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A school in Indiana has been criticised for apparently shooting teachers "execution style" with pellets as part of an "active-shooter drill". The case has reignited conversations about the usefulness of drills and the methods used to prepare schools for shootings.
[...] Many experts agree that discussing and practising how to respond to a dangerous situation will help protect students who find themselves faced with the real thing. Fire drills, for example, are well established tools to teach children how to behave in a potentially life-threatening situation.
[...] While more realistic and stressful situations may be appropriate here, he says "large-scale, prolonged, realistic drills are not ideal" for children.
[...] "Children being asked to pose as victims on the floor covered in fake blood is just pointless and can be traumatising, I can't see why that's necessary."
Source: US school shootings: Have drills gone too far?
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Monday April 01 2019, @02:38PM (7 children)
These drills do little to prepare people for evading an armed murder with the intent to kill. Locks can be shot off, even if used effectively, not as easily as in movies, but the kind of equipment school shooters have been packing is more than up to task. There's no material evidence they'll save a single life.
On the other hand, I feel like the drills very much could cultivate a young killer-to-be, whose outlook might already be damaged enough to take sadistic glee in watching their fellow students cower.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 01 2019, @03:16PM (2 children)
Don't forget it also serves to inculcate a hate for the 2A.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Monday April 01 2019, @03:18PM
I'm not seeing the problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 01 2019, @06:46PM
What about the 2B, and classrooms 3A, 3B, and 3C? What's so special about 2A, other than the cops shooting the teachers in the haid with pellet guns?
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Monday April 01 2019, @04:06PM (1 child)
I could imagine the drills making a difference.
Yes, the bad guy can shoot the lock off. That doesn't him into the room if someone or something is trying to stop him from opening it. Also, shooting the lock or kicking down the door takes time, and delaying the bad guy means that the cops have more time to show up with enough firepower to do something useful, plus the longer it takes for the bad guy to kill each kid, the fewer kids will be dead. Sure, it won't stop anybody for long, but 20 seconds here, 10 seconds there, 15 seconds somewhere else, and that can start adding up. Plus, getting kids and teachers well-hidden behind barriers reduces the chance that SWAT will hit them trying to take down the bad guy.
It's not perfect. There will probably still be people killed, and it's entirely possible some of those people will be schoolchildren. That's because when you've gotten to the point of "madman with AR-15 determined to kill a many kids as possible before being taken out", a lot of things have gone very very wrong. As a general rule, it's nigh-impossible to stop someone who is at the point of wanting to kill a bunch of people before being killed themselves from doing just that, the only question is how many bodies will be on the deck when it's all over.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by ikanreed on Monday April 01 2019, @05:12PM
It's possible, but color me about as willing to believe that as I am by the TSA confiscating a bottle of water.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 01 2019, @05:29PM
The point of locking the doors and sheltering in place is to slow the killing spree down and to reduce the likelihood of armed officers shooting innocent people in the process.
Of course, locks can be shot off and an intruder can break into a room, but doing so is a lot harder than just engaging in a turkey shoot of students and faculty fleeing for their lives.
Once you have an active shooter, there are no good solutions left.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 01 2019, @05:32PM
They can be, but generally in mass shooter situations like this they are not. The shooters get to a locked door and move on. You are actually far safer behind a locked door than out in the open. Although I'd agree these types of drills aren't all that useful.