saying something
about a student maybe just because of their personal bias,
personal racial bias, or personal ideologic bias, if you know
what I am saying.
Mr. Richmond. I do. I think that something this complex and
something this drastic, we really do need a belt-and-
suspenders-type approach to it so whether that is more school
counselors who would also have an obligation to see something
and say something where there is a concern, I look at it how we
fight terrorism in this country and we do it with intelligence
and information gathering, and I think that at some point we
all have--unfortunately, we all have that responsibility and we
would hope that people don't bring in their personal bias, but
it is America.
We are humans and I think that, you know, it is a problem
and as much as we can prepare for the active-shooter situation,
what we really want is to prevent it. I will just tell you as a
parent who drops a kid off to kindergarten every day that I am
possible, I am very fearful that he doesn't go home.
As I bought his school uniforms this year, Mr. Schachter, I
am sure that you have had to go through this especially because
you have other children, I had to make a decision do I buy the
kevlar square that goes in the backpack so that I can teach him
to hide behind it in case of an active-shooter situation.
Parents shouldn't have to be doing that.
When I was in high school, our drills consisted of stop,
drop, and roll. Now the drills that our children are going
through are run, hide, and fight. So the real thing is that we
as Americans also have to accept our responsibility as adults
to the divide, to the hate, to the bullying, and to all the
other things that are adding to this sense.
Because if it is not in a school, then it will be in a
church like Mother Emanuel. If it is not in a church like
Mother Emanuel, it will be Tree of Life Synagogue. If it is not
there, it will be at a Safeway store where our colleague, Gabby
Giffords, was shot. If it is not at a grocery store, it will be
on a baseball field where our colleague Steve Scalise was shot.
We have to protect our most vulnerable, which is our children,
but we have to do a better job as Americans of leading, loving,
and showing the leadership to prevent this.
So I think you all did your part today by being here and I
think Congress needs to do our part by enacting those
reasonable measures that can stop these things before they
start.
So thank you for being here.
Mr. Payne. I would like to thank the gentleman and, you
know, it is unfortunate that this year one of the highest-
selling products in New Jersey for going back to school were
bulletproof book bags.
I now recognize the gentlelady from New York, Ms. Clarke.
Ms. Clarke. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and I thank
our panelists for really lending your expertise and your
common-sense concerns to today's discussion. Columbine,
Virginia Tech, Sandy Hook, Umpqua Community College, Parkland,
each time our Nation experiences another school shooting, we
send out our thoughts and prayers, but thoughts and prayers
don't stop bullets.
Twenty years have passed since Columbine, but school
shootings have become only more and more common. We need to
take action; we must take action. We need to and must confront,
tackle, and end this gun violence epidemic once and for all.
Ms. Hogg, I want to get from you how your daily life has
changed since that shooting?
Ms. Hogg. So when I was preparing for my testimony today
and we were discussing this, I realized that pretty much
everything in my life has changed. I think one of the greatest
changes was the loss, not necessarily, the physical loss of
people like my brother and other victims and my friends that
went through the school shooting alongside me, but the loss of
our past selves, the loss of ourselves who were innocent and
believed like Mr. Schachter said so eloquently today that we
believed that this would never happen to us.
I mean, I could go through the specifics, but it would take
me probably days, but every single aspect of my life has
changed. It seems as though, like I stated before, I was 14
when I experienced the school shooting and that is the age when
kids are kind of ready to have that John Hughes high school
experience, if you know what I am saying, and for me I went
directly from--it seems as though I had to go from childhood to
adulthood and skip that period of my life that most people do
have the chance to experience where they get to be--they get to
be a teenager, they get to be a child, and I think about this
every single day.
My goal for this year was to learn how to be a teenager and
that is something that no child who is 16 should have to
experience. But I mean, like I said, the fact that I am even
here today, the fact that I spend my weekends on the Hill when
I can talking with my policy makers, everything has changed,
and I really just hope that no other child has to have this
experience of losing those precious teenage years where they
get the chance to have--to be stupid in a sense, to have fun,
but I think that is one of the greatest ways my life has been
affected.
Ms. Clarke. Thank you for sharing that with us.
Mr. Maples, when you testified in front of the subcommittee
last year, the horrific shootings in Parkland, Florida, Santa
Fe, Texas, were still recent and many States were just in the
beginning phases of instituting policies to improve school
safety and in some cases gun control measures.
Now over a year out, can you tell the committee of any
challenges that you have had while instituting new school
security measures and are there any lessons learned that you
think are important for other States to know?
Mr. Maples. Well, I will start off by addressing the
challenges piece. Some of the challenges have been making sure
that the school districts are all getting the relevant
information in a coordinated way. We continue to work on that
and that is something we are able to do at the State level in
New Jersey.
The implementation of the see something, say something--Mr.
Richmond just brought up that piece and in New Jersey we are
doing that. We have rolled that in through an attorney
general's directive that all suspicious activity, that school-
related threats, are rolled into our See Something Say
Something Campaign.
New Jersey's a little bit different than a lot of other
States. My office coordinates everything from the Federal,
State, to local levels, so the bureau, the FBI, gets their
leads from my folks at one hub location or fusion center, and
that is a little bit different model than many other States.
I will tell you that getting school districts to recognize
those threats, in the See Something, Say--what are the threats
and reporting those to law enforcement who then report it to us
or directly to us, that is a challenge, but it is something
that we are really focused on, getting that public messaging
out there.
My staff is constantly engaging with the schools and one of
the great benefits we have in New Jersey is the Department of
Education, the commissioner has essentially loaned us his
school safety team. They actually report to me, but they are
education employees. They come to Homeland Security spaces.
So we are trying to really coalesce around that one common
goal of protecting our schools together in that way.
So the challenges of joining any type of unit--you wouldn't
think of Homeland Security and education kind-of linking up the
way that we do, but we do and we are really focused on that.
Ms. Clarke. We appreciate that, Mr. Maples. Let me just
close by saying that having been a victim myself watching my
colleague getting gunned down in the New York City Council,
that trauma never leaves you. So Ms. Hogg, I thank you for your
courage. The trauma goes beyond what anyone can imagine when
you are in a space, you are a survivor.
There is so many other dynamics, so I can relate to all
that you have shared with us today because I am still
recovering to this very day.
I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Payne. I would like to thank the gentlelady.
The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Green, is recognized.
Mr. Green of Texas. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the
Ranking Member as well, and I apologize for the condition that
we find ourselves in. I say I apologize because we have failed
you. The adults have failed you.
We shouldn't have allowed unlimited assault weapons on the
streets capable of killing scores in seconds. We failed you,
and we ought to do something about it. We don't have the will.
We have lost our way. We failed you.
We are at a point regrettably in our history where we have
to prepare for the unthinkable to deal with the inconceivable.
It is where we are. Gone are the days when children had to have
as a part of their exercise a fire drill. There is an active-
shooter drill now.
Gone are the days when there was a rumor of a person having
a knife on campus at my school and the principal just stopped
everything, brought us all into the auditorium, and had a
meeting, who has the knife? Now we have assault weapons on
campuses.
So we have to deal with the inconceivable, and I have to
ask you about something that I regrettably must ask about, but
I think we have to prepare for this unthinkable inconceivable
event and that would be, of course, whether or not we are ready
to deal with a chemical or biological event.
We can't wait. We have to prepare for the unthinkable if we
are going to deal with the inconceivable. So I ask as gently as
I can, are we adequately prepared for an attack of this kind on
a school campus where it should never happen, where it would be
inconceivable? Are we having any drills, any information,
intelligence accorded our students so that they can deal with
these things?
Do we have proper equipment available? Where are we? If we
are not there, then perhaps the adults won't fail us as we go
forward. I am one of the adults. Would someone care to answer,
please?
Mr. Schachter. Yes I mean, obviously we are extremely
unprepared. Our county doesn't even have an active-shooter
policy, let alone a policy to protect us from a chemical or
biological attack.
We are just trying to get teachers to teach with a locked
door, you know. We are just trying to move the needle. We are
so far away from where we need to be, but we can prevent, you
know, 80, 90 percent of these attacks, you know.
We have got the gold standard in anonymous reporting app
was developed in Colorado. It is called Safe to Tell. They have
stopped thousands of young people from committing suicide.
Suicide is the homicide issue. If we can stop suicide, we can
stop homicide and they have stopped hundreds of school
shootings.
Post-Parkland, we have had dozens of States implement those
anonymous threat reporting apps. Every day we hear in the news
about mass shootings that are stopped by courageous people that
are sending in tips and kids do it. So we can stop a lot of
these as we were talking about on the prevention side, but we
have to prepare.
We can't stop 100 percent of these. We have to be cognizant
of that, and so that is why--what are we going to do? We need
to decide what are we going to do if a guy with a gun walks on
that school campus, how are we going to save lives? That is
what we need. That needs to be addressed, unfortunately, you
know, all over this country.
Mr. Green of Texas. Thank you. I could not agree with you
more, and I regret that we find ourselves being reactive when
we had a great opportunity to be proactive and deal with these
issues such that we wouldn't have to deal with the unthinkable,
but there is a future and we still have the opportunity to
change this circumstance if we but only will acquire the
courage and the will.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. Payne. I thank the gentleman.
I would like to now recognize the gentlelady from Texas,
Ms. Jackson Lee.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Mr. Chairman, thank you. I want to ask
whether the chairman, the gentleman from Florida, wants to go
and I will go after him.
You all right?
OK. Just wanted to offer it to you.
Mr. Deutch. Thanks.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Mr. Chairman, thank you and to the Ranking
Member for this very vital hearing, and I thank the witnesses.
We are sometimes in overlapping hearings and we have to make
our way to an important hearing. Let me acknowledge, in
particular, a dad who lost his son. Your face is familiar. I
know that you wish that it was not, and I thank you for putting
your energy in a place where those of us who are parents would
never want to imagine.
I think this committee is well-suited and this House and
this present leadership with the Members of this committee,
with Congressman Deutch are prepared to listen and to adhere to
some of the things that we can do. We don't want to call the
role, but I think you know, why didn't it stop at Sandy Hook?
Why wasn't something done? We tried very hard.
So I want to first start with Lauren. We work a lot in
Houston with March for Our Lives. I like the word ``march''
because we follow, but I know that it is important that we act.
Let me ask you this question because I have talked to
teenagers who, like you, have to learn to be a teenager. What
is it like with your peers to have to live with the idea of
death, death of your fellow students, death at a school site?
What should we know about that as you are growing up?
Ms. Hogg. So for myself because I was 14 years old when
this happened as I stated previously, I think that is a pivotal
time in your life. I mean, all of the 4 high school years are a
pivotal time in your life. It is when a lot of your brain
development occurs, it is when you are supposed to learn a lot
of things at school.
When you have something like a school shooting, when you
have something like your friends and teachers being murdered in
your classroom next to you, I think there is something drastic
that happens within yourself and I think it is important to
address that within regards to trauma to gun violence, it is
hard to heal when this issue continues every single day. It is
kind of like rubbing salt into the wound that is our trauma.
I mean, the previous question earlier that I was asked when
it was how has your life changed, every single day. I think
just every single aspect--like when I go into a restaurant, I
have to sit with my back not against the door because I will
feel like somebody will come in. When I go to a movie theater,
I have to always make sure I know where the exits are and know
if I can be close enough to be able to run out in time.
Even in crowded spaces, places I used to go and love to go
to, whether that be Disneyland or a concert, I can't go there
without being scared that something is going to happen. So even
the things that would be traditionally viewed as fun and an
escape turn into themselves an act of trauma where you don't
know what to do and you don't know how to act.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you.
Ms. Hogg. Yes. Thank you.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Let me ask Alex's father.
I am going to give you a combined answer. You obviously
can't hear that from Alex, but for us to do something along
with what we have heard from our experts, you are an expert in
terms of making a school solid, but in doing this
comprehensively, we have to deal with guns--this is my
question--mental health and added resources for those students
who we miss.
I have been working on for many years anti-bullying, which
is accelerated, cyber-bullying and otherwise, and then a
positive way of reinforcing schools. So would you respond to
that in the context of your organization and your group.
Mental health, anti-bullying, guns, and the idea of how we
strengthen a school to protect its most precious inhabitants.
Mr. Schachter. You know, I am on the commission that is
investigating the Marjory Stoneman Douglas tragedy and we had a
presentation by Flagler High School which developed a culture
and climate survey that they give to tribute to all of their
students and it has made their school safe. That--you know, I
think that sets a deficiency in our schools that we are not
doing culture-climate surveys of our students and of our
teachers because to reduce violence on campus, reduce bullying,
if we don't know what is happening on campus, we can't fix it.
I alluded in my presentation and in questions that we don't
know--you know, schools underreport violence on campus. We need
to get an accurate reporting. In Florida, we require schools to
report in violence and we came to the conclusion that what they
are reporting is absolutely garbage and it is totally
incorrect. We have now put measures in place to the
commissioner of education to financially penalize
superintendents that consistently underreport school violence.
So we need to get that under control, but we need to find
out what is happening first so that we can tackle this bullying
problem and we can provide better mental health to our students
and reduce violence on campus which will reduce violence in our
community because if we are not giving kids when they are in
school the tools to deal with rejection and failure, as they
get older, we have horrible consequences.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Let me thank you and the experts as well.
My time has expired, but let me just say to the Chairman using
the experts, but using the passion of our two witnesses who
have experienced it first-hand can help us be guided in the
right direction for working on this very crucial issue.
With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Payne. I would like to thank the gentlelady.
I recognize the patient gentleman from Florida, Mr. Deutch.
