Miserably, school violence has become routine across the nation. For example, just by watching the news alone; one listens to, and witnesses countless occurrences of school violence. Highly publicized school shootings, [like the massacre in Columbine[1],] have created an uncertainty about the safety and security of this country’s schools, and have generated fear that an attack is imminent in any school, in any community” (Vossekuil, 2002, p3). For this reason, the United States government set into motion, various studies to determine both the direct and indirect causes and effects of school violence. The intention of this research paper is to examine the impact that school violence has on students’ learning environment, and to hypothesis new safety approaches. In addition, this research paper will focus on the fundamental characteristics that can cause a student’s narcissistic behavior to lash out, as well as, the effects of their behavior has on the student’s peers.
The intention of bullying, for example, is intended to make the victim feel stressed and impaired. The aggressor generally has power over the person/s whom they are bullying. Bullying is a major foundation that relates to the rising amount of unpleasant incidents of school violence; and it necessitates attention from educators. School sadism has an emotional impact on children of all ages; this act of domestic terrorism is seen as early as kindergarten, to the college level – where students bring guns to school to simply alarm other students, whom they have been hostile with (Toppo, 2003).
School violence has become an all-too common crisis within the last few years. In 1996, a study conducted by the Children’s Institute International Poll of American Adolescents, revealed that 47 percent of adolescences’ believed that their schools survival rate was on a decline due to violence. 10 percent adolescences’ were terrified of being shot or wounded by classmates carrying weaponry to schools; while more than 20 percent of the students were afraid to go to restrooms, because these unsupervised sections of the school, were common locations for student victimization (The US Department of Health and Human Sciences, 2003).
Plausible Causes of School Violence
Contrary to common belief, school violence does not originate from gang-related occurrences; but rather it does derive from frequency of narcissistic (some who shows extreme love and administration for oneself, and worthlessness of others) behaviorisms, like bullying. Bullying is defined as an act of intentionally causing harm to others through verbal harassment, physical assault, or other more devious methods of coercion (Bullies and their victims: Understanding a pervasive problem in the schools, Batsche, G. M., & Knoff, H. M. (1994) School Psychology Review, 23 (2), 165-174 EJ 490 574). Bullying, which is often a common element of school violence, is also repeated acts of aggressive behavior to torment and to calculatedly impair another person/s. Bullying is characterized by a distinctive entity behaving in a manifested approach to acquire power over another person (Besag, 1989). Behaviors may include name chastising, verbal or paper/technological written abuse, social isolation and exclusion from social functions, physical abuse, or coercion (Carey, 2003; Whitted & Dupper, 2005). Bullies may behave this way, to be perceived as popular, tough, or simply to seek attention. The aggressor may be bulling out of jealousy; or in return, the aggressor may be a victim who appears to be acting out, because they themselves are bullied (Crothers & Levinson, 2004).
The USA National Center for EducationStatistics suggests that bullying can be broken into (2) two categories:
1. Direct Bullying
2. Indirect Bullying (also known as social aggression)
Direct bullying necessitates a great deal of physical aggression such as pushing, punching, and slapping, throwing things, choking, kicking, stabbing, pulling hair (often seen in female/female situations), scratching, biting and scraping.
Indirect bullying is characterized by threatening a victim into social isolation. This process of social isolation is accomplished through an extensive range of techniques. These techniques include vague communication by spreading gossip, refusing to associate with the victim, bullying other people who desire to socialize with the victim, and criticizing the victim’s behavior and other socially-significant indicators which include the victim’s race, religion, and disabilities. Other forms of indirect bullying, which are likely related to verbal chastising; are name calling, the silent treatment, manipulation, hearsay, scuttle-butt (military jargon for water cooler gossip), and laughing at the victim in ridicule mocking.
