Imagine an announcement comes over the loudspeaker that an active shooter is on campus. The lights turn off, doors lock and every student sits under a desk or in an obscure location in their classroom. It is frightening, the idea of being unsafe at your very own school, frightening enough that a student might feel glued to the floor, unable to move.
At that moment, the brain is going through an intense and traumatic experience trying to decide what to do. Some may exhibit classic signs of extreme stress, like a rapid heart rate, sweaty palms and shaking. That is the release of hormones from the endocrine system to initiate a rapid response to the situation. This reaction is the human fight-or-flight response, which prepares one to either forcibly resist or run away from a situation.
School shooting drills have become increasingly prominent in students’ lives as a way to prepare for the worst-case scenario. Students are told what to do if they are in the hallway, in the bathroom or outside in the event that this nightmare comes to life. When practicing a drill on what to do in the event of a school shooting, some may also exhibit feelings of doubt — doubt that their school's procedures will keep them safe.
These drills have been implemented to study how natural human behavior coincides with drill procedures that could keep students safe in the future. The main objective is to determine how human psychological responses tie into the steps of these drills, and how efficient these drills are.
According to the FBI, the three main tactics one should rely on in the event of an active shooter are to run, hide and fight. These three tactics involve human fight-or-flight responses. However, with every person's response being different depending on their behavior, it can be argued that these shooter drills are not as beneficial as they are made out to be.
According to Thomas Ristoff, director of the Syracuse City School District’s Department of Public Safety in New York, “If done properly, in conjunction with training, the lockdown drills provide us with an opportunity to train our staff and students, [and] to build their personal confidence in their ability to respond in an actual crisis.”
The question many are asking is how can school shooting drills really be done properly? And if they are done “properly,” how can they prepare students for an unpredictable situation?
The reality is that these drills are not taken nearly as seriously as they should be due to a lack of structure. It is common to see students on phones, walking around, knocking on doors and not actively attempting to practice for the worst-case scenario. Dr. Tara Stevens, an educational psychology professor at Texas Tech University, said that, “For years, children have regularly participated in fire and evacuation drills. Although these practices all address potentially lethal situations, lockdown drills are associated with especially egregious behavior. Explaining the need to prepare for the potential threat of fire or mechanical failure to children is one thing, explaining the need to prepare for an armed assailant is another.”
At least 40 states require schools to conduct active shooter drills to prepare for such an event. However, there is a significant lack of data to study the effectiveness of such drills because of the many unique factors of each school’s drills.
Some schools are raising concerns about the graphic and life-like drills and the trauma they may leave students with. Reports from Everytown for Gun Safety recommend that drills should not include simulations depicting an actual shooting, parents should be notified beforehand, students and educators should be told immediately at the start that it is a drill and schools should implement trauma approaches to improve students’ well-being.
The mental health of students and teachers is extremely important to preserve. While these drills are educational, they must be done in a fashion that is taken seriously and is done correctly for students' own safety. The next time the principal initiates a drill over the loudspeaker, remember that anyone could be put in an unsafe situation and learning how to handle being unsafe is now a responsibility and reality.
Illustration by Carsen Goltz