Mr. Deutch. Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to you
and the Ranking Member for calling the hearing. I am grateful
to you and your staff for including 2 of my constituents as
witnesses and extending the invitation to me to join you as
your guest.
I also want to express my gratitude to the thoughtful and
dedicated participation of so many Members of this committee
today.
Thanks to the witnesses, all of you, for your testimony and
your hard work to make students safer.
First, I would like to seek unanimous consent to enter a
statement for the record from Tony Montalto, the surviving
father of Gina Montalto and president of ``Stand with
Parkland'', a group formed by parents from Stoneman Douglas, if
I may.
Mr. Payne. Without objection.
[The information follows:]
Statement of Tony Montalto, President, Stand with Parkland--The
National Association of Families for Safe Schools
September 26, 2019
Chairman Payne, Ranking Member King, and Members of the committee,
thank you for the opportunity to submit a statement for the record for
today's hearing. Nothing is more important than the safety of our
Nation's children and I appreciate your decision to hold this hearing
on this important issue.
My name is Tony Montalto. I am the president of Stand with
Parkland--The National Association of Families for Safe Schools. Stand
with Parkland was founded by the families of the children and school
staff murdered in the Parkland school massacre on February 14, 2018. I
lost my 14-year-old daughter Gina on that day and have engaged in this
activism because her death was preventable. It is our desire to keep
any other parent from experiencing the profound loss that myself and
others have gone through as a result of this tragedy.
We are now part of the many who bring a human face to these grim
statistics: Since Columbine, there have been 710 school shootings in
the United States; 341 people have been killed and 653 injured,
including the 17 killed and the additional 17 injured in the Parkland
shooting.\1\ Using our unique and inclusive approach, Stand with
Parkland has grown into a National organization focused on identifying
and advocating for practical solutions that will keep our kids and
teachers safe in school. We are fundamentally a non-partisan group. We
believe that the safety of our kids and teachers in school is not a
political issue and we will work with anyone who shares our goal for
safe schools.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Center for Homeland Defense and Security, ``K-12 School
Shooting Database,'' 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Stand with Parkland's founding families have different political
views, but when it comes to protecting our children and staff members
at school, we all agree on 3 key outcomes: Secure the school campus,
implement better mental health screening and support programs, and
practice responsible firearms ownership. We are committed to advocating
for practical public safety reforms focused on these goals. Absent
addressing all 3 of these components, the uniquely American tragedy of
mass school shootings will not find a solution.
Personal responsibility and a desire for change are paramount to
this effort, and it will require action at all levels of government to
make these goals a reality. Violence in our schools affects everyone.
It is an American epidemic and it is time for us to come together as
the American family to do something about it--to demand action from our
elected leaders.
Even now, 20 years after Columbine, our Nation is still grappling
with this issue. It is extremely unfortunate that it took the murder of
our loved ones at school to rekindle the National discussion. The
voices of the surviving students kept this tragic story in the news.
However, it has been the relentless pursuit of the facts and the
determination of the victims' families that has driven change to both
policies and laws across the country. Those changes began with the help
of former Governor (now Senator) Rick Scott and the bipartisan support
of the Florida legislature when the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High
School Public Safety Act was passed in March 2018. Stand with
Parkland's advocacy began when our families spoke with lawmakers from
both sides of the aisle about the importance of passing the law to
protect students and staff members from harm. Our collective voice made
a difference then and we will continue to use it to prevent anyone else
from suffering a similar tragedy. We want to ensure that children and
staff members are safe at school and can focus on their true purpose:
Learning and growing into responsible young adults.
Our children are the future. This is a fairly common adage on which
there is almost universal agreement. But it is not enough to merely
acknowledge this and repeat it in public--that future is at risk and
action is necessary. Before this tragedy, we had happy families. We had
whole families. Now that is forever changed--our daughters, sons, and
spouses never made it home from school that day.
When we look at the history of mass school shootings, we are here
to point out that this issue affects all segments of America, all
sharing the same misconception that it couldn't happen in their
community. That false sense of security is dangerous.
This is not a Republican problem; it's not a Democratic problem; it
cannot be laid at the feet of either end of the political spectrum or
any group. This is an American problem that requires collective action.
Our children are in danger; inaction in the face of that danger is not
merely negligent but constitutes a dereliction of duty.
While our organization supports certain specific proposals, we
recognize the importance of a fulsome discussion and building consensus
as we develop and implement specific solutions. This model of
discussion and willingness to compromise, while maintaining a steadfast
commitment to meaningful action and fighting against mere window-
dressing, was effective when we worked on school safety legislation in
Florida--leaving partisan politics behind was instrumental.
As a result of this willingness to compromise, and the commitment
to not permit perfection to stand in the way of meaningful progress, we
supported the recent passage in Florida of SB 7030--Implementation of
Legislative Recommendations of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School
Public Safety Commission--even though we did not agree with all of its
provisions.
While Stand with Parkland supports armed guardians at schools, we
believe that arming teachers is a misguided idea that could actually
undermine efforts to safeguard our schools against mass shootings like
the one that took our loved ones. We believe our teachers should be
focused on teaching and trained law enforcement or school security
officers should be provided to protect the students and staff at
school. However, even though we opposed this provision, we supported
the majority of the bill and accordingly worked to ensure its passage
because we believed the legislation made our schools safer.
Our Nation needs an open and continuous discussion that leads to
the collective development of specific solutions. Stand with Parkland
is firm in its advocacy for a holistic approach toward improving the
safety of all the Nation's schools by:
(1) Securing the school campus
(2) Improving mental health screening and support programs
(3) Supporting responsible firearms ownership.
All of these issues must be addressed in a meaningful way and we
have developed specific proposals that can help achieve our goals in
each of these areas:
Securing the Campus.--The Parkland shooter walked onto campus
through an open and unmonitored gate; even though he was identified as
he entered campus, nobody called a code red until more than 3 minutes
after the shooting started. Furthermore, the school did not have an
active-shooter policy or any plan for dealing with school shootings.
Securing the school campus starts with securing the perimeter and
creating a single point of entry. Other low-cost items such as locked
doors, safe corners in classrooms, and active-shooter policies and
drills are vital to protecting America's schools. Taking these
straight-forward steps will give our students and teachers a chance of
survival when confronted by a school shooter. I want to emphasize that
we must encourage all of our school administrators to prepare for an
active shooter by having a policy in place and training students and
staff accordingly. In this same spirit, it is essential that we develop
a Federal standard for minimum school safety features and best
practices, as well as bring the resources of our Federal Government to
bear. We need Congress to provide continuous Federal funding of school
security enhancements, upon which State and local governments can rely.
There has been some progress--the Departments of Health and Human
Services, Justice, Education, and Homeland Security are working
together to create a clearinghouse website that will serve as a
National resource. This clearinghouse will provide school safety best
practices collected from various schools and related organizations. Our
organization has continued to be involved in this process and our
entire membership strongly supports its continued development. In light
of the potential impact of this project, we hope that the House can
lead the way with a bipartisan bill that will codify and provide
funding for this groundbreaking initiative.
Improving Mental Health Screening and Support Programs.--To improve
mental health screening, support, and intervention, we need to take
actions such as funding and promoting suicide detection and
intervention programs because 67 percent of mass shooters are
suicidal.\2\ Additionally, Congressional action is needed to relax and
clarify Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and
Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) regulations, so that
schools, law enforcement, and mental health professionals are allowed
to share mental health information, as well as permit the release of
mental health information for threat assessments and background checks.
Fixing these issues will allow for more effective use of the provisions
enacted by the STOP School Violence Act, which was contained within the
Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2018, and other existing laws.
Permitting this exchange of information would allow a team of
professionals--including school counselors, police, and mental health
care providers--to assess at-risk individuals and likely prevent
tragedies like the one that took our loved ones.
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\2\ US DHS, US Secret Service National Threat Assessment Center
March 2018.
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My daughter's killer, we've since found out, was known to the
school, the sheriff's office, a local mental health agency, and the
FBI, as an angry, violent, and potentially dangerous person. They never
shared information about him; they never connected the dots. Because of
this, Gina's killer was able to purchase a rifle legally. Had an
effective threat assessment been conducted, and a corresponding
exchange of information permitted, there may have been a better
understanding of just how dangerous this individual was--my family
could be whole today.
Additionally, more research is required to support threat
assessments and their efficacy. The U.S. Secret Service's National
Threat Assessment Center (NTAC) is dedicated to the advanced research
that is the basic building block of all threat assessments. In today's
environment of ever-increasing threats, the NTAC needs more funding and
resources. One path to provide this is through bipartisan legislation
that has been introduced in both chambers, the Eagles Act. This bill is
named after Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School's mascot and would
help provide a lasting legacy to our beloved children and spouses who
were murdered that day. We urge the House to consider and vote on this
important legislation, which will help protect not only students and
staff members, but any American from being subjected to similarly
targeted violence.
Stand with Parkland also urges Congress to provide funding to
support and implement successful ``off-the-shelf'' programs, such as
Sandy Hook Promise's Know the Signs or It Starts with Hello.
Additionally, there is a proven suicide prevention product developed by
Columbia University: The Columbia Protocol, which provides an
evidenced-based threshold for determining imminent risk. This protocol
has already been adopted by the Department of Defense and many other
governmental agencies. In fact, a total force roll-out by the Marine
Corps helped lead to a 22 percent reduction in suicides.\3\ These are
only a few of the highly effective non-Governmental programs that could
use a boost from the Federal Government to expand their reach and
improve the safety of America's students and teachers.
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\3\ Columbia University, ``C-SSRS Helping to Reduce Suicide and
Decrease Workload via Evidence-Based Thresholds for Imminent Risk,''
2016.
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Supporting Responsible Firearm Ownership.--There are many elements
that contribute to responsible firearms ownership. This starts with
enforcing the laws already on the books and personal responsibility.
Owners of firearms must ensure they are practicing safe firearm
storage, such as ensuring they are kept out of the reach of children,
because many school shooters get their weapon from the home.
Another important area is Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPO), or
Red Flag laws, which can save lives by creating a way for family
members and law enforcement to act before a situation escalates,
providing an opportunity for the individual subject to the order to get
help. ERPOs also touch on the mental health pillar of our holistic
approach to school safety; they are powerful tools that enable law
enforcement officers to protect themselves and the community at-large.
In the wake of the Parkland tragedy, Florida enacted Red Flag laws with
strong bipartisan support. As of this past February, 13 States had
these powerful law enforcement tools in place, and it is likely that
they have already saved many lives. Had these laws been in place on
February 14, 2018, the numerous warnings regarding the murderer of our
loved ones would have provided law enforcement a chance to remove the
firearms from his home and Parkland would still be an idyllic town and
our families would be whole instead of broken.
This year, Rep. Salud Carbajal (D-CA) reintroduced H.R. 1236, the
Extreme Risk Protection Order Act of 2019. On September 10, the bill
passed out of the House Judiciary Committee's gun violence prevention
markup, moving it one step closer to a vote on the House floor. This
bill would utilize Department of Justice funds to encourage States to
enact laws that provide law enforcement or family members the option of
obtaining a court order to prevent firearm purchases and possession by
individuals who pose a significant threat to themselves or others,
while also providing due process protections. Additionally, the bill
establishes a grant program that would incentivize States to adopt
extreme risk laws, which in turn would reduce gun deaths and injuries
while protecting due process rights. We strongly urge Republicans and
Democrats to support this bill and hope it is swiftly brought to the
House floor for a vote.
Finally, our Nation must improve the current background check laws
and make them more comprehensive. This can be achieved through
legislation like H.R. 8, ``the Bipartisan Background Checks Act of
2019'' that has been passed by the House of Representatives and we've
been working with the Senate to consider similar legislation. We need
to do more than just talk about these measures--the American public
expects that our representatives will take meaningful action to protect
our children.
While we commend our National leaders for taking some action, such
as the recently-issued final Report of the Federal Commission on School
Safety from the Trump administration, these actions have continued the
trend of only partially addressing this issue. The report contained
recommended changes that address the first 2 items in our holistic
approach, securing the school campus and better mental health programs,
but little is mentioned regarding firearms. It is clear that the status
quo is ineffective, or our loved ones would not have been shot and
killed in their school on February 14, 2018.
We hope that the vast majority of Americans, who are in the
ideological middle, come out and support the change for which Stand
with Parkland--The National Association of Families for Safe Schools is
advocating. Continued conversations about how we can't agree and what
we don't agree on will not make our children safer. This Congress, and
the Nation as a whole, needs to have an open discussion and actively
listen to one another. This cannot be a rhetorical battle centered
around partisan messaging and talking points--every step we take must
be meaningful and make our children safer. We will be failing in the
duty to protect our children and future generations of Americans if all
we do is talk and take symbolic steps.
I would like to conclude by saying that there can be no more
excuses. The safety of students and teachers at school is something
that this country can unite around. We must stop the divisive rhetoric
and work together to stop these uniquely American tragedies. Surely,
where it concerns the safety of our children, there is more that unites
than divides us.
Again, thank you for the opportunity to submit this statement for
the record and your willingness to address this vital matter facing our
Nation.
Mr. Deutch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. These families have
varying political views, but they write when it comes to
protecting our children and staff at school we all agree on 3
key outcomes: Secure the school campus, implement better mental
health programs, and practice responsible firearms ownership. I
hope their goals can be shared by all of us here today
regardless of our political affiliation.
Mr. Schachter, Ms. Hogg, I feel so fortune to know you, so
proud to represent you, and so utterly heartbroken by the
circumstances that have brought us together. You are survivors
of this horrible crisis of gun violence in America.
