Ensuring safety in the schools

By Lynn Thompson
Times Snohomish County bureau
In the wake of the shooting death of a Tacoma high-school student last week, local educators and law-enforcement officials say violence in schools can't be eliminated. But schools can be made safer, they say, if school staff respond as a team to assess potential threats and provide support to at-risk youth.

"The most important thing a school can do is create a climate of trust and open communication. It's surprising how often that's overlooked," said Martin Speckmaier, a private-security consultant and a 22-year veteran of the Edmonds Police Department who patrolled Edmonds-Woodway High School as a school-resource officer for seven years.

Speckmaier noted that incidents involving guns at school are rare, in part because bringing a firearm to school results in a mandatory one-year suspension under state law. Most Snohomish County districts had none or one gun seized at schools in 2005-06, according to statistics from the Office of Superintendent for Public Instruction (OSPI).

But knives and other weapons were seized at a rate of about two a day in county schools, often in the largest districts. Everett had 74 incidents involving knives or other weapons, while Marysville and Northshore each had 60.

The Edmonds School District bucked the trend with only 14 incidents involving weapons last school year.

But Speckmaier cautioned against putting labels of "dangerous" on schools with higher incidents of weapons. A school may be more vigilant or alert to possible weapons, which may explain why they turn up more often, he said. And he said weapons go unreported at every school.

But Speckmaier also noted an alarming trend in teenage-death statistics. While car accidents still kill the most teenagers each year, homicide is now the No. 2 cause of death among older teens, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. And he said the number of juvenile homicides with multiple victims also is increasing.

That's where school-threat response teams and safety planning come in.

After the Columbine shooting in 1999 that left 14 students and a teacher dead, the federal government developed a threat-assessment model that is now being implemented by Snohomish County schools. Under the model, schools create a team to identify, assess and manage students or situations that pose a threat of violence.

In Washington, OSPI has sponsored statewide training on the approach, which calls for school personnel, including administrators, counselors, psychologists, police and security officers to meet together and evaluate a threat. In some communities, mental-health and juvenile-justice professionals also are brought in to help evaluate and provide assistance to at-risk youth.

"The focus is on helping kids succeed. Most aren't hard-core psychopaths. They're kids stumbling who need support," said Craig Apperson, supervisor of safety and security for OSPI.

Edmonds School District adopted the threat-assessment model three years ago, said Jan Beglau, manager of student support and outreach for the district. Anytime a student threatens to act violently, the school team meets to devise a response plan and get ongoing monitoring and support for the student.

It might mean checking a student's backpack every day, or assigning an adult mentor, Beglau said. Parents also are brought into the confidential discussions, she said.

"The process is designed to identify underlying issues, to get at the root of what's causing the threats and give the kids a support system." But she cautioned that the motives for violence are often complex and hard to predict.

"If we knew why kids turned to violence, we wouldn't have any shootings," she said.

In Marysville, Assistant Superintendent Gail Miller said several of the gun incidents in the district last year involved nonlethal weapons including paint-ball rifles and air-pellet rifles spotted by school-security officers in cars parked in the student-parking lot.

Even though there was an innocent explanation, Miller said the incidents were treated seriously and threat-assessment teams evaluated the circumstances of the students involved.

She said the threat-assessment process allows school officials to distinguish the accidental or unintended event from the truly dangerous and to determine whether a student needs outside help or intervention.

Next year, Marysville Pilchuck High School, one of the state's largest at 2,700 students, will be broken into smaller learning communities, in part so students are better known by the adults in the school, she said.

Larry Francois, superintendent of Lakewood School District, said the most important thing a school staff can do is keep lines of communication open with students.

"Kids will know about things before an adult. We work on making kids feel comfortable and safe letting an adult know if there's a problem."

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