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The crime was the focal point and impetus for state-mandated, ongoing school safety plans that are now in force in every school in the state of Indiana.
"All this was at Columbine was pre-meditated murder," say Greene County Emergency Management Agency Director Roger Axe.
Locally, the Greene County School Safety Commission meets periodically to talk about school violence and discuss with law enforcement officials and other first responders how to better protect students in the event of a crime like the Columbine shooting.
The group, which first was organized in 2000, met Thursday night in a meeting hosted by the Bloomfield School District.
Indiana State Police Major Monte McKee, a Daviess County native who works with the Indiana State Department of Homeland Security's fusion center in Indianapolis, was the guest speaker.
Fusion centers are central locations where local, state and federal officials work to receive, integrate and analyze intelligence.
The ultimate goal of a fusion center is to provide a mechanism where law enforcement, public safety, and private partners can come together with a common purpose and improve the ability to safeguard our homeland and prevent criminal activity.
"He (McKee) talked about a number of issues and Columbine was talked about," Axe said. "McKee said any kind of school incident (like Columbine) is really an act of terrorism."
Axe facilitated the meeting and said it went very well.
All five of the school districts were represented. Eastern Superintendent Ty Mungle serves as chairman of the group by virtue of heading up the county's largest school district in terms of the number of students.
Axe said he believes the county is making progress in its state of preparedness in the area of school violence in the last decade
"It think what we have learned is we -- the schools, law enforcement and the emergency service providers -- can not operate in a vacuum. We have to work as a team and that is what we are doing," Axe said.
"In other words, when they roll up on the scene -- we have five different school districts here in the county and there are not going to be five different plans, or five ways of doing things. Our responses are going to be pretty much the same, except in unique situations. I think we have taken some very good steps."
He pointed out that the Greene County Sheriff's Department vehicles all now carry floor plans of all the schools to have in the case of an emergency.
"Just when you think you've got it all down, something happens different. Here is the dilemma, how free can a free society be? We want schools to be places of learning. We don't want to make them fortresses. If we wanted too, we could really make them one of the most secure places around. Is that going to promote an atmosphere of learning and is that going to promote an atmosphere of well being?"
Axe said he makes a habit of sending out a bulletin to all the school districts every time there is a national school crime incident, just to remind them that the chance of similar instances happening locally is always a possibility.
It also alerts school officials to look for copycat crimes.
He also urges the school officials to listen to what the students are saying and try and get a clue of what they are thinking.
"If we talk to these people, many times the situations can be defused because some of these people are alienated and they are isolated. If we can give them a stake in society then we can reach them before so they don't resort to the great equalizer -- the firearm. That is one of the things we have to do and do it better. We've got to be listening and looking for signs," he stressed. "I don't know if it will always work, but I think there will be a time when it will work.
"We are not where we should be, but thank God we are not where we were. I think the public awareness has been raised. I have a sign that hangs in my office that says the five most dangerous works in the English language are 'It can't happen here'. I read that every day."
Bloomfield School Superintendent Dan Sichting says, "Columbine itself was a lesson for schools ... I think we are better prepared today for that kind of situation than we have been prior to this."
Sichting said the school safety group meetings have been beneficial to him in the three years he's served as Bloomfield superintendent.
"We have worked together to make sure our school safety plans through the law enforcement agencies and that we would all be on the same page if God forbid one of those incidents happens," Sichting said.
The superintendent said another key to the preparedness is the institution of a state-required disaster drill once a year.
Sichting said the two bomb threats at his school last year by two female students served as a wake-up call and helped them to get prepared for any other violent acts in the future.
"It helped us get prepared. We don't want to have any more of that, but after every one of those situations we sat down and talked about the things that went well and said these are things that need to change," he explained.
Sichting said his school district in the last three years has taken some steps to make the school safer. Exterior doors are locked during class time and other security measures have been installed.
"Sometimes our parents don't like it, but at the same time we have the best interest of their students at heart," he stressed. "We have a camera and a buzzer with an intercom at the front door of our high school. We feel very secure. We feel our building has become more secure because of that."
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This is a great thing but only if the Schools follow these direction and/or suggestions,not evacuating a school when there is a Bomb threat is not the way to go about it.
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I agree with you 100% chrisgoat
As always Chrisgoat,you have lots of opinions but very little knowledge. The local law enforcement officials demanded BSD officials to evacuate the building. This was not open for debate. Also, due to BSD being a large facility under one roof it took in excess of five hours both times to sweep the building. Maybe you ought to ask some questions prior to professing to have all the answers.
Research has determined that from the Moment of Commitment (the point when a student pulls their weapon) to the Moment of Completion (when the last round is fired) is only 5 seconds. If it is the intent of a school district to react to this violence, they will do so over the wounded and/or slain bodies of students, teachers and administrators.
Educational institutions clearly want safe and secure schools. Administrators are perennially queried by parents about the safety of their schools. The commonplace answers, intended to reassure anxious parents, focus on the school resource officers and emergency procedures. While useful, these less than adequate efforts do not begin to provide a definitive answer to preventing school violence, nor do they make a school safe and secure.
Traditionally school districts have relied upon the mental health community or local police to keep schools safe, yet one of the key shortcomings has been the lack of a system that involves teachers, administrators, parents and students in the identification and communication process. Recently, colleges, universities and community colleges are forming Behavioral Intervention Teams with representatives from all these constituencies. Higher Education has changed their safety/security policies, procedures, or surveillance systems, yet K-12 have yet to incorporate Behavioral Intervention Teams. K-12 schools continue spending excessive amounts of money to put in place many of the physical security options. Sadly, they are reactionary only and do little to prevent aggression because they are designed exclusively to react to existing conflict, threat and violence. These schools reflect a national blindspot, which prefers hardening targets through enhanced security versus preventing violence with efforts directed at aggressors. Security gets all the focus and money, but this only makes us feel safe, rather than to actually make us safer.
Some law enforcement agencies use profiling as a means to identify an aggressor. According to the U.S. Secret Service and the U.S. Department of Education's report on Targeted Violence in Schools, there is a significant difference between "profiling" and identifying and measuring emerging aggression; "The use of profiles is not effective either for identifying students who may pose a risk for targeted violence at school or -- once a student has been identified -- for assessing the risk that a particular student may pose for school-based targeted violence." It continues; "An inquiry should focus instead on a student's behaviors and communications to determine if the student appears to be planning or preparing for an attack." We can and must assess objective, culturally neutral, identifiable criteria of emerging aggression.
For a comprehensive look at the problem and its solution, http://www.aggressionmanagement.com/Whit...
Happy Gilmore
Obviously you missed something here the fact that I said, "not evacuating a school when there is a Bomb threat".
I never said anything about BSD but as always you have to insults and assume.
Maybe you are the one that should ask some questions prior to professing to have all the answers.
johnbyrnes
Nice Post
http://lisnews.org/columbine
"K-12 schools continue spending excessive amounts of money to put in place many of the physical security options. Sadly, they are reactionary only and do little to prevent aggression because they are designed exclusively to react to existing conflict, threat and violence. These schools reflect a national blindspot, which prefers hardening targets through enhanced security versus preventing violence with efforts directed at aggressors. Security gets all the focus and money, but this only makes us feel safe, rather than to actually make us safer."
EXACTLY!!!!!
I don't believe any amount of "exterior" security will prevent violence inside the schools. If someone was really wanting to do anyone harm, they would not give the heads up before acting.
Children that are prone to commit violence in the schools don't always wear a sign that says "HEY, I'm prone to hurting someone...watch me closely!"