Mr. Schachter, you lost your beloved Alex. Ms. Hogg, you
lost friends, classmates, and teachers. In addition to Alex,
Alyssa, Scott, Martin, Nicholas, Aaron, Jaime, Chris, Luke,
Cara, Gina, Joaquin, Alaina, Meadow, Helena, Carmen, and Peter
were all lost at Marjory Stoneman Douglas on February 14, 2018,
but you have turned your pain into action.
Mr. Schachter, you have been a fierce advocate for
expanding the level of expertise in schools, school districts,
and States to improve policies. You have become an expert in
security infrastructure. I knew from the first moment I spoke
with you that within a short period of time you would be a
National leader on keeping our schools safe.
So I want to ask you, the EAGLES Act, H.R. 3714 will expand
the National Threat Assessment Center. By doing that, what can
that do to help ensure that schools have the expertise to keep
their students and staff safe?
Mr. Schachter. Thank you, Congressman, and thank you for
everything you have done to protect our children. You have been
a great championing of that.
As far as the EAGLES Act goes, I talked about this in my
opening statement, I am a strong supporter. I hope that we can
get the full committee support and pass this. It is great
legislation.
We know that threat assessment teams, that the Secret
Service, has developed protect the President and protect
Congress and this is a major problem in schools. We know that
threat assessments work, but, you know, it needs to be done
correctly.
There was a threat assessment done on the murderer in 2016
that was completely botched. The problem was the assistant
principal that did the threat assessment had no idea how to
perform one. He had never conducted a threat assessment in his
30-year history, he didn't know where the paperwork was, and it
was completely done wrong.
I feel that if it was done correctly, my little boy might
be still alive today, so by passing the EAGLES Act, we can give
education to all schools on proper threat assessments, to
prevent these acts of targeted violence before they happen and
we have got to stop being reactionary and be proactive, and
that is what threat assessments do.
Mr. Deutch. Thank you very much.
Ms. Hogg, thanks for your leadership in your school and
across the country through March for Our Lives and thanks for
your really powerful testimony today.
The March for Our Lives Peace Plan for a Safer America
includes a call, among other things, for community-based
solutions. As part of that call, you support Representative
Moore's bill, H.R. 2457, the National De-Escalation of Violence
and Community Safety Training Act. One thing you have not had
an opportunity to talk about is why community-based
interventions is such an important part of your peace plan?
Ms. Hogg. Community-based intervention programs as we have
talked about today, earlier when we are talking about proactive
measures, are the perfect example of this. They go in before
these things happen as I stated previously.
It is so important for us when we created this plan to
include that because we have seen across the country and
especially communities of color and lower socioeconomic
communities how effective these are in preventing community gun
violence.
I have some examples of individuals and stats about stuff
that are within regards to violence intervention programs, but
one of the greatest examples is Life Camp. It is out of the
Bronx founded by this woman named Erica Ford and they have
violence interrupters that go in and they train youth from the
community how to be violence interrupters instead of inciters
of this violence and how to keep out of this violence.
I think if we could apply that to our school system across
the country, I cannot even imagine the great effects we would
see in preventing things like what happened at our school.
Mr. Deutch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am--I want to just
thank you again. It is so clear from the testimony today from
the expertise on this panel, from the dedication of all 4 of
our panelists that there is more that we can do in a bipartisan
way to help strengthen and bolster the efforts of our witnesses
and people just like them all around the country to help keep
our school safe. And to help keep kids safe and to prevent the
kind of trauma that we have heard so eloquently spoken about.
We can do this and I am so grateful for your leadership on
this issue. I look forward to working with you, and again, your
extending an invitation for me to join you today is something
that I will forever be grateful for.
Mr. Payne. Well, I would like to thank the gentleman for
accepting the invitation and they are very fortunate to have
you as their Representative in Congress. I know the work that
you do tirelessly for your constituents and you have been
proactive on these issues.
So I just thought it was fair you had the opportunity today
to be here, so thank you.
We are going to go for a quick second round. I just wanted
to ask Mr. Maples, as I mentioned in my opening statement, DHS
along with other agencies is working on the clearinghouse that
will compile best practices for various school safety
practices, can you describe what you want to see out of a
clearinghouse to make it useful for New Jersey?
Mr. Maples. Sure, absolutely. So one of my roles in
addition to being the director of homeland security, I am also
the Federally-designated homeland security adviser, which is a
DHS designation, so we work hand-in-hand with Federal DHS on
the wide variety of issues that we confront in the State of New
Jersey.
I lead in to say that from a clearinghouse perspective, we
absolutely welcome that. I think a place for a structured,
directed, and concise plan, the best practices themselves can
really help us bolster what we are trying to do at the State
level.
We do a lot proactively in New Jersey, but having that
Federal interface and to be able to point that back to someone
from the Federal Government can be very powerful in talking to
a superintendent across our 21 counties. So to the degree that
the clearinghouse is coming on-line, we welcome it and I think
that it will continue to help make our schools safe.
Mr. Payne. Thank you.
I don't want to keep people much longer, but I just want to
thank all the witnesses for their testimony today. This has
been an honor for me to chair this hearing and hear from all of
you, all with different experiences on this one very important
subject.
Mr. Schachter, you brought up interoperability, which has
been my main focus since 2012 arriving here on this committee
and the author of the interoperability bill for DHS and just
issues around school safety has been my main thrust.
So thank all of you for being here today for your expert
testimony and with that--there is something I have to do here.
All right. Now that we have finished with our questions, I
would like to ask unanimous consent to enter into the official
record written testimony from the National Association of
School Resource Officers, Everytown for Gun Safety, Sandy Hook
Promise, the National Association of School Psychologists, the
NAACP legal defense fund, and materials from the American
Institute of Architects,* without objection, is so ordered.
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* A portion of the information has been retained in committee files
and is also available at http://content.aia.org/sites/default/files/
2019-09/CAE_Report_v7_FINAL_interactive.pdf.
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[The information follows:]
Statement of Jay M. Brotman, American Institute of Architects (AIA)
August 16, 2018
introduction
Secretary DeVos, Secretary Azar, Secretary Nielsen, Attorney
General Sessions, and Deputy Secretary Zais, thank you for the
invitation to appear before you today. On behalf of the American
Institute of Architects (AIA), it is an honor to partner with you and
your staff to promote design solutions for the challenges and
opportunities facing today's schools. For over 20 years, the AIA,
through its Committee on Architecture for Education, has been working
to develop and disseminate best practices in education architecture--
ones that create positive learning environments while better
safeguarding students and school faculty.
While I have designed many schools during my 40-plus years
practicing architecture, perhaps none has been more impactful and
fulfilling than the new Sandy Hook Elementary School. And while it is
only I who appear before you today, the success of the new Sandy Hook
school was possible only with the full participation and collaboration
of several hundred partners including my fellow architects, our
consulting engineers, the construction management team, the
construction workers and most importantly the people of Newtown.
Not surprisingly, there was a significant focus to design this new
school in a way that would prevent a tragedy of this caliber from
happening again. To be clear though, no school design can stop all
school violence, especially ones involving guns. There is no single
``design solution'' or design standard to prevent them. However, there
are design principles and best practices that can help to mitigate
risk, both before and during an act of mass violence such as a
shooting.
In general, each school, whether a new build or a retrofit, must be
designed for its unique student population, for its unique location,
and to meet the needs of its unique community. More specifically, and
of paramount importance, the primary goal of each school is to provide
an inspiring, healthy environment that promotes learning. As we address
this particular threat to children and adults in our schools, we must
remember that schools are buildings that must be designed as schools
first and foremost. Their security features, while vital and necessary,
should be as passive as possible. They should be incorporated into the
school's design, rather than define the school. Failing to do so puts
children's education, emotional development, and pro-social behavior at
risk. To that point, I'd like to provide some specific design
principles and strategies that architects can routinely use.
design principles
There has been much discussion about ``hardening'' schools. This
may be the most common reaction to recent tragic events, and while
hardening elements have their place within a strategic plan of security
measures, hardening alone can be costly, ineffective, and counter-
productive to a positive learning environment. Furthermore, physical
design features, such as hardening, are only one leg of an effective
School Security Plan. Hardening must be coordinated with Technology
components, such as security cameras, and the third critical aspect,
Operations, which are the safety protocols and procedures that need to
be well-designed, rehearsed, and enforced.
With this 3-leg approach, the architects' key security design focus
is ``layering'' the physical environment with bringing in those
particular security elements that are most suitable to each unique
design. This layered concept arose from Crime Prevention Through
Environmental Design or CPTED. The goal of CPTED design principles is
to Deter, Detect, and Delay the assailant, and last to Defend the
occupants. With layering, if one design element or layer is breached,
another layer will be encountered to continue to slow or limit the
assailant's progress. ``Layering'' reinforces each selected security
design solution to build in more minutes for first responders. School
site and building designs can actually slow down an assailant, giving
students and school personnel more time to react and position
themselves securely while allowing law enforcement more time to arrive
on the scene and intervene. This is critically important in all school
settings, but especially in rural and more remote areas where the
average law enforcement response time is longer because their
jurisdictions cover more geography.
Architects utilize 5 primary strategies of CPTED: Territory
Reinforcement, Natural Surveillance, Access Control, Image, and Access
Hardening.
sandy hook
When redesigning Sandy Hook Elementary School, we applied these
design principles based on input and feedback from the community. As
architects, it is our responsibility to bring together the community's
perspectives, especially when designing a school. Convening
stakeholders and gathering their feedback is central to how architects
craft a design solution--one that is both functionally responsive and
contextually sensitive to a variety of community stakeholders'
interests.
In the case of Sandy Hook and given the nature of the attack, many
parents initially envisioned impenetrable fencing and high windows.
However, these reactions had to be balanced against the negative effect
such overt security tactics would have on both students and staff.
Instead of costly perimeter fencing, CPTED principles rely on defining
the site through a combination of minimal fencing, landscaping
materials, and natural geography, which achieves the goal of signaling
where you are being observed and monitored. There are no blind
approaches to the school.
Incoming traffic is diverted into staff or visitor parking lots,
while school busses and deliveries are the only vehicles allowed to
enter the bus loop that comes closest to the school. All of this
activity is readily visible from the school. This natural surveillance
is maximized through careful design of vegetation and the placement of
the main office to provide an unobstructed view of the approach to the
school. Natural surveillance is paired with surveillance by technology,
in the form of well-placed video cameras, to offer early detection.
Architects are especially concerned with maximizing transparency to
the greatest extent practicable within the school. Not only does it
allow for more passive natural surveillance and supervision of the
surrounding exterior space of the school by staff and faculty, it also
allows more daylight to illuminate classrooms while using less
electrical energy, and as research shows, daylight is one of the most
powerful antidepressants and positive boosts to one's mood and ability
to concentrate and learn. This transparency can also establish a
greater sense of school community among the students and faculty.
As noted earlier, a reaction to limit windows or a desire for only
high windows also removes the ability for inhabitants to view the
outdoors and eliminating natural surveillance, but also eliminating the
proven benefits of a connection to nature. Based on research, high
windows would be perceived as a fortress, and young elementary school
students would have been too short to see out the windows. Instead our
approach was to slope the grade away from the building, such that the
windows are higher to a potential assailant but feel normal to the
children inside.
Another example from Sandy Hook incorporated a variety of
requirements in a single design element. Our security consultant had
advised that an important layer would be a stand-off area from the
front of the school, where both vehicles and people would not be
allowed. At the same time, our sustainability consultant was advising
on environmentally-friendly methods of diverting rain water from the
school roof. And for the front facade design, we were looking to create
a beautiful approach as well as something symbolic of the community
identity. Our solution to all three concerns was a rain garden. With
hardy colorful plants and a sunken rock ``river,'' it is a decorative
natural element that runs along the entire front of the school--
creating a moat of sorts, that is clearly not friendly to cars or
people. The rain water is channeled into the garden where it percolates
into the soil and is naturally cleansed by the plants. The design then
has three small footbridges to cross the rain garden to enter the
school--a reflection of the community identity and the many streams and
rivers of the area that are crossed everyday with bridges throughout
town.
The children are unaware about the security benefits provided by
the rain garden--and they don't need to know. For them, the rain garden
is a teaching tool where they can see and learn about the cycle of
water and the seasonal plants with which we share our land. This small
but impactful example shows the value of taking a comprehensive,
design-centered approach to school security: It is a highly-specific
answer to multiple physical and emotional considerations at once.
conclusion
The desire to craft design solutions for the challenges facing
schools is absolutely a priority for communities. As architects, we see
this every day. However, 2 on-going problems prevent local school
officials from implementing these solutions: Lack of access to quality
information regarding design solutions and the ability to fund them.
Consider that a survey was conducted 1 year after the Sandy Hook
shooting. It polled architecture and design firms across the country
with the simple question: Has there been an increase in requests from
education officials for security features in schools. Most of the
responses were ``no'' or ``about the same''.
Part of the reason for this was lack of funding. However, the other
part was due to a lack of quality information. The truth is local
education officials don't have reliable information. Most don't know
where to begin or what information to trust in their efforts to make
their schools safe and secure. These two issues could be solved by
allowing certain Federal grants to fund design services and
furthermore, establishing a Federally-housed school design clearing
house that serves as an independent, unbiased, and ``one stop shop''
informational repository for State and local education officials.
In conclusion, while there are limitations on design to prevent
these tragedies, design can significantly mitigate them. Therefore, the
AIA would like to continue working with you and your Congressional
colleagues on potential solutions that can truly help protect our
children.
Thank you again for the opportunity to speak. I look forward to
your questions, and, on behalf of the AIA, continuing to be a resource
on this important issue.
