Teachers fake gun attack on kids

[faceless]

Teachers stage fake gunman attack on 6th-graders

MURFREESBORO, Tenn. (AP) - Staff members of an elementary school staged a fictitious gun attack on students during a class trip, telling them it was not a drill as the children cried and hid under tables. The mock attack Thursday night was intended as a learning experience and lasted five minutes during the weeklong trip to a state park, said Scales Elementary School Assistant Principal Don Bartch, who led the trip. "We got together and discussed what we would have done in a real situation," he said.

But parents of the sixth-grade students were outraged. "The children were in that room in the dark, begging for their lives, because they thought there was someone with a gun after them," said Brandy Cole, whose son went on the trip. Some parents said they were upset by the staff's poor judgment in light of the April 16 shootings at Virginia Tech that left 33 students and professors dead, including the gunman.

During the last night of the trip, staff members convinced the 69 students that there was a gunman on the loose. They were told to lie on the floor or hide underneath tables and stay quiet. A teacher, disguised in a hooded sweat shirt, even pulled on locked door. After the lights went out, about 20 kids started to cry, 11-year-old Shay Naylor said. "I was like, 'Oh My God,' " she said. "At first I thought I was going to die. We flipped out."

Principal Catherine Stephens declined to say whether the staff members involved would face disciplinary action, but said the situation "involved poor judgment."

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Poor judgment? Just a bit! If I was one of those kids I'd now be planning my revenge - no matter how long it took!

[Skylace]

I saw this on the news this morning and was just gob-smacked!
I'm with you. Poor judgement is a pretty light term to use here. I think what they did was so disgusting. How any of the teachers and the asst. principal thought this would be a good idea and a funny joke is beyond me.

[Mandy]

Terrorism by another name ...

This can traumatise the kids for ever.

I wonder how many lawyers would be chasing these kids to sue.

[nekokate]

Insanity. Pure insanity. I'd not be looking to sue, I'd be looking to make sure they never worked as teachers again.

[Skylace]

[6ULDV8]

I'm sorry, but this is just a step up the evolutionary ladder....

I as a kid was scared shitless by just regular 'Fire drills' that were not announced as such to students...

But then when I was a kid (outside of the UK) the biggest threat was indeed a fire...

When I returned to the UK in the late 70's... well then it was a bomb threat (Thx IRA )... those too put the shits up me as they should & we had real threats as well as 'drills' & we as students were not warned that "this is not a drill".


We all live in a world where THREATS of weapons in schools has become more common than the threat of fire...
We have advanced enough to detect fires & then solve the fire by ways of automated extinguishers etc... so they are not so much a threat.

However... in high risk areas where guns, gangs & violence prevail (not just the USA I might add), I can see the need for such a "DRILL" to be carried out.

Had such a drill been carried out over say just the last 18 months & a plan implimented as such... perhaps the last situation in Virginia could have had less victims.

Where such things as the topic of this thread may not be everybodies cup of tea... we have to look at the world in which we live & not the world we lived in...

We live in a world of discontent, no matter where we are there are people (KIDS TOO) with weapons, guns etc...

I'd rather have my kids become aware by such actions as this school took & have them react as if it were a real situation than have them think or feel it could never happen to them...

That said... RIP all those who died at any school, uni etc anywhere in the world.

[Mandy]

[faceless]

[Mandy]

Even ignoring the harm caused, this "exercise" was useless. What did it teach the kids ?

A correct policy is probably to try and run out of the building, or to barricade the door and possibly jump out of the window, which could cause more potential injuries to kids (broken bones etc.), like a fire drill. Indeed, the gun man could be perceived as a mortal danger, like a fire. Who in a fire barricades themselves in a room and doesn't try to escape out of the window ?

Better to teach kids how to avoid harm / defuse confrontation in normal situations (e.g. on the street, Pub etc.), including "anger management"

[Skylace]

We do drills at our schools. But these are done as "drills". The students know these are drills.

We have four levels that we practice. The fourth being a planned evac. These drills are done once a month. Even the kinders know what to do. Because they are handled properly and are handled correctly.

This was not done as a drill it was done as a joke.

I can also speak from experience that these drills are good to do at the schools. I have been on an actual lock-down at one of my schools (no one is allowed in or out until police have cleared) and also in a lock-down and hide. The first is when there was a shoting by another school and the gun man fleed the scene and the other a shoting had happened during a domestic violence dispute right by our school.

The latter of those two was a great example of how the drills prepared us. I always warned my students when we were having drills (from fire, to tornado, to any type) and when they heard the announcement "Level 2: Code Blue" I vaulted over a bunch of kids to closed my door and shut out the lights. One student whispered "This isn't a drill is it Mrs. B?" and I said "It's not". They all hid where they were supposed to and didn't say a word.

None of our parents have ever been mad over our drills. Why? Because they weren't Jokes. These prats should loose their jobs.