According to Trump (1998), a common setting surfaces when, “A student is harassed, slapped around, and punched roughly daily on the bus ride home from school.” For the most part, when there is a precedence of abuse that occurs over a lengthy period of time, the victimized student/s often brings a knife or a gun of some variation to school, and formulates a plan (premeditation) to pull the weapon out, and stab or shoot the bully. Not only are students bullies, but often teachers are identified as manipulative aggressors. On the other hand, many teachers tend to observe bullying as a normal, natural part of life; which can mean that they are therefore, indifferent when they see it occur (Coy, 2001). Unfortunately, when teachers ignore the fact that bullying is occurring, it is probable to suggest that the victimized student may feel alone, and that their options are limited.
Peer Pressure
Students face peer pressure everyday because they have a void to fulfill, along with a need to fit in with other students their age. Peer pressure can be both:
1. Positive
2. Negative
Peer pressure is positive when it is giving confidence to colleagues and/or friends of students, to improve themselves academically or socially in a legal, harmless manner. A group of students supporting other students to be involved in community service programs is an illustration of positive peer pressure.
In contrast, negative peer pressure involves a group of students compelling other students to participate in illegal and/or detrimental behavior.
Another form of peer pressure relates case in point, back to the notorious bullying in schools. Bullying is a relentless predicament because it can have negative consequences on the entire school’s ambiance, and it can hinder students’ rights’ to learn in safe surroundings. Victims habitually dread school, and view it as a miserable and insecure place to be. Bullies’ give that the impression that for the most part, they need to feel in control; and to draw from some sort of realm and satisfaction, by inflicting pain and suffering on to others.
The National School Safety Center calls bullying, “the most enduring and underrated problem in American schools” (Banks, 2000, p. 12). It is interesting that the severity and frequency of bullying have an inverse relationship. The severity increases with age, while the frequency decreases. Prime and tragic examples of severity are the students from Columbine High School, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. They were no-expense-spared targets for verbal and physical harassment by the athletes of the school. Researchers and observers speculate that they were pushed over the edge from years of torment (Banks, 2000).
The Media
The media also plays an important position in the spread of school violence. “Violent movies, violent music, violent video games-many believe they have combined to erode the moral fiber of today’s youth, turning some into ruthless killers” (Glasgow, 2003). After the terrorism at Columbine occurred, news stations replayed video recordings of the chaos that followed. The attention individualized Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, the Columbine shooters, which may have been inspiration to others, who suffered being bullied and wanted to lash out against their attackers. In a society that is flooded with media images of violence, Mediascope
The problem may not necessarily be the direct correlation between student watching an image on the television or the movies and duplicating it; it is likely the constant exposure to violence that tends to guide children to believe that violence is an ordinary and not deviant behavior. These various kinds of media attention have a tendency to significantly influence students that already have penchants to violence, leading them to believe it is not out of the ordinary.
Preconditioned, should a student/s decide that they are going to terrorize their school or a specific individual, it is virtually easy to do so, despite the many failed attempts and successful school acts of violence in the past. The internet contains a generous amount of information on how-to-concepts, like building bombs, planning murders, how to map out a school attack, suicide packs, and much more terrifying acts to fuel criminal-behavior. A 1999, Gallup Poll indicated that 82 percent of Americans, who were surveyed, blamed the internet for a major source of mitigating information that led to the Colorado slaughter (Moore, 1999). Basically, any student (even a young child who knows how to type) can search the internet to learn ways to plan and execute an attack. Despite laws and enforcement, guns are incredibly easy for children to acquire. “Too many guns handled in rage, by troubled adolescents, can often be traced back to irresponsible adults” (O’Connor, 1998).