Attachment
where we stand: school design and student safety
Protecting the health, safety, and welfare of building occupants is
fundamental to what architects do. Over the course of almost 2 decades,
architects have worked with school communities across the country in
response to repeated acts of deadly violence targeting students and
educators. Architects feel a deep responsibility to contribute to
solutions on this troubling issue. We're committed to working with all
concerned stakeholders and every level of government, on both sides of
the aisle, to keep our children safe.
As architects, we believe that schools are intended to be
communities and should be planned without sacrificing the inherent
positive qualities of the school environments we all desire for our
children. We know there is no one-size-fits-all design solution to
school safety. School design must adapt to differing and evolving
community concerns, support student health and safety, and create
productive learning environments, all while respecting stretched school
budgets.
Architects address social, psychological, economic, and
environmental factors in building design. Architects believe that
innovative architectural design solutions can keep learners and
learning central to the decision-making process in designing safe
schools. As the professional association of architects, the American
Institute of Architects (AIA) supports architects and their communities
by dedicating resources and expertise in the following ways:
AIA will lead efforts at the local, State, and Federal levels of
government to update school design guidelines.--Architects can offer
strategies designed to avert and restrict violence while preserving
open learning environments that can positively influence student
behavior and create more connected, open school communities. Achieving
this critical balance in schools requires the development of best
practice design standards and guidelines. AIA commits to advising on
best practices and to monitor their effectiveness. AIA will work
collaboratively with all levels of government to ensure they are
adopted and followed.
AIA will support collaborative and continuing education to achieve
safe school design.--The AIA will continue to engage in activities to
better inform its members and leaders in the community of the many
design options and avenues available for school officials to access.
AIA will aggregate and disseminate school safety best practices by
engaging its members, Knowledge Communities, and chapters across the
country. AIA will conduct grassroots efforts to educate State and local
government officials on the importance of implementing safe school
design in their communities.
AIA will strive to make safe school design eligible for Federal
grants.--AIA will spearhead the formation of a multi-stakeholder
coalition to support a bipartisan effort that makes architectural and
design services for schools an allowable use of funds within existing
Federal funding and grants.
AIA will establish a Federal clearinghouse on school design.--AIA
is pursuing Federal public policy to establish a repository of
architectural and design resources that is accessible by educational
officials, architects and other design professionals to inform the
design of safe, productive learning environments.
Much of the public debate about school safety has focused on access
to firearms and mental health services. Neither approach to solving
school violence has progressed much over many years despite all-too-
frequent tragedies. Architects can improve school safety through the
power of design now.
By design, innovative learning environments address the need for
contemporary learners to work peacefully, collaboratively, and safely.
To design and build the new schools we need and to retrofit existing
schools requires significant support and resources that go beyond just
the architecture, engineering, and construction communities. The AIA
urgently calls on all policy makers and stakeholders to work with
school communities to safeguard students and teachers while keeping
schools positive places of learning and growth.
______
Joint Letter From the Dignity in Schools Campaign and NAACP Legal
Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.
Committee on Homeland Security, Subcommittee on Emergency Preparedness,
Response, & Recovery, U.S. House of Representatives, H2-176
Ford House Office Building, Washington, DC 20515.
RE: Letter for the Record for the September 26, 2019, Hearing of the
U.S. House Committee on Homeland Security's Subcommittee on Emergency
Preparedness, Response, & Recovery, ``Engaging the Community:
Perspectives on School Security''
Dear Chairman Payne, Ranking Member King and Subcommittee Members:
On behalf of the Dignity in Schools Campaign (DSC) and the NAACP Legal
Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF), we encourage the
Subcommittee, and all Members of Congress, to focus on providing
students with positive supports that maintain safe, healthy, and
inclusive schools and to avoid the use of any Federal resources on
hardening schools, which does not make students safer and contributes
to the school-to-prison pipeline for historically marginalized
students.
DSC is a coalition of over 100 grassroots and education advocacy
organizations in 28 States. Since its inception in 2006, DSC members
have worked to dismantle the school-to-prison pipeline by advocating
for educational environments that keep students in school and learning.
DSC has challenged the systemic use of exclusionary discipline
practices that disproportionately impact students of color, students
with disabilities, and students who identify as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual,
Transgender, and Queer (LGBTQ), which the Department of Education's
(ED's) most recent civil rights data and other national research
verifies.\1\
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\1\ U.S. Dep't of Education, 2015-2016 Civil Rights Data
Collection: School Climate and Safety (April 2018), https://
www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/school-climate-and-safety.pdf.
See also, Hilary Burdge, Adela C. Licona & Zemi T. Hyemingway, LGBTQ
Youth of Color: Discipline Disparities, School Push-out, and the
School-to-Prison Pipeline 2, https://gsanetwork.org/files/aboutus/
LGBTQ_brief_FINAL-web.pdf (``Research shows that LGBTQ youth of color
in particular face persistent and frequent harassment and bias-based
bullying form peers and school staff as well as increased surveillance
and policing, relatively greater incidents of harsh school discipline,
and consistent blame for their own victimization.'').
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Founded in 1940 by Thurgood Marshall, LDF is the nation's oldest
civil rights law organization. For almost 80 years, LDF has relied on
the Constitution and Federal and State civil rights laws to pursue
equality and justice for African Americans and other people of color.
Since the historic U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of
Education,\2\ which LDF litigated and won, we have continued to
represent students of color to ensure they receive quality and
equitable educational opportunities \3\ and are not subject to
racially-biased school practices and policies.\4\
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\2\ 347 U.S. 483 (1954).
\3\ See, e.g., Thomas, et al. v. St. Martin Parish Sch. Dist., et
al., Civil Action No. 6:65-cv-11314, Doc. 178 (W.D. La., Jan. 25, 2016)
(approving plan to integrate the district & ensure Black students equal
access to educ. opportunities), available at http://www.naacpldf.org/
update/ldf-announces-consent-decree-thomas-v-school-board-st-martin-;
Br. for Black Student Alliance at Univ. of Tex. at Austin, Black Ex-
Students of Tex., & LDF as Amici Curiae, Fisher v. Univ. of Tex. at
Austin, 2015 WL 6690039 (Nov. 2, 2015), available at http://
www.naacpldf.org/files/case_issue/14-
981%20bsac%20The%20Black%20Student%20Alliance%20at%20the%20Uni-
versity%20of%20Texas%20at%20Austin%20et%20al._1_1.pdf.
\4\ See Complaint from LDF & Nat'l Ctr. for Youth Law to U.S. Dep't
of Educ. Office for Civil Rights (hereinafter OCR) against Bryan Indep.
Sch. Dist. (Feb. 20, 2013), available at http://www.naacpldf.org/files/
case_issue/Bryan%20ISD%20OCR%20Complaint.pdf.
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DSC's and LDF's recent joint national advocacy efforts have
included releasing a toolkit for school communities on how to engage in
the implementation of State plans under the Every Student Succeeds Act
(ESSA),\5\ including the promotion of effective strategies for reducing
these persistent racial disparities in school discipline and providing
meaningful supports to school districts to reduce the overuse of
exclusionary discipline; and re-releasing a brief on why increasing the
police presence in schools would lead to further disparities for
students of color.\6\
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\5\ Dignity in Schools, Engage for Equity: A Toolkit for School
Communities on the Every Student Succeeds Act, http://
dignityinschools.org/resources/engageforequity.
\6\ Dignity in Schools, Police in Schools are Not the Answer to
School Shootings, http://dignityinschools.org/resources/police-in-
schools-are-not-the-answer-to-school-shootings/.
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Research and experience show that increasing school safety hinges
on creating a positive school climate where students feel welcome and
safe.\7\ Efforts to harden schools both undermine efforts to improve
school climate and pose a particular problem for students of color and
students with disabilities, increasing the risk that they will enter
the school-to-prison pipeline.
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\7\ Steinberg, Matthew, Elaine Allensworth, and David Johnson.
Student and Teacher Safety in Chicago Public Schools. Consortium on
Chicago School Research, 2011, available at: https://
consortium.uchicago.edu/publications/student-and-teacher-safety-
chicago-public-schools-roles-community-context-and-school.
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For example, there is no evidence to show that the assignment of
law enforcement officers to schools makes students safer. However, law
enforcement officers placed in schools too often engage in routine
disciplinary matters best left to educators. Students who attend
schools where a school resource officer is present are more likely to
be referred to law enforcement for typical childhood behaviors that
previously would have been handled by educators using developmentally
appropriate, pedagogically sound interventions.\8\ For example, police
have arrested students, some as young as 5 years old, for throwing a
tantrum, texting, passing gas, violating the school dress code,
arriving late, bringing a cell phone to school, or having a nonviolent
verbal disagreement with a schoolmate.\9\ Just last week, 2 6-year-olds
were arrested at school in Florida, one for kicking someone and the
other for an unspecified misdemeanor, with all charges having since
been dropped.\10\
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\8\ Jason Nance, Students, Police, and the School-to-Prison
Pipeline, U. of Fla. Levin College of L., 2016, available at http://
papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2577333.
\9\ Id.
\10\ Allyson Chiu, Florida officer fired for `traumatic' arrests of
two 6-year-old students at school, Wash. Post, Sep. 24, 2019, https://
www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/09/23/girl-tantrum-orlando-
classroom-arrested-battery-school-investigation/.
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These are unfortunately not isolated incidents. In Florida, for
example, during the 2010-11 school year, assigning police to schools
led to 16,377 referrals of students to the juvenile justice system--an
astounding 45 students each day.\11\ Two-thirds of these referrals were
for misdemeanors such as disruption of a school function, disorderly
conduct, or minor scuffles with schoolmates.\12\ This criminalization
of developmentally appropriate childhood misbehavior has dire
consequences. Turning police into school disciplinarians increases
student anxiety, creates alienation and distrust, diminishes students'
faith in the legitimacy of the authority of school staff, and can
trigger, rather than prevent, misbehavior.\13\ Harsh disciplinary
practices, such as school-based arrests, increase the risk that
students will fail a grade, drop out of school, and become entangled in
the criminal justice system.\14\
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\11\ Fla. Dep't of Juv. Just., Delinquency in Florida's Schools: A
Seven Year Study 3 (Nov. 2011), available at http://
www.djj.state.fl.us/docs/research2/2010-11-delinquency-in-schools-
analysis.pdf?sfvrsn=0.
\12\ ACLU of Fla., Advancement Project, & Fla. St. Conf. of the
NAACP, Still Haven't Shut Down the School-to-Prison Pipeline 6-8 (Mar.
2011), available at http://b.3cdn.net/advancement/
be89ef01bcb350c7fc_z5m6btbgo.pdf.
\13\ Philip J. Cook, et al., School Crime Control and Prevention,
39 CRIME & JUST. 313, 372 (2010). Accord Matthew J. Meyer et al., A
Structural Analysis of School Violence and Disruption: Implications for
Creating Safer Schools, 22 EDUC. & TREATMENT OF CHILD. 333, 352 (1999);
Randall R. Beger, The Worst of Both Worlds, 28 CRIM. JUST. REV. 336,
340 (2003); Kathleen Nolan, POLICE IN THE HALLWAYS: DISCIPLINE IN AN
URBAN HIGH SCHOOL 53 (2011).
\14\ Russell Skiba et al., Are Zero Tolerance Policies Effective in
the Schools? A Report by the American Psychological Association Task
Force (2006), available at http://www.apa.org/pubs/info/reports/zero-
tolerance-report.pdf; Tony Fabelo et al., Breaking Schools' Rules: A
Statewide Study of How School Discipline Relates to Students' Success
and Juvenile Justice Involvement (2011); Centers for Disease Control,
Health Risk Behaviors Among Adolescents Who Do and Do Not Attend
School--United States, 1992, 43 MORBIDITY & MORTALITY WEEKLY REP. 129
(1994). See also Robert Balfanz et al., Sent Home and Put Off-Track:
The Antecedents, Disproportionalities, and Consequences of Being
Suspended in the Ninth Grade (Dec. 2012) (Paper prepared for the
Closing the School Discipline Gap: Research to Practice national
conference in Washington, DC, Jan. 10, 2013) (finding that students who
were suspended even 1 time in ninth grade were twice as likely to drop
out).
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Furthermore, law enforcement officers placed in schools too often
discipline, arrest, and assault Black children at a higher rate than
their White peers,\15\ violating Federal law prohibiting discrimination
based on race. Although Black and Latinx students do not misbehave more
than White students,\16\ they make up over 58 percent of school-based
arrests, but only 40 percent of public school enrollment.\17\ Black
students are more than twice as likely as their White peers to be
referred to law enforcement or arrested at school.\18\ The presence of
police in schools makes Black students and students who have been
victims feel less safe,\19\ which negatively affects school climate.
The prohibition of the assignment of law enforcement officers to school
would positively impact school safety by creating a more positive
school climate and therefore contributing to a welcoming environment
conducive to learning for students, particularly those of color.
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\15\ See Ajmel Quereshi et al., Locked Out of the Classroom: How
Implicit Bias Contributes to Disparities in School Discipline, NAACP
LEGAL DEFENSE & EDUCATIONAL FUND, INC., 2017, available at http://
www.naacpldf.org/files/about-us/Bias_Reportv2017_30_11_FI- NAL.pdf.
\16\ Russell J. Skiba, et al., Are Black Kids Worse? Myths and
Facts About Racial Differences in Behavior: A Summary of the
Literature, Indiana U., Mar. 2014, available at http://www.indiana.edu/
?atlantic/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/African-American-Differential-
Behavior_031214.pdf.
\17\ Education Week Research Center original analysis of Civil
Rights Data Collection, 2017, available at https://www.npr.org/
sections/ed/2017/01/27/511428075/does-your-school-arrest-students.
