In the aftermath of school shootings, media outlets often amplify calls for gun control while ignoring or spurning evidence-based ways to protect students. Here are four life-saving tools they are missing or dismissing.
Shatter-Resistant Entryways
As documented in the academic journal Victims & Offenders, an “immediate and economical” way to protect students “is to tighten” access to school buildings. Many school administrators have done this simply by locking doors. However, there are roughly 460 million firearms in the U.S., and the bulk of them will quickly shatter the glass entrances that are a common feature of schools, allowing killers to enter in a few seconds.
That is precisely what happened in the Covenant Christian school shooting in Nashville where the killer took the lives of three 9-year-old children and three staff after shooting out the school’s glass doors and walking into the building:
Likewise, the perpetrator of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in Newtown, CT broke into the building by shooting out a glass panel at the school’s entryway. He then proceeded to slaughter 20 students and 6 adults.
These and other such tragedies may be prevented if schools took a simple and affordable action: apply a security film that prevents glass entryways from shattering when bullets hit them:
By James D. Agresti