For example, children as young as preschool ages are capable of obtaining a gun in their parents’ home; and sadly enough, there is a likelihood of finding an arsenal of accessible weapons in neighborhoods and adjoining cities. Chances are that many of these young children are not aware of the consequences and deprecations that derive from “playing” with a gun. Older students have easy access to guns, and can use the internet to create an action plan for using the weapons. “Access to weapons among some students may be
The Preparation behind the Violence
In many incidents of school violence, the terrorist often brags to friends are other victims of abuse regarding their intentions. Regardless of whether or not their attentions are believed to be authentic or joked about, the student/s may have mentioned their plan of action briefly to friends. As a rule of thumb, these friends or acquaintances never reported the mentioned violence to the proper authorities, because they believed the attack were only idiotic nonsense; and that they would never actually go through with it (Department of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 2003). According to the findings of the Safe School Initiative, “in nearly 2/3 of the incidents [studied], more than one person had knowledge about the attack before it occurred. In nearly all of these cases, the person who had direct knowledge of the event was a friend, schoolmate, or sibling” (Vossekuil, 2002, p25). Arguments that are similar to the September 2001 attacks can be correlated to school attacks, in that people or organizations that had direct knowledge that intent might exist; then theoretically, the entire attack would have most likely been prevented.
Consequently, many citizens argue that these student terrorists’, who engage in some sort of illegal activity, prior to an assault, can be seen as a “cry for help.” Notwithstanding, if the proper help and counseling was given to the student, it is plausible that the attack would have never occurred. In the aftermath of the Virginia Tech[2]
Weapons Release
Virginia Tech
During February and March 2007, Cho premeditatedly purchased the weapons that he would later use throughout his killing rampage. On 9th February 2007, Cho purchased a .22 caliber semi-automatic handgun, from a federally-licensed firearms dealer in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Cho bought a Glock semi-automatic handgun, on 13th March 2007
On 22nd March 2007, Cho purchased two 10-round magazines“All the [shit] you’ve given me, right back at you with hollow points…”
Effects
Bullying has many negative effects on students even before a sadistic retaliation transpires. For the victim, it may be a noteworthy factor related to their low self-esteem, or that directly relates to lowering their self-esteem. This low self esteem can either lead to suicide or it can cause the student to act in response with a violent retaliation. Permitting bullying to continue can have countless negative consequences for the bullies themselves. If a more strong-minded approach to end bullying were exercised, perhaps fewer students would experience the pain of being tormented daily during school.
If zero is done to lower the amount of occurrences of school violence, many negative consequences will likely continue to acerbate. For example, the less unfortunate number of children who stay home to avoid bullying will increase. Currently, 162,000 students stay home each day because they are afraid to go to school” (Weinhold, 2003). If bullying is not stopped, more shootings will occur within the schools. Short term preventive solutions, such as metal detectors and security guards are used, but there will be no long term solutions that focus on the true nature behind the threat of why children lash out. These short term resolutions only sheds a spotlight on preventing children from inappropriate violent acts, instead of actually removing the rooted foundation for why they choose to be violent.
Fear
School violence has many negative effects on the students, and on the school overall. “Students and teachers coming into our schools must have a safe and orderly environment. Children cannot learn and teachers cannot teach if they are scared or intimidated” (Philips, 2002). It is unjust for both students and teachers to function in continuous fear of being attacked at school. It would be nearly impossible for a student to concentrate in their learning environment if the student lives in a constant condition of fear.
Prevention Methods
Bullying is a foremost cause of school violence, and any attempts to eradicate it would lower the relentless frequency of school violence. The Secret Service and the Department of Education collaborated and created the Safe School Initiative, a program designed to establish a safe learning environment for students. The study examined 37 incidents of school violence in the United States, for a period of 26 years, to expose the philosophy and behavior of student attackers, and to determine what preventative procedures could have been taken to avoid the torment. In a safe school climate, adults do not bully students and [they] do not bully each other, and they do not turn a blind eye to bullying behavior when they know that it is going on in the school” (Vossekuil, 2002, 70).
Professional School Security Assessment
The first crucial step in developing a plan of action for safe school environments is having a professional school security assessment already set in to practice. The purpose of this assessment is to give education staff a report on the existing security conditions in their schools; and to evaluate the strengths and their weaknesses of the current practices. “An assessment identifies vulnerabilities and risks related to security threats. It also makes specific recommendations, short-term and long-term, for corrective action to reduce these risks or to continue effective practices,” (Trump, 1998, 45). More often than not, the breakdown of an assessment includes (a) interviews with the faculty and the staff, (b) an analysis of authoritative date relating to disciplinary actions, and (c) an examination of the school’s design and structure (Trump, 1998). Notwithstanding, perhaps the assessment should either include *(d) or use a separate assessment which includes students’ opinions.