\18\ 2013-2014 Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC), A First Look:
Key Data Highlights on Equity and Opportunity Gaps in Our Nation's
Public Schools, U.S. DEP'T OF EDUC. OFFICE FOR CIV. RTS (June 7, 2016).
\19\ Matthew T. Theriot et al., School Resource Officers and
Students' Feelings of Safety at School, 14 YOUTH VIOLENCE & JUV. JUST.
2, 130-146 (Dec. 2014), abstract available at http://
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1541204014564472.
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These consequences are not limited to increasing law enforcement
presence. Many recent efforts to address school safety concerns have
included the use of technology like facial recognition software,\20\
increased use of threat assessments,\21\ and increased data sharing
with law enforcement.\22\ These and other similar recommendations that
rely upon the use of data and technology are often presented as
transparent and objective innovations, but they each come with serious
civil rights concerns. Where schools do implement threat assessments
and data sharing, they must also ensure that proper due process and
privacy protections are implemented to guard against subjecting
innocent students to false and malicious allegations of wrongdoing
without any recourse.\23\ In addition, protections should be in place,
including a robust system of feedback and review, to ensure that these
systems are not having a disparate impact on students of color or other
groups at risk of being targeted. Even well-meaning students or staff
who unknowingly hold implicit biases against students of color \24\ may
act on those biases by reporting those students as a threat. For
guidance on how to implement threat assessment teams to address these
concerns, please see the enclosed upcoming chapter from DSC's Model
School Code,\25\ entitled ``Using an Intervention Support Team Model to
Conduct ``Threat Assessments.''\26\ Facial recognition software should
not be used at all, as it has been shown to be inaccurate in
identifying Black faces, darker-skinned women, and children and has
been found to be completely ineffective in making schools safer.\27\
Additional measures like arming school staff, adding metal detectors,
and other efforts to ``harden'' schools have not been found to increase
school safety, but will unfairly negatively impact students of color.
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\20\ See, e.g., Issie Lapowsky, Schools Can Now Get Facial
Recognition Tech for Free. Should They?, WIRED, Jul. 17, 2018; Ava
Kofman, Face Recognition Is Now Being Used in Schools, but It Won't
Stop Mass Shootings, THE INTERCEPT, May 30, 2018.
\21\ See, e.g., FINAL REPORT OF THE FEDERAL COMMISSION ON SCHOOL
SAFETY, Ch. 5, Dec. 18, 2018, available at https://www2.ed.gov/
documents/school-safety/school-safety-report.pdf.
\22\ See, e.g., Benjamin Herold, To Stop School Shootings, Fla.
Will Merge Government Data, Social Media Posts, EDWEEK, Jul. 26, 2018.
\23\ U.S. Secret Service and U.S. Dep't of Educ., Threat Assessment
in Schools: A Guide to Managing Threatening Situations and to Creating
Safe School Climates (July 2004).
\24\ See, e.g., Philip A. Goff, et al., The Essence of Innocence:
Consequences of Dehumanizing Black Children, 106 J. OF PERSONALITY &
SOC. PSYCHOL. 526 (2014), available at https://www.apa.org/pubs/
journals/releases/psp-a0035663.pdf; Rebecca Epstein, et al., Girlhood
Interrupted: The Erasure of Black Girls' Childhood, CTR. ON POVERTY &
INEQUALITY AT GEO. L. SCH. (Aug. 14, 2017), available at https://
www.law.georgetown.edu/poverty-inequality-center/wp-content/uploads/
sites/14/2017/08/girlhood-interrupted.pdf; John Paul Wilson, et al.,
Racial Bias in Judgments of Physical Size and Formidability: From Size
to Threat, 113 J. OF PERSONALITY & SOC. PSYCHOL. 59 (2017), available
at http://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/psp-pspi0000092.pdf;
Walter S. Gilliam, et al., Do Early Educators' Implicit Biases
Regarding Sex & Race Relate to Behavior Expectations & Recommendations
of Preschool Expulsions & Suspensions?, YALE U. CHILD STUDY CTR. (Sep.
28, 2016), available at http://ziglercenter.yale.edu/publications/
Preschool%20Implicit%20Bias%20Policy%20Brief_final_-
9_26_276766_5379_v1.pdf; Tony Favro, Discipline and civil rights in
American State schools, CITY MAYORS, Nov. 22, 2011, available at http:/
/www.citymayors.com/education/usa-school-discipline.html; Wesley
Wright, Fear of black students, unfair treatment rampant in Denver
schools, black educators say, CHALKBEAT, Aug. 5, 2016, available at
https://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/co/2016/08/05/fear-of-black-students-
unfair-treatment-rampant-in-denver-schools-black-educators-say/.
\25\ You can find the full Model Code at http://
dignityinschools.org/take-action/model-school-code/.
\26\ This chapter is not yet finalized, so there may be slight
differences between the version attached and the soon-to-be-released
final version.
\27\ See Ava Kofman, Face Recognition Is Now Being Used in Schools,
but It Won't Stop Mass Shootings, THE INTERCEPT, May 30, 2018.
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For these reasons, DSC and LDF encourage the subcommittee to work
to prohibit the use of Federal resources to support efforts to
``harden'' schools as such efforts actually render students less safe.
The subcommittee should also work to provide more resources to schools
and districts to both protect students' rights and promote positive
school climates, including increasing the number of school counselors
and social workers, as well as access to evidence-based and promising
programs like Restorative Practices, Positive Behavior Interventions &
Supports \28\ and trauma-informed care.\29\ For additional information
and guidance on effective methods for supporting student safety and
positive school climates, please see the Civil Rights Principles for
Safe, Healthy, and Inclusive School Climates \30\ recently released by
the Leadership Conference Education Fund. These measures get to the
root of problems students are facing and proactively create safer
environments for everyone in the school community.
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\28\ See Jenni Owen, et al., Instead of Suspension: Alternative
Strategies for Effective School Discipline, Duke Center for Child and
Family and Policy, 2015, available at https://law.duke.edu/childedlaw/
schooldiscipline/downloads/instead_of_suspension.pdf.
\29\ See Katy O'Grady, Transforming Schools with Trauma-Informed
Care, ASCA SCHOOL COUNSELOR, Jan. 2017, available at https://
www.schoolcounselor.org/asca/media/asca/ASCAU/Trauma-Crisis-Management-
Specialist/TransformingSchools.pdf.
\30\ Available at http://civilrightsdocs.info/pdf/education/School-
Climate-Principles.pdf.
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Thank you for considering this letter. If you have any questions or
concerns, please do not hesitate to contact Natalie Chap [.] or Nicole
Dooley [.]
Sincerely,
Natalie Chap,
Campaign Coordinator, Dignity in Schools Campaign.
Nicole Dooley,
Senior Policy Counsel, NAACP LDF.
Encl: Dignity in Schools Campaign, ``Using an Intervention Support Team
Model to Conduct ``Threat Assessments.''
______
Letter From Everytown for Gun Safety
September 24, 2019.
Representative Donald Payne, Jr.,
Chairman, Emergency Preparedness, Response, & Recovery Subcommittee of
the House Committee on Homeland Security, H2-176 Ford House
Office Building, Washington, DC 20515.
Representative Peter King,
Ranking Member, Emergency Preparedness, Response, & Recovery
Subcommittee of the House Committee on Homeland Security, H2-
176 Ford House Office Building, Washington, DC 20515.
Dear Chairman Payne and Ranking Member King: Everytown for Gun
Safety, the largest gun violence prevention organization in the
country, submits this letter in advance of the Emergency Preparedness,
Response, & Recovery Subcommittee of the House Committee on Homeland
Security hearing titled Engaging the Community: Perspectives on School
Security. Earlier this year, Everytown released a report in
collaboration with the National Education Association and American
Federation of Teachers that goes into detail on the data on school gun
violence and proposes a comprehensive set of proven effective solutions
to strengthen schools' ability to intervene effectively when a student
is at risk, increase physical security and preparedness, and address
student access to firearms. The recommended school reforms are
essential, including programs establishing evidence-based threat
assessment teams, but it is without a doubt that strong gun safety laws
are a critical component of any comprehensive plan to address school
safety.
The data shows that targeted school violence is overwhelmingly
committed by students. From 1966 to 2016, nearly 79 percent of active
shootings in schools throughout the United States were committed by a
current student or recent graduate of the school.\1\ Research by the
U.S. Secret Service on targeted school violence shows that in 93
percent of cases there were behavioral warning signs that caused others
to be concerned, and in 81 percent of incidents, other people, most
often peers, had knowledge about the shooter's plans.\2\ These are
critical moments when a school must have a program to intervene to stop
students at risk from harming themselves or others. The U.S. Secret
Service released a report providing guidance on how to develop an
evidence-based threat assessment program, which includes addressing
students' access to guns.\3\
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\1\ The New York Police Department specifically analyzed active-
shooter incidents from 1966-2016. Analysis finds that 79 percent of
active shootings in schools involved shooters who were under 18; and
were a current student or recent graduate of the school. New York City
Police Department. Active shooters: Recommendation and analysis for
risk mitigation. 2016. https://on.nyc.gov/2GlEbI1.
\2\ United States Secret Service and United States Department of
Education. The final report and findings of the safe school initiative:
Implications for the prevention of school attacks in the United States.
https://bit.ly/2oFpIwa. Published May 2002.
\3\ National Threat Assessment Center. Enhancing school safety
using a threat assessment model: An operational guide for preventing
targeted school violence. United States Secret Service and U.S.
Department of Homeland Security. https://bit.ly/2NKlwqD. Published July
2018.
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The guns used in targeted school violence follow a pattern: Most
mass shooters obtain their guns from family or friends. Studies show
that in 68 to 80 percent of incidents, shooters obtain their guns from
home, their relative's home or from friends.\4\ There have been many
``comprehensive'' school safety plans proposed over the last 20 years.
Few have effectively and thoroughly addressed the issue common in all
school shootings: Easy access to guns by those at risk of committing
harm. Everytown strongly urges the Committee to support three targeted
gun safety policies that are proven effective interventions to prevent
students from accessing firearms.
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\4\ United States Secret Service and United States Department of
Education. The final report and findings of the safe school initiative:
Implications for the prevention of school attacks in the United States.
https://bit.ly/2oFpIwa. Published May 2002; Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention. Source of firearms used by students in school-
associated violent deaths, United States, 1992-1999. MMWR Weekly. 2003;
52(09):169-172; Woodrow Cox J, Rich S. `The gun's not in the closet.'
The Washington Post. August 1, 2018. https://wapo.st/2TyDnTW.
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First, when family or law enforcement is made aware that a student
or another person is a risk to themselves or others, and that the
person has access to guns, they need the ability to go to court and ask
a judge for a civil restraining order. These extreme risk protection
orders, or ERPOs, can be issued only after a specific legal
determination is made that a person poses a threat to him or herself or
others. An essential component of the law allows courts to take
immediate action if the evidence shows that the threat is imminent.
These laws also contain significant due process protections to ensure
that a person's rights are balanced with public safety. There is strong
evidence that extreme risk laws can prevent acts of violence before
they happen.
In Maryland, Montgomery County Sheriff Darren Popkin
testified that a recently passed ERPO law has been invoked in
at least 4 cases involving ``significant threats'' against
schools.\5\
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\5\ Broadwater L. Sheriff: Maryland's `red flag' law prompted gun
seizures after 4 `significant threats' against schools. The Baltimore
Sun. January 15, 2019. https://bit.ly/2Gdf6Qi
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In Florida, an ERPO law passed in 2018 has been invoked in
multiple cases of potential school violence, including in the
case of a student who was accused of stalking an ex-girlfriend
and threatening to kill himself,\6\ and in another in which a
potential school shooter said killing 29 people would be ``fun
and addicting.''\7\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\6\ Kennedy E. Tate student's AR-15, father's 54 guns removed under
new red flag law. Pensacola News Journal. July 9, 2018. https://bit.ly/
2UHmaba.
\7\ Lipscomb J. Florida's post-Parkland ``Red Flag'' law has taken
guns from dozens of dangerous people. Miami New Times. August 7, 2018.
https://bit.ly/2ORW56U.
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The Federal Commission on School Safety recently endorsed ERPOs as
an effective tool to prevent school gun violence, and during his
confirmation hearing before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, now-
U.S. Attorney General William Barr said that ERPOs were ``the single
most important thing we can do in the gun control area to stop these
mass shootings from happening in the first place.'' The Senate
Judiciary Committee recently held a hearing where there was bipartisan
agreement that ERPOs are important tools to prevent gun violence.
Twelve States, including Florida, and Washington, DC have passed ERPO
laws since the Parkland shooting; 5 of them were signed by Republican
Governors.\8\ In all, 17 States and the District of Columbia now have
strong ERPO laws on the books.\9\ This tool needs to be available in
every State and schools, families, and law enforcement need to be aware
of how to use it.
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\8\ CO, DE, FL, HI, IL, MA, MD, NV, NY, NJ, RI, VT. Republican
Governors signed bills in FL, IL, MA, MD, VT.
\9\ The 17 States are: CA, CO, CT, DE, FL, HI, IL, IN, MA, MD, NV,
NJ, NY, OR, RI, VT, WA.
