Koehler worries about the safety of school children

By Amanda Koehler
Collegian Editor
October 11, 2006

During the Columbine tragedy of April 20, 1999, I was at home, sick. While all my peers were at school, I was lounging on my couch watching MTV. I still remember that John Norris interrupted TRL to provide coverage on what turned out to be a defining, horrifying event for our generation.

I was scared out of my mind about what had happened, and even more so when I returned to school. Over the next few months, we had quite a few bomb threats, which led to chaotic evacuations. The culprits behind the threats were most likely students wanting to get out of class for the day; nevertheless, every time I heard the principal come over the loudspeaker to announce that we were exiting the building, my overactive imagination ran wild. In my mind, I never ruled out that a massacre like Columbine could happen at my high school.

A little over seven years later, I was at home again—coincidentally, still watching MTV. I was just getting into another trashy program when the phone rang. It was my sister, and she sounded panicked. She told me that some senior was up in the observatory of our high school with a gun, and that I needed to come pick her up—now.

I felt like I was in eighth grade again as I drove less than half a mile to my alma mater. I had to park pretty far away from the high school because the whole area was in a state of pandemonium. As I walked toward the school, floods of students were passing by in a disorderly fashion. I could hear them speculating and trading bits of information. One said, “I heard he’s holding an assistant principal hostage.” The other said, “I knew that kid was crazy!” In the end, the boy only threatened to hurt himself, and the police were able to get him to surrender his weapons before he could do anything, but he had a .22-caliber rifle, hidden in a guitar case, among other weapons, with him that day.

Looking at this personal example, and the many other school shootings in the news recently, I fear for students across the nation. No school anywhere is immune to a tragedy of this nature happening to its students and faculty. Further, this constant state of fear does not create a good learning environment for students. How are they supposed to be properly educated when they are worried that one of their peers might have a weapon, or that a stranger could enter their school and open fire?

Unfortunately, I’m not sure what the answer to this question is. Many schools have stepped up security since Columbine, my high school included. Still, that didn’t stop the senior with a rifle in his guitar case. I believe the government, and schools in all states, should focus more on the issue of protecting students while they are in a place that is supposed to be a safe haven, away from the harsh, grim violence and realities of the rest of the world. Maybe then we’ll all be able to breathe a little easier.

Until then, I’ll still get that uneasy feeling every time I read about another school shooting in the newspaper.

koehlera1@lasalle.edu