Violent Shootings On School Campuses

Violent Shootings on Campus

There seems to be an increase in violent crimes, mainly involving mass murders and violent shootings, on many campuses nationwide. From as far back as August 1, 1966, when a man named Charles Whitman stood atop the observation deck of the University of Texas at Austin’s clock tower and began gunning people down with a rifle, violent school offences involving weapons can be traced up to the present day shooting such as the massacre that occurred at Virginia Tech on April 16, 2007 (CBSNews).Two solutions can be brought forward to solve this horrible problem that is scarring the youth of America. These solutions are efficient, practical as far as cost goes, and feasible to implement.

Violent events, from brutal shootings to simple bullying, on campus have been recently increasing over the years. There is no system currently set in place at schools or Universities to help prevent or stop such violent offences. At the Northern Illinois University a man opened fire from a stage out into a crowd of people with a shotgun and two hand guns. A senior journalism major recalled thinking “Oh God, he’s going to shoot me. Oh God, I’m dead. I’m dead. I’m dead” (Rousseau). Since there was no system in place to stop this, the gunman was able to fire with ease upon the crowd. Also since there was no measure to prevent this from happening; the man was easily able to tote 3 guns, including a large shotgun, without being noticed. It was the fourth school shooting in a week (Rousseau). I feel this problem affects me greatly due to the fact that I currently go to school on a University campus.

The decision makers for this would definitely be the president of Oklahoma State University. It would be his decision whether or not to make it legal to carry Tasers on campus with approved classes. It would also require the consent of the OSU Police Department due to the fact that if it is legalized most students on campus will be armed with a weapon. They would need to make a decision to make sure that they could handle the extra work needed to police such a campus.

The first solution I suggest is for the establishment to give permission to students to be allowed to carry Taser personal safety devices provided that they take usage and handling courses that should be provided by the University. This corrective measure could be backed by the Oklahoma State University Police Department being that the Taser is closely related to the handguns that they are accustomed to and have been fully trained to use. This solution can also be co-backed by a student organization due to the fact that the group could get some funding from the University as well as be more in touch with the students and make this more appealing to the student body. Being backed by the OSU Police Department could also cut down on costs because some of the officers could volunteer their time to teach the classes instructing the use of the stun weapons saving money on paying someone to teach the class. This solution would require little to no funding. The only way this could use any money would be if the organization backing this posted flyers around campus informing students about what the plan of action is and at what time and date instructive classes will be available to them or if the police department could not find anyone to volunteer their time to teach they would have to use some funding to pay for an instructor. However I doubt that no one would have at least an hour to spare to instruct students on how to become safer. The funding, if any, would come from the student organization as mentioned above. This solution has not been in place and is discouraged on other campuses by their respected campus polices due to the fact that an improper use of a Taser can be deadly (Technician Online). This is why the mandatory classes instructing the proper use of these weapons is critical, as well as a permit that allows you to carry such a weapon on campus that is granted to you upon the completion of that course. Tasers work because they are designed to bring down an attacker and do so accordingly with un-deadly force. According to a study done by Sergeant Brian A. Bruce of the Defensive Tactics unit of the Columbus, Ohio state division of police found that during a full month of Taser implementation out of the 140 probes that were deployed 120 were successful hits. Bruce attributes the 20 misses due to the fact that most of them were foot chases. Of the 120 successful hits 89.2% of them were effective (Bruce 1). Bruce explained these incidents as not being effective due to either thicker clothing one by the perpetrator or a hesitation in fire from an officer. Later on it is noted that the officer injury from physical confrontations declined 23.4% (Bruce 5).

An alternative solution would be to require a psychiatric exam to be given to all students be admitted into the University to clarify whether or not they are mentally stable enough to handle the campus and are not going to cause danger to themselves or others. This would prevent the situation of a gunman entirely by acknowledging his mental problem early and taking the safety of the students out of their own hands and into the protection of the University and related police department. A psychiatrist hired by the University could identify possible safety threats based on one of two theories: One of these theories is that these murders are the direct result of today’s violent driven society. Our culture tends to approve of violence and find it acceptable, even preferable, in many circumstances: According to research done in 1970, one out of every four men and one out of every six women believed that it was appropriate for a husband to hit his wife under certain conditions (Beaty). This is especially prevalent in many of the television shows on now. Violence occurs in 80 percent of all prime-time shows, while cartoons, presumably made for children, average eighteen violent acts per hour (Beaty). It is estimated that by the age of eighteen, the average child will have viewed more than 16,000 television murders. Some experts feel