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Second, we should encourage responsible firearm storage through
legislative change and awareness campaigns. The most common source of
guns used in school shootings is from the shooter's home, the homes of
friends, or the homes of relatives. This is unsurprising, since nearly
4.6 million American children live in homes with at least one gun that
is loaded and unlocked.\10\ Responsible firearm storage laws, often
known as child access prevention laws, require that people store
firearms responsibly when they are not in their possession in order to
prevent unauthorized access. Under these laws generally, if and when a
person accesses a firearm and does harm with it, the person who failed
to adequately store the firearm is liable. In addition to enacting
responsible storage laws, policy makers should encourage a culture of
responsible gun storage by increasing awareness of responsible storage
practices. Storing household guns locked, unloaded, or separate from
the ammunition is associated with reductions in the risk of self-
inflicted and unintentional firearm injuries among children and
teenagers--up to 85 percent depending on the type of storage
practice.\11\ For years, Moms Demand Action, the grassroots arm of
Everytown for Gun Safety, has run a public safety program called Be
SMART. This PTA-endorsed program focuses on fostering conversations
about responsible storage among parents and children to help facilitate
behavior change and address unauthorized access to guns, including the
hundreds of unintentional shootings committed and experienced by
children every year.
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\10\ Azrael D, Cohen J, Salhi C, Miller M. Firearm storage in gun-
owning households with children: Results of a 2015 national survey.
Journal of Urban Health. 2018; 95(3): 295-304. Study defined children
as under the age of 18.
\11\ Grossman DC, Mueller BA, Riedy C, et al. Gun storage practices
and risk of youth suicide and unintentional firearm injuries. Journal
of the American Medical Association. 2005; 293(6)707-714.
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Third, background checks are a key foundation to enforcing our gun
laws and are an effective tool for keeping guns out of the hands of
people with dangerous histories. A 2019 analysis found that States with
laws requiring background checks for all gun sales have homicide rates
10 percent lower than States without them.\12\ As part of a
comprehensive plan to prevent gun violence in schools, the Federal
Government must act to require background checks on all gun sales so
that shooters cannot easily purchase firearms. Current Federal law
requires that background checks be conducted whenever a person attempts
to purchase a firearm from a licensed gun dealer, however, current
Federal law does not require background checks on sales between
unlicensed parties. This means that people with dangerous histories can
easily circumvent the background check system simply by purchasing
their firearms on-line or at a gun show. A recent Everytown
investigation showed that as many as 1 in 9 people arranging to buy a
firearm on Armslist.com, the Nation's largest on-line gun marketplace,
would fail a background check, including because they are minors under
18.\13\ Among the prospective Amslist.com gun buyers in Florida in
2018, 1 in 10 were under 21 years old and not eligible to purchase
firearms under State law solely because of their age.\14\ And yet
without background checks required on those sales, those individuals
may have been able to get armed illegally and with no background check.
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\12\ Siegel M, Boine C. What are the most effective policies
inreducing firearm homicides? Rockefeller Government Institute. 2019.
\13\ Everytown for Gun Safety. UNCHECKED: OVER 1 MILLION ONLINE
FIREARM ADS, NO BACKGROUND CHECKS REQUIRED. https://
everytownresearch.org/unchecked/. February 2019.
\14\ Everytown investigators posted advertisements for firearms for
sale in Florida. Investigators did not possess any of the firearms
being listed for sale nor did they complete any transactions as part of
this investigation. Investigators then conducted telephone, text, or
email communications with prospective buyers and verified the identity
of 111 individuals in Florida looking to purchase a firearm. By
conducting searches of publicly available records, investigators were
able to determine that 11 of these prospective buyers in Florida were
under the age of 21 and prohibited from purchasing a gun in Florida
solely due to their age.
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Finally, one solution that has not been proven effective and places
schools at risk is authorizing teachers and school staff to carry
firearms in schools. Arming teachers puts our children at greater risk
and does nothing to stop active shooters or other forms of school gun
violence. While the desire for action is understandable, the notion of
a well-trained teacher acting as a last line of defense is not based on
experience or research. Law enforcement, those we charge with
protecting our schools, strongly oppose arming teachers. The National
Association of School Resource Officers and the president and chief
executive officer of the Major Cities Police Chiefs Association have
all indicated their opposition to arming teachers. Law enforcement
personnel who carry guns on a daily basis receive hundreds of hours of
initial training and are generally required to continue their training
throughout their careers.\15\ In the States that have laws that are
designed to allow for armed school personnel, those armed personnel
receive significantly less training than law enforcement. The laws vary
widely, but not a single State requires teachers or school staff to
undergo training that is akin to that completed by a full-time law
enforcement officer. The simple fact is that greater access to firearms
is strongly correlated with additional risk. When more guns are placed
into schools, children will be more likely to access them.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\15\ The average number of initial training hours that a law
enforcement officer receives at a basic training academy is 840. Reaves
BA. State and local law enforcement training academies, 2013. U.S.
Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice
Statistics. https://bit.ly/2pg0whI. Published July 2016.
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Everytown commends this subcommittee for taking up this important
issue, and strongly urges Members to focus on strengthening gun safety
laws as part of a comprehensive solution to keeping schools safe from
gun violence.
Sincerely,
Robert B. Wilcox, Jr.,
Deputy Director of Policy and Strategy, Everytown for Gun Safety.
______
Letter From the National Association of School Psychologists
The Honorable Donald Payne,
Chairman, U.S. House Subcommittee on Emergency Preparedness, Response,
& Recovery, H2-176 Ford House Office Building, Washington, DC
20515.
The Honorable Peter King,
Ranking Member, U.S. House Subcommittee on Emergency Preparedness,
Response, & Recovery, H2-176 Ford House Office Building,
Washington, DC 20515.
Dear Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member: Thank you for holding this
important hearing to discuss the best practices for enhancing school
safety and security. On behalf of the 25,000 members of the National
Association of School Psychologists (NASP), we know first-hand that
schools play a critical and irreplaceable role in keeping students safe
and supporting their mental health. While schools remain one of the
safest places for children, we cannot ignore the fact that acts of
violence do occur on our school campuses, in addition to those that our
students experience on the way to and from school and in their
communities. This can include bullying, harassment, fighting, assault,
and gun violence. Data from the Naval Postgraduate School's K-12 School
Shooting database shows that 2018 was the worst year on record for
school shootings and gun-related incidents. The Washington Post
reported that more than 226,000 children have been exposed to gun
violence at schools since Columbine.\1\ This reality in our country is
completely unacceptable. Of all developed countries, the United States
is the only Nation that continues to experience gun violence on a daily
and pervasive basis.
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\1\ Valerie Strauss, ``Study: There's no evidence that hardening
schools actually works'' (April 26, 2019) available at: https://
www.washingtonpost.com/education/2019/04/16/study-theres-no-evidence-
that-hardening-schools-make-kids-safer-gun-violence-actually works/.
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As Congress explores solutions to prevent school violence, it is
imperative that we stay focused on facts and on what we know works.
NASP urges Congress to focus on comprehensive efforts to improve school
safety--a balance of physical and psychological safety measures that
address all aspects of school safety; not just incidents of mass
violence. Creating safe and supportive schools requires a team effort.
We know that, together, we can create successful schools that prevent
violence by simultaneously employing reasonable physical security
measures, maintaining appropriate crisis preparedness and response
teams and plans, and ensuring positive school climates in which
students' academic, social--emotional, and mental and behavioral health
needs are met. In all of these efforts, school psychologists play a
critical role.
In 2012, NASP--in collaboration with the National Association of
Elementary School Principals, the National Association of Secondary
School Principals, the National Association of School Resource
Officers, the American School Counselor Association, and School Social
Work Association of America--released a Framework for Safe and
Successful Schools (attached). This resource outlines best practice and
policy recommendations that we know improve school safety. In 2018, the
author organizations, along with the National PTA, released
Considerations and Action Steps for implementing the Framework for Safe
and Successful Schools (attached). This document builds on the
recommendations outlined in the Framework and gives school leaders
concrete steps they can take to improve school safety. We urge Congress
to seriously consider these policy recommendations, which include the
following:
Schools must implement safety initiatives that balance
psychological and physical safety.--Effective school safety
efforts should utilize evidence-based practices to ensure the
well-being of all students in addition to their physical
safety. Reasonable building measures, such as secure entrances
and exits, lighted and monitored hallways, and check in-check
out systems for visitors, are important. However, an
overemphasis on extreme physical security measures alone, such
as metal detectors and arming school staff, has either no
effect or arguably negative effects on school safety.\2\ Such
measures may, in fact, undermine student perceptions of safety
and schools' ability to ensure an effective learning
environment. Multiple studies have found no evidence that any
pattern of visible security had beneficial effects on academic
outcomes, and heavy surveillance was modestly associated with
detrimental effects on academic outcomes.\3\ This is
particularly true for low-income, inner-city schools or schools
who serve racial and ethnic minority students.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ Addington, L, The Use of Visible Security Measures in Public
Schools: A Review to Summarize Current Literature and Guide Future
Research (2018).
\3\ Fisher, Benjamin W. & Tanner-Smith, Emily E, Visible Security
Measures and Student Academic Performance, Attendance, and
Postsecondary Aspirations (2016).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
We must balance physical and psychological safety by taking
reasonable security measures while also engaging in a sustained
district- and building-level commitment to foster a welcoming
and supportive learning environment. It's especially important
to note that arming teachers is not the answer. Doing so places
an unrealistic, unreasonable burden on America's educators, has
the potential to cause more harm from unintentional or
inaccurate discharge of firearms, and can undermine the sense
of safe, supportive learning environments. The Heller v.
District of Columbia case reinforced that there are ``sensitive
spaces'' where gun prohibition is perfectly acceptable--
including schools. Our Nation must focus on the approaches that
genuinely safeguard the well-being of our children and of the
school staff who work to educate, empower, and protect them
every day. Allowing anyone other than a commissioned law
enforcement officer to carry a gun at a school is not one of
these approaches.
Increase access to comprehensive mental and behavioral
health services and supports in schools.--Only a fraction of
youth in need of mental health services actually receive them,
and among those that do, the majority receive care in school.
Schools are an ideal place both to promote mental wellness and
to identify and support students struggling with mental health
issues. In these cases, collaboration among school staff
members, community members, students, and their families is
essential to ensuring that children receive care and effective
interventions.
We must stress that the vast majority of people with mental illness
are not violent; in fact, individuals with mental illness are
more likely to be victims of violence. To conclude that the
presence of an issue like depression predisposes someone to
commit a violent crime perpetuates an incorrect stereotype and
maintains a stigma that often creates a reluctance to seek
treatment. Instead we must reduce stigma, improve access to
mental health services in schools, and continue efforts to
build strong relationships and connections at school. These are
critical factors in preventing harm and interrupting
individuals' pathways toward violence. These efforts also allow
for effective responses to violent acts directed at schools,
and providing effective crisis response following exposure to
trauma.
Importantly, in order to more effectively meet the mental,
behavioral, and social-emotional health needs of students--to
address the needs of the whole child--we must increase the
number of school psychologists, school counselors, and school
social workers. There is currently a critical shortage of these
professionals, who are trained to guide school-wide prevention
and intervention, provide direct services to students in need
of support, help teachers and other school staff understand the
warning signs that individuals may be at risk of causing harm
to themselves or others, provide appropriate threat and suicide
assessments and supports to identified students, and provide
crisis response and recovery mental health supports.
Create welcoming, supportive learning environments.--
Students need to feel connected and included in their school
communities. It is critical to enhance school connectedness and
trust between students and adults, as well as to reinforce open
communication and the importance of reporting concerns about
someone potentially hurting themselves or others. A key
component of a welcoming and supportive environment is the use
of effective, positive discipline strategies that focus on
teaching and reinforcing positive behavior, preventing and
addressing negative behavior, and keeping students in school
rather than pushing them out. Overly punitive discipline
strategies, like zero-tolerance policies, do not improve school
safety. Overreliance on suspension and expulsion contributes to
the school-to-prison pipeline. Furthermore, students who are
suspended or expelled are at increased risk of dropping out,
substance abuse, and other risky behaviors that could lead to
involvement in the criminal justice system. Schools can and
should address negative behavior and connect students to the
necessary supports needed to be successful, rather than pushing
them out.
Establish trained school safety and crisis teams.--Schools
and districts need trained school safety and crisis teams and
plans that are consistently reviewed and practiced. Training
should encompass on-going prevention and early intervention as
well as response and recovery in the event the unpreventable
occurs. This includes conducting effective lockdown drills,
collaborative planning with community responders, and training
school mental health professionals with skills and techniques
to support psychological recovery. A primary goal should be to
reinforce learning as well as safety.
Enact and uphold gun laws that prevent access to firearms by
those who have the potential to cause harm to themselves or
others.--NASP supports measures that will reduce access to
firearms by individuals who intend to harm themselves or others
and are in line with existing public safety measures designed
to protect American citizens. This includes eliminating
inappropriate youth access to guns; reinstating the Federal
assault weapons ban; keeping guns out of the hands of
individuals deemed at risk of hurting themselves and others;
improving awareness of safe gun practices, including secure
storage of firearms; and funding public health research on gun
violence. We will not solve the issue of school and community
violence by making weapons more accessible or increasing their
presence in our schools. Instead, we must do everything we can
to keep weapons out of the hands of those who intend to harm
others.
The truth is that no amount of investment in physical security can
guarantee absolute protection from gun violence, and while hardening
schools with visible security measures initially may alleviate student
and parent fears and make the community aware that schools are taking
action, these measures have not been proven to decrease acts of
violence in schools. The education sector of the market for security
equipment services reached $2.7 billion in revenue in 2017 \4\--but a
recent study by researchers at the University of Toledo and Ball State
University found that there were no physical security practices with
evidence indicating they had reduced such violence.\5\ This is why
addressing the shortage and increasing access to school-employed mental
health professionals is absolutely critical to tackling this difficult
issue. These professionals provide valuable expertise on creating
healthy school environments--free of bullying, harassment, and
discrimination--where students are comfortable and able to get the
support they need and adults are able to recognize a student in crisis.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\4\ ``School security systems industry--US market overview
(February 26, 2018) available at https://technology.ihs.com/600401/
school-security-systems-industry-us-market-overview.
