I got a phone call from Alabama...

When I received the e-mail about the assignment this week, I personally have some close emotions relevant to this topic that I have recently experienced. I went to Tennessee this weekend to visit some friends. On Friday, one of my friends who attends the University of Alabama Huntsville campus called and was distraught. He said that there has been a shooting on campus and he is not sure what exactly has happened. He didn’t know if it was students or teachers, how many of been shot, or what was going on. I can only imagine what he was going through. This is a thought that has gone through every students head but never actually believe that they would witness something so overwhelming. The phone conversation was pretty short but I did ask how he found out that it had happened. He replied and said that he received a text message that awoken him during a nap. This made me start thinking about how emergency plans are developed on campuses for different emergency situations.

I didn’t get to talk to him again, because he was on the phone with his friends and family. As soon as I got up the next morning, I got on the internet and did some research. I started reading articles from many different websites that did not have the same story. I know they were written too soon after the event. I then kept my ears and eyes out for any more information. Monday night I came across this article:

http://abcnews.go.com/WN/female-shooter-kills-university-alabama-huntsville/story?id=9827937

After reading this article, I was shocked because I learned that the shooter was actually a TEACHER! I think that this is a very unique situation that has not been a popular situation for school shootings. A teacher who was in a meeting about future tenured plans got upset when she was denied tenured and decided to shoot the department chair and two other faculty members who were granted tenured. The department that held the shooting was biology. I am a biology TA on campus right now and can’t fathom the idea of a teacher bringing a gun into our department and shooting other faculty during a meeting. Actually re-reading the sentence that I just typed gives me the creeps. This just reminds you that you can never know when a shooting will occur and by who. I don’t know…I guess I have always stereotyped a student shooter as someone in the classroom who would keep to themselves, not have a lot of friends, and fall into the stereotype of a “loner”. After this school shooting that happened in Alabama, gives us proof that the emergency reaction plans need to include all kinds of scenarios even including the least likely scenario.

I think that every campus has an emergency plan when it comes to a school shooting. Which one is the best? Which one keeps the students and faculty the most out of harm? I don’t think there is one best emergency plan to follow. I think you have to consider a lot of facts that keep plans in reality. The size of the campus, how many students attend the school, what time of day does the emergency happen, and other factors that could affect the direction of the emergency plan that should go into effect.

This is not my area of expertise but I can say that I assumed that lockdowns were always what most schools relied on to keep their students safe and out of harm’s way. I found this quote in the following article:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/school-shootings/lockdowns.html
“Following the dramatic school shooting at Virginia Tech in April 2007 a campus law enforcement expert told an investigating panel that lockdowns at schools might not always be realistic and are difficult to execute at large schools during emergencies.”
This article was based mainly upon high school and secondary lockdown procedures and routines that they practice. I think this is a great article but does not include some of scenarios that I listed earlier for a college campus. This lockdown procedure could work at small campuses. After reading the quote though, I was surprised. I just didn’t know there were other options, but after sitting here thinking about it…I think it is a good thing.

So I did some more research….I found another article written in 2007 after the Virginia Tech shooting happened. In this article they listed the following prevention and preparedness strategies:
• Recognize that the entire campus community - students, faculty, staff, local emergency and law enforcement personnel, and neighboring areas - must be involved in prevention.
• Be prepared for crisis situations. Develop and practice contingency plans based on a variety of possible emergencies. Include student and faculty leaders who can help coordinate immediate responses.
• Develop mechanisms for communicating regularly (as well as in emergencies) with law enforcement, faculty, staff, students, parents and the community on prevention strategies and preparedness and response plans.
• Discuss school safety and security activities and plans with parents and students during school orientation. Provide reminders through the communications network to update staff, faculty, returning students and others. Consider periodic open forums to answer questions or clarify procedures.
• Bring together the campus safety team, which should include campus and community safety and security personnel, faculty, staff, students, and parents to review, update, and strengthen prevention and preparedness plans.
• Use crime analysis and crime mapping tools to help identify crime trends and issues on campus, along with incident analysis to help refine and improve prevention and response strategies
Here is the following link to the article that listed these above:
http://govpro.com/public_safety/homeland_security/gov_imp_52826/

I think that all these strategies are a good way to ensure that the emergency procedure is up to date and acceptable for many situations for a specific campus. Another great website I came across is this:
http://www.ncpc.org/

This website is the National Crime Prevention Council. This website contains blogs on recent crime prevention plans and actions that are happening all over the United States. This website could give campuses some great information on what to do when developing these emergency action plans.

Going back and reading all the things that I found and did research on, I think that the shooting at the University of Alabama- Huntsville campus will open the floor to develop emergency reaction plans that include actions on how to keep students and faculty safe if the shooter happens to be a faculty member.