It’s been hard. This past week, the news has been filled with gun violence. But here’s the even crazier part. There are school communities experiencing significant gun violence that don’t even make the evening news. Today, we’re talking about the safety children deserve.
It doesn’t matter who is to blame for safety if a student feels scared to attend a school. Students should not be required to go to schools where they feel unsafe. Just imagine having to go to school with this list of atrocities at the forefront of your memory every day:
A schoolmate was recently shot outside her home on the way to Austin-East High School. At the same school, another student was recently found armed in a school bathroom and fired on police when he was asked to leave. Then, two more teenage boys accidentally fired a gun inside their car in the parking lot, killing one and the other was charged with criminal negligent homicide. And finally, a boy was killed leaving school by two other teenagers, ages 14 and 16.
Looking at these stories, none of them are connected specifically to a classroom, but the relational connections to school are undeniable. So, why are education administrators and community leaders saying “school is safe” with so many Austin-East lives lost? Originally, the argument was “once you’re on school grounds, you’re safe.” But that was before a student had a gun in the bathroom and fired on a policeman.
But even before there was evidence that students could get guns into the school, the violence was clearly connected to relationships among teenagers. Two boys looking at a gun in a car. Teenagers knowing each others’ schedules. Relationships and conflicts are more complicated, more fluid than property lines. Violence is not going to stay off school premises. In a community with gun violence, those guns are going to come to school, especially to a school without a metal detector. In fact, research shows that neighborhoods have a huge impact on mortality rates. If a school is in a violent neighborhood, where is the evidence that schools in high crime communities are “safe?”
And although the community leaders are claiming the school is safe, parents feel differently. One parent whose children are the 4th family generation at Austin-East said she feels like “she’s dropping her kids off at a war zone,” according to the Knox News. Then she commented,
"Even though I feel they are doing everything that they can, it's still unnerving," Holloway said. "They can not watch everybody all the time and if people are not willing to come forward to say who is doing this, they don't even know who to watch."
Maybe an even better question is whether a district would do anything if someone did come forward. Consider what district leaders have to lose by acknowledging that a school is unsafe or that someone related to the violence is connected to the school. Look at how they have tried to portray the school’s “safe environment” thus far in the media. Just over a month before the shooting in the school bathroom, the Knoxville mayor asserted, “I know that school is a safe place,” in a press conference. Was the mayor just unaware of the problems at the school? Or was she trying to protect the school board from mounting criticisms?
What if parents didn’t have to fear for their children because children were allowed to leave schools where their child’s physical safety is a concern? Right now, many parents do not have the option to move to a nicer neighborhood to get a safer school assignment. That’s why we believe that Education Savings Accounts (ESAs) directed specifically to struggling neighborhoods like Austin-East would mean a safer, higher quality education in low-income communities. Some school administrators fear that allowing families to access ESAs would endanger public school budgets. But whose fear should be addressed first? A parent’s fear for their child’s safety, or an administrator’s fear for their budget?