Quick Fixes
After an incident of school violence, there is usually some sort of quick fix. The most common “quick fix” is the use of metal detectors. Metal detectors are not entirely efficient in preventing students from smuggling weapons into schools; it is feasible for a student to get a weapon into a school by climbing into a window. Handheld metal detectors are more effective than stationary ones and surveillance cameras are another effective method in lowering violence in schools. One, however, must take into account operating costs, determining who will monitor the surveillance cameras, and in what locations will the cameras be most effective. The most important thing to remember is that even though it may seem like these surveillance cameras are not effective, perhaps because the school has only confiscated two guns within the year, imagine how many guns were not brought to school because of the knowledge that these surveillance cameras and metal detectors were present (Trump, 1998).
School security personnel, composed of either security guards or police, have become a typical presence in schools. Duties include, “[1] deter, detect and defeat criminal activity, [2] prevent theft and other losses caused by fire, damage, accident, trespass, or criminal activity, [3] protect life, property, and the rights of individuals, and [4] enforce laws, rules, regulations, and statutes” (Hylton, 1996, 27). It is typical to have one guard for every four hundred students that are in the school. This way there are plenty of security personnel to deal with an emergency if one were to arise.
Long-term Solutions.
A recent program, Crime Prevention through Environmental Design [CPTED], takes a new approach to safety measures. By conducting a CPTED analysis, school officials can pinpoint specific environmental changes that will foster desired behaviors rather than inadvertently encouraging unwanted behavior” (Schneider, 2001). There are three main points to CPTED. Natural surveillance is key and this means watching the whole area without overexerting oneself to do so. Pruning shrubs is a good way to improve natural surveillance because this allows faculty, staff, and security to easily look for suspicious characters. The second main point in this program emphasizes natural access control. This simply means controlling who can enter the school by having one main entrance and closing off all unsupervised entrances. The final point is territoriality or establishing control over the environment. Administration should make clear who is part of the school environment and who is not. A good way to implement this method is to have the students wear uniforms and to have the teachers wear name tags (Schnerider, 2001).
The best way to prevent attacks on schools is to try to get rid of the reasons why children turn violent. Lowering the amount of bullying that occurs will be very beneficial. “Students should be encouraged to report incidences of bullying by promising the students anonymity. The school should develop a student watch program by training student volunteers to patrol and report instances of bullying” (Coy, 2001). If a school makes its student body aware that bullying will not be tolerated under any circumstances and the punishment for bullying is harsh, students will be less likely to bully their peers. This in turn will foster a learning environment that will not have as many students who are hostile and have built up rage; however, there will always be students with problems. The final preventative method is, “… educators can play a part in prevention by creating an environment where students feel comfortable telling an adult whenever they hear about someone who is considering doing harm to another person, or even whether the person is considering harming themselves” (Vossekuil, 2002, 42). This method will only be effective if the authority figures listen to the students and handle the information fairly and justly.
In recent years, school violence has spread to every type of school in the nation. The attackers have been of every race, gender and ethnicity. The problem is that students feel that they cannot resolve their problems without resorting to violence; administrations need to give students another way out. School violence negatively affects every person in the learning environment in numerous ways. By eliminating the causes of school violence, a safe learning environment for all children can be achieved.
References:
-Books:
Fein, R. A. (2002) Threat assessment in schools: a guide to managing threatening situations and to creating safe school climates. Washington, D.C.
Hylton, J. B. (1996) Safe school: A security and loss prevention plan. Boston, Massachusetts: Butterworth-Heinemann Publishing.
Saunders, C. S. (1994).Safe at school: Awareness and action for parents of kids grades K-12. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Free Spirit Publishing INC.
