Gunshots And Lockdowns: When Nearby Gun Violence Interrupts The School Day

“The kids are terrified. You hear them say, ‘Is the gunman coming to get me?’”

By Alana Wise & Luis MelgarSeptember 9, 2019 9:30 am, , , ,

From KERA:

The issue of gun violence e and what to do about it has become more than just a top story across Texas, but, in the wake of two mass shootings in a month, a hot political matter, too. But mass shootings are relatively rare. Far more common is what’s become a routine feature in some big city neighborhoods – and sometimes, just outside of school doors.

In the daylight hours of a recent Wednesday afternoon, a 33-year-old man was shot and killed in Southeast Washington, D.C., just a short walk from where children at Savoy Elementary School were in their afternoon classes. Hendley Elementary School, roughly a mile away, was recently hit by bullets, reportedly for the second time in a month.

These gunshots, and others like them, occurring in close proximity to grade schools, are a fairly routine occurrence for many students in Washington, where a Guns & America analysis found dozens of shooting incidents within 1,000 feet of a school campus in the 2016-2017 school year.

Read more.