\5\ Khubchandani, Jagdish and Price, James, School Firearm Violence
Prevention Practices and Policies: Functional or Folly? (June 2019).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In order to make our schools safer, we must do more to address the
underlying causes of violence. This means enacting legislation that
will balance physical and psychological safety, increase access to
comprehensive mental and behavioral health services in schools, and
uphold meaningful gun safety regulations that will reduce inappropriate
access to weapons. As Congress proposes legislation to curb acts of
violence in schools, it is absolutely imperative that these efforts are
grounded in research and best practice. If you have any questions or
would like to follow up, please contact me [.]
Sincerely,
Kathleen Minke, PhD, NCSP
Executive Director, National Association of School Psychologists.
Attachment.--A Framework for Safe and Successful Schools*
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
* The attachment has been retained in committee files and is
available on-line at www.nasponline.org/schoolsafetyframework.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Attachment.--Policy Recommendations for Implementing the Framework for
Safe and Successful Schools
Implementing the Framework for Safe and Successful Schools \1\
requires policies and practices that support on-going efforts to
establish comprehensive school safety programming. Following are policy
and practice recommendations to consider when developing your action
plan. Some recommendations may appear in multiple sections.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Cowan, K. C., Vaillancourt, K., Rossen, E., & Pollitt, K.
(2013). A framework for safe and successful schools [Brief]. Bethesda,
MD: National Association of School Psychologists.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Integration of Services and Initiatives
Provide on-going, high-quality, relevant, and job-embedded
professional development to all school staff.
Encourage the use of professional learning communities or
other structured avenues to foster collaboration among school
staff.
Ensure that district and school building teams have
representation of diverse stakeholders, including principals,
teachers (general and special education), parents, school
security professionals and school resource officers (SROs),
school-employed mental health professionals (e.g., school
psychologists), and other specialized instructional support
personnel.
Engage in resource mapping to better understand available
resources and how they are utilized through the school or
district to support:
Instruction
Organization and management
Learning supports (e.g., mental and behavioral health
services).
Develop a process for regular examination of school
initiatives to improve student outcomes.
Are any initiatives redundant?
Are all initiatives directly related to the school
improvement plan?
Do you have staff buy-in?
Effectively engage parents and families in school
improvement and school safety efforts.
Related Resources
Assessing School Level and District Level Needs
Ready to Learn, Empowered to Teach: Guiding Principles for
Effective Schools & Successful Students
Ensuring High-Quality, Comprehensive and Integrated Student
Supports (NASP Position Statement)
NASSP Position Statement on Safe Schools
NASP Online Learning Center
NASP PREPaRE Training Curriculum
Leading Success Module on Safe and Healthy School
Environments
Implementation of Integrated Multitiered Systems of Support (MTSS)
Establish a process for universal screening for academic,
behavioral, and emotional barriers to learning.
Implement high-quality, rigorous curricula that address core
academic competencies, social-emotional learning principles,
mental and behavioral wellness, and positive behavior.
Establish a process for regularly reviewing student data
(both behavioral and academic).
Require a multidisciplinary, data-based decision-making team
comprised of diverse stakeholders, including principals/
administrators, teachers (general and special education),
parents, school-employed mental health professionals (e.g.,
school psychologists) and other specialized instructional
support personnel.
Ensure access to a range of high-quality, evidence-based
interventions to address the comprehensive needs of students.
Build upon existing district and State initiatives related
to MTSS (e.g., response to intervention and positive behavioral
interventions and supports).
Embed time for planning and problem solving into the staff
master schedule.
Explicitly include MTSS efforts in the school improvement
plan.
Braid available funding streams to scale up existing
efforts.
Embed MTSS principles into all relevant professional
development.
Leverage existing technical assistance available from State,
regional, and National centers.
Related Resources
Leveraging Essential School Practices, ESSA, MTSS, and the
NASP Practice Model: A Crosswalk to Help Every School and
Student Succeed
Integrated Model of Academic and Behavior Supports (NASP
Position Statement)
The School Counselor and MTSS
ESSA and Multitiered Systems of Support
ASCA specialist trainings/PD opportunities
Access to School-Based Mental Health Supports
Examine existing ratios of school psychologists, school
social workers, and school counselors.
Work with district and State leaders to develop a long-term plan to
achieve recommended ratios of each profession.
Develop and implement a process for parents, teachers, and
students to refer themselves or others for mental health
support.
Provide annual (or biannual) professional development to all
school staff in mental health first aid, the appropriate
referral process, suicide prevention, and other relevant mental
and behavioral health topics.
Utilize existing school-employed mental health
professionals in the development and delivery of this
professional development.
Provide additional professional development to school-
employed mental health professionals on current evidence-
based practices.
Develop policies and procedures for conducting suicide risk
and threat assessments.
Require involvement of the school counselor, school
psychologist, or school social worker.
Conduct a needs assessment to evaluate existing and needed
supports.
Examine availability of services in all tiers (prevention/
early intervention, targeted support, intensive support).
Implement universal screening for mental and behavioral
health concerns.
Ensure availability of evidence-based mental health supports
for students identified as being `at-risk' in universal
screening measures and other referral processes.
If your school or district maintains formal partnerships
with community agencies who provide mental and behavioral
health, establish clear expectations for communication and
collaboration among school-employed mental health professionals
and community-employed providers.
Braid available funding streams to scale up existing
efforts.
Related Resources
NASP Practice Model Implementation Guide
Mental and Behavioral Health Services for Children and
Adolescents (NASP Position Statement)
Shortages in School Psychology Resource Guide
School Psychologists: Qualified Health Professionals
Providing Child and Adolescent Mental and Behavioral Health
Services (NASP White Paper)
NASSP Position Statement on Mental Health
The School Counselor and Student Mental Health
Community Schools White Paper
School-Community Alliances Enhance Mental Health Services
Integration of School Safety and Crisis Preparedness Efforts
Require establishment of a dedicated safety/crisis response
team that includes, at a minimum, school principals/
administrators, school-employed mental health professionals,
school security professional/SROs, community stakeholders,
parents, and other school staff as appropriate. Convene this
team on a regular basis.
Develop a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with school
security agency/local police department with clear articulation
of specific roles and responsibilities of school security
personnel or the school resource officer.
Examine existing ratios of school psychologists, school
social workers, and school counselors.
Work with district and State leaders to develop a long-term
plan to achieve recommended ratios of each profession.
Develop an emergency response plan with procedures for
regular review.
Provide on-going staff development on the school safety and
crisis plan that includes regularly-scheduled practice and
coordination with community responders.
Related Resources
Model School District Policy on Suicide Prevention
School Violence Prevention (NASP Position Statement)
NASP PREPaRE Training Curriculum
NASP Online Learning Center
Balance of Physical and Psychological Safety
Ensure annual (at least) collection and review of school-
wide climate and school safety data.
Data collection should include teacher, parent, and
student perception of school climate and safety.
Include explicit goals related to school climate and school
safety in the school/district level improvement plan.
Regularly examine the use and effectiveness of extreme
physical security measures (e.g., metal detectors, armed
security).
Examine the use of these measures in conjunction with
student perception of school safety.
Develop and implement procedures (including anonymous
reporting) for students, staff, and families to report
potential threats or other concerning behaviors.
Promote mentoring programs and other efforts to ensure that
all students have a positive relationship with at least one
adult.
Develop and implement a process for parents, teachers, and
students to refer themselves or others for mental health
support.
Provide annual (or biannual) professional development to all
school staff--and students as appropriate--in mental health
first aid, the appropriate referral process, suicide
prevention, and other relevant mental and behavioral health
topics.
Ensure availability of evidence-based mental health supports
for students identified as being `at-risk' in universal
screening measures and other referral processes.
Related Resources
School Security Measures and Their Impacts on Students (NASP
Research Summary)
ESSA and School Climate
Best Practice Considerations for Active Shooter and Armed
Assailant Drills
School Safety: What Really Works
Use of Effective Discipline Practices
Create and communicate clear behavioral expectations for
staff and students.
Clearly articulate, and consistently enforce, consequences
for inappropriate behavior.
Routinely teach students appropriate behavior, and make sure
that staff model appropriate behavior.
Reinforce the display of appropriate behavior.
Establish a process for regularly reviewing student
discipline data (in conjunction with other available data
sources).
Require a multidisciplinary, data-based decision-making team
comprised of diverse stakeholders, including principals,
teachers (general and special education), parents, school-
employed mental health professionals (e.g., school
psychologists) and other specialized instructional support
personnel.
Prohibit the use of zero tolerance policies.
Establish enumerated antibullying and harassment policies.
Establish procedures for responding to all reports of
bullying and harassment.
Related Resources
Bullying Prevention and Intervention in Schools (NASP
Position Statement)
Corporal Punishment (NASP Position Statement)
NASSP Position Statement on Corporal Punishment
NASSP Position Statement on School Discipline
A Framework for School-Wide Bullying Prevention and Safety
Effective School-Wide Discipline
______
Statement of James ``Mo'' Canady, Executive Director, National
Association of School Resource Officers (NASRO)
September 25, 2019
Thank you for inviting me to testify on behalf of the National
Association of School Resource Officers. It is my honor to serve as the
executive director for this outstanding group of law enforcement and
education professionals. NASRO is a not-for-profit association founded
in 1991 with a solid commitment to our Nation's youth. NASRO is
comprised of school-based law enforcement officers, school
administrators, and school security and safety professionals working as
partners to protect students, faculty, and staff, and their school
communities. The ``school resource officer'' (SRO) refers to a
commissioned law enforcement officer selected, trained, and assigned to
protect and serve an educational environment. I cannot emphasize enough
how critical it is for officers to be carefully selected and specially
trained to function in the school environment. This is always a factor
in the success or failure of the SRO program.
The SRO program is most effective when it is built on the
foundation of interagency collaboration. Through a formal memorandum of
understanding between a law enforcement agency and a school district,
each collaborator has a clear and properly-enforced understanding of
his or her role in the school environment.
The role of the SRO should utilize the triad concept of school-
based policing, in which an SRO functions in a school environment in 3
capacities: (1) As a law enforcement officer, (2) as a teacher or guest
speaker, and (3) as an informal counselor or mentor. These strategies
should be based on a set of well-established best practices, which
NASRO has spent nearly 30 years crafting. The NASRO Board of Directors
recently commissioned a group of dedicated association members to
create a formal document of standards and best practices for school
resource officer programs. On July 13, 2018, this important document
was completed. A copy of these best practices is included with this
written testimony.
These standards are organized in 4 sections, each of which
encompasses an essential component of a successful SRO program.
The first section outlines administrative standards, including an
outline of the definition and purpose of an SRO and recommendations for
the composing of a thorough memorandum of understanding between a law
enforcement agency and a school. An SRO should be a sworn, certified
law enforcement officer assigned to a community-based policing program
and actively working in a collaborative effort with the school
district. When this definition is followed, the SRO program serves at a
tremendous benefit to its school community. However, when the
definition is not adhered to, the SRO program's effectiveness will, at
best, be greatly hindered, and, at worst, be significantly detrimental
to the school, the law enforcement agency, and the community. The No. 1
goal of any successful SRO must be to ``bridge the gap'' between law
enforcement and youth. Positive relationships between students and SROs
lay a powerful foundation for the exchange of information. These
relationships, along with those the SRO builds with the school
administration and with parents, can and have averted acts of school
violence before a shot is ever fired.
The second section speaks to the importance of the selection
process. The SRO position is a unique assignment in law enforcement,
and it requires a unique officer to properly serve in it. Due to the
nature of the assignment, the SRO will become one of the most well-
known officers in the community. The officer selected for this position
must have law enforcement experience, be of good moral character, and
have a sincere willingness to work with students.
The third section outlines the essential details of an SRO's
specialized training. Once the officer has been carefully selected, it
is then critical that he or she be specifically trained to work in a
school environment, in the triad approach. Every SRO should attend and
complete NASRO's Basic SRO Course, which includes topics such as:
Foundations of School-Based Policing, Understanding the Teen Brain,
School Law, and Emergency Operations Plans. An SRO's training must be
on-going as educational trends and school culture change and should
include topics such as: Adolescent Mental Health, Threat Assessment,
and Active Shooter Response.
The final section highlights the make-or-break importance of
interagency collaboration between the school district and the law
enforcement agency. Proper collaboration between school officials and
SRO's will most definitely be effective in preserving the campus from
disruptive forces while nurturing and protecting youth who are
compelled to attend school. This collaboration should be formalized in
a Memorandum of Understanding.
Relationship building is certainly an important factor in the
success of an SRO program. The SRO must strive to build positive
working relationships with the school administration. One way of
helping to build these relationships can be through the SROs role on
the school safety team. Properly trained SRO's are prepared to be a
member of safety teams and can also take a leadership role in helping
to develop teams where none exist.
I spent nearly half of my law enforcement career in school-based
policing. It was without a doubt the most rewarding period of my
career. It was more than just a job. It became my life's work. I
developed positive relationships with administrators, faculty members,
students, and parents. I became an integral part of the Hoover City
Schools District Crisis Team. By being a part of a school safety team,
the SRO becomes fully engaged in crisis planning to include Prevention,
Preparedness, Response, and Recovery. SRO's can provide value to the
written plans for a school district. They can also assist with campus
site assessments as well as conducting safety drills.
The aspect of ``Recovery'' was not one that I had given a great
deal of thought to during the early phase of my career in school-based
law enforcement. It was not until the days following November 19, 2002
that it became clear to me the importance of the role that a school
resource officer can play in the recovery portion of a critical
incident. The unthinkable had happened at our largest high school. One
student had taken the life of another in the hallway during the change
of class periods.