Trump, K. S. (1998). Practical school safety: Basic guidelines for safe and secure schools. Thousand Oaks, California: Corwin Press INC.
Vossekuil B. (2002) The final report and findings of the safe school initiative: Implications for the prevention of school attacks in the United States. Washington, D.C.
-Journal Article (Peer Reviewed)
Coy, D. R. (2001 November 1) Bullying. ERIC/CASS Digest. Retrieved March 9, 2003 from EBSCO ERIC Database
-Journal Articles
Phillips, S. (2002 September 27) Unruly Pupils Face Hard Times. The Times Educational Supplement pp.22 Retrieved March 9, 2003 from Lexis-Nexis/ Academic
Schneider, T. (2001 January 1) Safer Schools through Environmental Design. ERIC Digest. Retrieved March 9, 2003 from EBSCO ERIC Database
Toppo, G. (2003 January 13) School Violence Hits Lower Grades. USA Today pp1A. Retrieved from Lexis-Nexis/ Academic database
-Newspaper Articles
Glasgow, G. (2003) Media the Message. The Daily Camera. Retrieved April 26, 2003 from http://cfapps.bouldernews.com/printpage/index.cfm
O’ Connor, E. (1998 July 8) Clinton Backs Gun Access Penalties. The Associated Press. Retrieved April 16, 2003 from http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1998/07/08/clinton.guns/
-Internet Resources
Department of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. (2003, March 23). Center for the Prevention of School Violence Floor Plan”. Retrieved April 15, 2003 from http://www.ncsu.edu/cpsv/
Moore, C. (1999) Blaming The Internet For School Violence Scapegoats The Real Problem. Retrieved April 27, 2003 from http://barque.freeyellow.com/scapegoat.html
The US Department of Health and Human Sciences. (2003) “School Violence Prevention”. Retrieved April 15, 2003 from http://www.mentalhealth.org/school
Weinhold, B.K. (2003) “Bullying and School Violence: The Tip of the Iceberg”. Retrieved April 27, 2003 from http://www.balarad.net/clients/weinhold/bullyingmain.htm
[1] The Columbine High School massacre occurred on Tuesday, 20th April 1999, at Columbine High School near Denver and Littleton. Two students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, went on a shooting rampage, killing 12 students and a teacher. They also wounded 23 others, before committing suicide. It is the fourth-deadliest school killing in United States history, after the 1927 Bath School disaster, 2007 Virginia Tech massacre and the 1966 University of Texas massacre.
[2] The Virginia Tech massacre was a school shooting comprised of two separate attacks that were about two hours apart on 16th April 2007, on the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg, Virginia. The perpetrator, Seung-Hui Cho, killed 32 people and wounded many more,before committing suicide, making it the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history violence/default.asp of ammunition through eBay from Elk Ridge Shooting Supplies in Idaho; and an additional 10-round magazine of ammunition on 23rd March 2007, from another eBay seller. Along with an electronic warning message, Cho had sent a photograph of a hollow point bullet, to NBC News with the caption from a licensed gun dealer located in Roanoke, Virginia. Various other weapons and ammunition were also purchased by Cho at pawnbrokers in Blacksburg, Virginia, where he successfully fulfilled the legally-required background check, for the purchase and possession of a handgun. He was successful at completing both handgun purchases, even though he had botched to disclose information on the background questionnaire about his mental health, which would require court-ordered outpatient treatment at a mental health facility. He also purchased guns on websites, which were shipped to him at his college dormitory. massacre, Virginia Governor, Tim Kaine, organized a group consisting of diverse representatives and professionals to investigate, and to examine the feedback and management of issues related to the Virginia Tech bombardment. The discussion group released its concluding findings in August 2007, detailing Cho’s disturbed past. The group apparently criticized over profuse failures by school administrators, educators and mental health professionals who had contact with Cho; and whom ineffectively noticed his fading condition, and their combined lack of response to get him help that he so desperately needed. The group also condemned misinterpretations of privacy and gun laws, as well as flaws in Virginia’s mental health system.