This resulted in a very large crime scene that took some time to
secure. The students had to remain in a modified lockdown for several
hours. We all knew that this was putting quite a burden on teachers in
particular. However, they did exactly what they were supposed to do, as
they had been trained. The principal asked me to join him in a faculty
meeting after the students were released. I took the opportunity to
praise the staff for their good work. One of the reasons that faculty
members were so well-prepared for an incident such as this, was due to
the school's commitment to maintaining a solid school safety team.
I believe that this faculty meeting was actually the beginning of
the recovery process. Plans were developed for the next day. We thought
that our most important job on November 20 would be to keep this from
happening again. To keep weapons out of the school. To make sure that
no retaliation occurred. While all of those things were important, it
paled in comparison to the need of the student body to be comforted and
reassured. The need for trusted and caring adults became the more
important issue in this recovery process. The school resource officers
were certainly still focused on security but we were most definitely
more engaged in the mental and emotional recovery process. The reason
for this is because we were much more than just a law enforcement
presence. We were trusted adults and we helped to make a difference in
the lives of children during the days prior to and most definitely
following November 19, 2002.
Trained and committed police officers are well-suited to
effectively protect and serve the school community. School resource
officers contribute by ensuring a safe and secure campus, educating
students about law-related topics, and mentoring students as informal
counselors and role models. Over the last 29 years, the National
Association of School Resource Officers has become the world leader in
school-based policing. We have trained thousands of officers based on
the Triad model of school-based policing and these officers are having
a positive impact on the lives of children every day.
As ``The World's Leader in School Based Policing,'' NASRO has
regularly spoken to the critical need for best practices for SRO
programs. We are proud to have authored Standards and Best Practices
for School Resource Officer Programs. This important document was
created in the furthering of our mission to keep every school and every
student safe.
______
Standards and Best Practices for School Resource Officer Programs
The Standards and Best Practices presented here are separated into
two classifications: Mandatory (M) and Recommended (R) to identify the
importance of each Standard and Best Practice.
Forward
1.0 purpose of the standards
1.1 General
This publication represents a standard for domestic and
international agencies and departments. This Standards and Best
Practices for the School Resource Officer Programs was developed and is
maintained by the National Association of School Resource Officers,
Inc., (NASRO) a section 501(c)(3) IRC membership association
established pursuant to Chapter 617 of the laws of the State of
Florida.
1.2 Applicability
This document contains professional standards and recommended best
practices for law enforcement agencies both within and outside of the
United States, regardless of size or level of government (Federal/
national, State/provincial or local).
NASRO has adopted this Standards and Best Practices for the School
Resource Officer Programs and supports the need for the standards to be
used as a guide for new and existing SRO units and for the best
practices to be reviewed and adopted by all law enforcement, school
safety agencies and school boards, as recommended.
NASRO has adopted these standards and best practices as the basis
for future law enforcement certification or accreditation and supports
the need for the standards to be used as a guide for all SRO law
enforcement administrations and operations.
1.3 Intent
These standards and best practices are intended to provide a
foundation of safe operating practices in the performance of the unit's
mission and were formulated based on what has been identified as the
two highest priorities of school-based law enforcement programs:
1. Safety first in all aspects of the operation.
2. Provide excellence in SRO services in support of the agency's
mission.
1.4 Scope
The scope of this document is intended to encompass all aspects of
SRO law enforcement and has been divided in 4 major sections:
Administration, Selection, Training, and Collaboration. The subsections
are intended to encompass the primary aspects of SRO law enforcement
unit administration and operations.
2.0 the major benefits of adopting these standards
Agencies are strongly encouraged to adopt and implement the
standards and best practices outlined in this publication. They have
been designed as industry standards intended to foster a universal
application of best practices throughout the SRO law enforcement
community. Although adoption and implementation of these standards and
best practices is strictly voluntary, agencies that choose to adhere to
them set themselves apart from others, becoming exemplars of SRO safety
and operational excellence.
2.1 Safe, Effective, and Cost-Efficient SRO Law Enforcement Operations
Compliance with these standards and best practices provides
agencies with a foundation upon which a culture of safe operating
practices may be formulated and establishes a mark of excellence to
further develop and enhance the SRO unit's professionalism, efficiency,
and overall effectiveness.
2.2 Greater Accountability with the Agency
These standards and best practices provide the respective agency
chief, sheriff, or department head sound training principles, personnel
qualification requirements, clearly defined lines of authority, and
examples of accepted industry standards that support informed decision
making and resource allocation.
2.3 Controlled Liability Insurance Costs
Compliance with these standards and best practices may allow for
agencies to more easily purchase SRO law enforcement and liability
insurance, increase the limit of their insurance coverage, and, in many
cases, lower their insurance premiums and/or gain other financial
incentives.
2.4 Stronger Support from Government Officials and the Community
By complying with these standards and best practices, agencies
establish credibility as professional operations, which provide safe,
cost-effective, and essential SRO support to law enforcement operations
in a variety of missions.
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
______
Letter From Sandy Hook Promise
September 26, 2019.
The Honorable Donald Payne Jr.,
Chairman, Subcommittee on Emergency Preparedness, Response, and
Recovery, 103 Cannon House Office Building, Washington, DC,
20515.
The Honorable Peter King.
Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Emergency Preparedness, Response, and
Recovery, 302 Cannon House Office Building, Washington, DC,
20515.
Dear Chainman Payne and Ranking Member King: At Sandy Hook Promise,
we believe that school violence is preventable when you know the signs.
We are pleased that the Subcommittee on Emergency Preparedness,
Response, and Recovery is examining this critical issue during today's
hearing on ``Engaging the Community: Perspectives on School Security.''
As you take on this work, we encourage you to prioritize prevention and
hold up proven evidence-based programs that can help stop tragedies
before they happen.
We are among the family members whose loved ones were killed in the
mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School that took the lives of 20
precious first-graders and 6 of their dedicated educators on December
14, 2012. Together, we formed Sandy Hook Promise, a national nonprofit
committed to preventing gun violence before it happens by delivering
no-cost, evidence-based prevention programs to our schools that train
students and adults to know the signs of gun violence and intervene to
stop a potential tragedy. We have trained over 7.5 million youth and
adults and averted multiple school shooting, suicide, and other violent
threats across all 50 States.
While threats to our schools can come from the outside, the
committee should consider that most school violence occurs between
students. The Rural School and Community Trust reviewed nearly forty
years of data and found that 90 percent of school-based mass violence
events occurred in middle and high schools, and in these events, 65
percent of violent attacks were committed by students. Through our Know
the Signs programs, students and school personnel are taught to
recognize the signs of potential interpersonal violence and self-harm
and take action to get help and stop a tragedy. Empowering and training
our students is especially important because we know that they are
often the first to see warning signs of violence and self-harm in their
peers, particularly through social media.
Research shows that our students are already helping to avert
tragedies. A recent report on averted school shootings showed that when
school shootings have been averted, it was largely due to students
speaking up about a potential threat before harm could occur. The
Police Foundation's Averted School Violence Project, developed with the
support of the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) Office,
tracked and evaluated 51 instances of school violence over 2 years that
were averted, avoided, or somehow stopped. They found that 68 percent
of all averted violent threats were stopped because a student saw
something and spoke up, leading the Police Foundation to name
prevention programming as their top recommendation for preventing
school shootings. The Department of Homeland Security echoed this
recommendation in their 2018 report on K-12 school security, stating
that ``the importance of detecting and addressing concerning behavior,
thoughts, or statements cannot be overstated. In fact, preventing
violence by detecting and addressing these red flags is more effective
than any physical security measure.''
At Sandy Hook Promise, we have worked diligently to create
opportunities for prevention programs to grow and reach more students
across the country, eliminating financial and geographic barriers for
schools. In March 2018, we worked with bipartisan champions in Congress
to pass the STOP School Violence Act which makes much-needed grants to
States, localities, school districts, and Tribal communities to bring
evidence-based violence prevention programs to their students. These
grants have already helped to train millions more students in suicide
and violence prevention. STOP funds are also being used to provide
school personnel with threat assessment training that can help them
better triage threats early and adopt a flexible, problem-solving
approach to disciplinary matters that encourages a more positive school
climate in which students feel treated with fairness and respect.
Suicide is the second-leading cause of death for middle and high
school age youth, and that is why it is critical that suicide
prevention be part of a holistic approach to protecting the health and
safety of our students. Much like other forms of violence in schools
and among young people, the most effective approach to preventing these
costly suicides is detecting warning signs early and acting on them
before a tragedy can occur. We know that 70 percent of individuals who
go on to complete suicide told someone about their plans or gave some
other noticeable warning sign.
We are proud to have worked with House champions to recently
introduce H.R. 2599, the Suicide and Threat Assessment National
Dedicated to Universal Prevention (STANDUP) Act in response to the
nation's growing youth suicide crisis. The STANDUP Act would encourage
more States and tribes to implement student suicide awareness and
threat assessment training by conditioning the receipt of the Substance
Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's (SAMHSA) mental
health program grants--Project AWARE grants--on the adoption of these
State-wide policies. This is the first of many steps we can take to
ensure that all our students have access to proven, life-saving
programs, and we urge members of this Committee to support this
legislation.
We thank you for holding today's hearing on school safety. There is
no single solution to stopping this epidemic of school shootings and
tragedies. The challenge must be met with urgency and the resources
that our students and schools deserve. We stand ready to work with
every member of this Committee to protect our children from violence.
Sincerely,
Mark Barden,
(Daniel's father).
Nicole Hockley,
(Dylan's mom).
Mr. Payne. I want to thank the witnesses for their valuable
testimony today and the Members for their questions.
The Members of the subcommittee may have additional
questions for the witnesses and we ask that you respond
expeditiously in writing to those questions.
Pursuant to the committee rule VII(D), the hearing record
will be open for 10 days without objection.
Hearing no further business, the subcommittee stands
adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:52 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
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Questions From Chairman Donald M. Payne, Jr. For Kathy Martinez-Prather
Question 1. Texas recently passed HB 4342, which requires an
architect to serve on the Texas School Safety Center board. What is the
importance of having an architect involved in school safety?
Answer. Protecting the health, safety, and welfare of building
occupants is fundamental to what architects do. Design is particularly
fundamental to the phases of prevention and mitigation in overall
hazard planning. Architects have always been integral for safety
features, such as ingress and egress and severe weather safety. Over
the course of the last 2 decades, architects have worked with school
communities across the country to design and create safer schools in
response to repeated acts of deadly violence targeting students and
educators. An architect can ensure that all stakeholder perspectives
and ideas are incorporated into a new or redesign of a school--from
first responders and mental health advocates to engineers as well as
parents and students. They have the training to ensure a holistic
approach is taken to design a school--one that will ensure it remains a
welcoming learning environment, while addressing safety. That's why it
is important for school officials to work with architects early in the
process of their addressing the physical security of their building
stock. Architects can and will be at the forefront of finding and
developing new building standards and codes that can make schools safer
at the critical design stage. This is one of the reasons that Texas
Governor Abbott appointed an architect to his school safety task force
that he established within the first 48 hours after the shooting at
Santa Fe High School.
Question 2. Are schools in Texas adequately planning for how they
might respond to a possible chemical or biological event, whether
that's an attack or an industrial accident or some other incident, to
protect students? Is this something the Federal Government needs to be
more active in promoting? If so, how?
Answer. Texas schools have been involved in multi-hazard emergency
operation planning for several years now. There is certainly more work
to be done and new and unforeseen threats to be considered all the
time. The Texas School Safety Center is rolling out new training
related to emergency operation planning and identifying threats and
hazards. Chemical and biological events are particularly difficult to
identify and plan for. In many instances a district may not even be
aware of the threat a particular industrial site may pose. It is our
goal to continue working with schools to better identify and define
threats and prepare for possible incidents.
One significant role the Federal Government could play is providing
funding for outlets for information and training for these types of
incidents. We are also in the process of establishing protocols for
reviewing emergency operation plans and one area that is lacking is
readily-available information for entities, such as ours, to identify
and establish the types of threats at school locations. We are in the
conceptual stages of how to gather information from multiple databases
to be able to identify hazards by school locations. For example, while
reviewing emergency operation plans we need the ability to be able to
look up a school address and see that the school is within so many feet
of a railroad track, is within or adjacent to the blast zone of a
pipeline, is within a defined distance of a chemical or industrial
plant. The ability to have that type of readily-available information
could greatly assist with helping schools know what to plan for and how
to train.
Question 3. The Texas School Safety Center has run a school safety
clearinghouse for several years. Can you provide any lessons learned
that might be useful to DHS as they establish a Federal clearinghouse?
Answer. Provide as much free on-line training as possible. There is
a great deal of commercial training and information on the market and
some of it is very good but it can be expensive. Providing information
and especially training is a valuable commodity that many districts
cannot afford. There are also many different methods and ideologies
around school safety and security and it is important to not let best
practices become vendor-driven. As a clearinghouse you will find that
there are many solutions floating around and often they are seeking a
problem to land on and proliferate. In many instances they have been
developed from one perspective, based on one incident, or sized to one
need. It is vitally important to look at things from a holistic view
and understand them from the perspective of the people utilizing the
information and putting into practice, from the students, to the
teacher, district employees, and first responders.
Question 4. Have you seen the U.S. Department of Homeland Security
actively engage with schools in Texas to improve preparedness? Where do
you think they can be the most effective in helping to improve school
safety?
Answer. Assisting State entities in identify emerging threats or
trends and best practices for prevention, mitigation, and response is
critical for planning purposes.
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