More handpicked essays just for you.
Background on the topic of gun violence in US schools
Background on the topic of gun violence in US schools
Background on the topic of gun violence in US schools
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
You are in the mall and someone yells everyone "'Get down!" Or I will shoot." Your first instinct is to hit the ground before shots are fired. Now imagine that in the school cafeteria. Scary, right? As scary as it sounds scenarios from horror movies are playing out in schools all over America. You are eating lunch in the cafeteria and a student enters the cafeteria and starts firing off a firearm. First instinct is to scream for help and get on the ground, but why are scenes like this taking place in the learning place. The place where we are told we are the safest, maybe even safer than home. If school is so much safer than home then why are school shootings on the rise? "Most of us already know that too many of our movies, television shows, music songs, and video games are filled with trash: grisly murder scenes, dismemberment and disembowelment, nonstop profanity, rape and torture scenarios" (Bennett par 14). By placing scenes like these in movies for the youth to see the media is causing America to become more violent than is needed. We must prevent violence in schools, solve violence in schools and violence needs to stop now.
Although overall school violence is declining in America, mass shootings in suburban and rural areas are becoming more common ("School" par 1). On April 20, 1999 Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold decided to bring firearms and explosives to Columbine High School to go on a shooting rampage. These two boys, before killing themselves, killed 12 students, one teacher, and wounded 24 others. The cause of this Massacre was violence at the school place, Harris and Klebold were bullied as students and no action was taken when they started talking about killing people or physically hurting people. At the beginning of the school year teachers should give students talks about violence and school shootings. Teachers should tell students that violence is not a joke and it needs to be taken as a serious offence, whether there is going to be a fight at moon base or talking about shooting up the school. Staff must talk about how serious school shootings are and how damaging to one's future violence can be. The worst consequence would be getting sent to prison for life. Killing someone is psychologically devastating to the murderer. ¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬ "It is the value of belonging and, conversely, the damage of isolation.
April 20th, 1999, Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, experienced a mass shooting. Thirteen people were injured and more than twenty were injured. Twelve were students and one was a teacher. Two students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold opened fire on their high school for forty one minutes before turning their guns on themselves and committing suicide. School shootings are notorious for making headline news but in 1999, school shooting were not as prevalent as they are in the present day. The media blew up on the catastrophe that was Columbine and many questions were raised, who were these kids and why did they do this? Speculation arose about why they did it. Maybe they were bullied for being goth and social outcasts or maybe they
The history of school shootings has shown an increase in mass school shooting. The very first known school shooting in the United States occurred on July 26, 1764 in present-day Greencastle, Pennsylvania. As part of the Pontiac's Rebellion, four Lenape Native Americans entered the school house and started shooting, killing the schoolmaster Enoch Brown and about nine students. Only two students survived the massacre (“History”). Since the 1700s the United States society has changed in many ways. Schools have become more than just one room school houses and each grade has its own teacher. Furthermore, the problem of school shootings has not decreased but rather increased over the years. On the one hand, reports from the Centers for Disease Control showed that in general school violence decreased from 1992 to 200...
As the world recovers from recent school shootings, people wondered why these events have occurred. They are focused on drug use, violent society, video games, bullying, and mental issues to try and explain an unexplainable event. The idea that a person would shoot others for little or no reason gave little relief to the survivors.
It is a sad time in American history when one can easily recount recent school shootings in their own area. This ease stems from a sharp increase in the number of firearms brought into elementary and middle schools across the country, with an intense focus on the issue beginning after the shooting of 20 children from Sandy Hook Elementary in Connecticut. Most school shooters are male, white, and often upper middle class. They are also more, often than not, under some type of mental stress that is causing them to create this type of violence in our communities. In fact, many school shooters are never suspected of doing any harm to their peers and teachers until it is much too late.
Family environment and the press are two major influences resulting in the recent tragic school shootings. As much as society continues to focus the killing rampages on factors such as television and music, what children are exposed to in reality contributes to the violence. The most recent school shooting in Michigan involved a six-year-old first grader who killed a classmate with a .22 caliber pistol. The news coverage had vanished after two or three days, and I was left wondering what had happened. Considering the fact that the media wore the Columbine incident out, I wanted to know why they did not pay more attention to this school shooting. As evidence did arrive, it was discovered that the child lived in a household where cocaine, heroin, and many other illegal drugs were commonplace. Also in this “home” guns were easily accessible to the child. Children growing up in this type of environment certainly are likely to be held accountable for future violence. Even though I am against the news media presenting too much school violence, Americans should have been deeply disturbed by this shooting because of the child’s young age. The Michigan shooting should have enlightened Americans to the dilemma we face in this country. Two weeks after the Columbine High School shooting, information on the mass murder was still being broadcast on television. The press was feeding young viewers ideas on how to kill their classmates. News was reported how the teenage murderers acquired information regarding building bombs, obtaining guns, smuggling guns into the school, and proceeding to kill their classmates. A mentally unstable teenager could simply watch these news reports and write a book entitled, “How to Slay Your Classmates”. This onslaught was ridiculous and the news coverage should not have been permitted to continue for countless weeks. Society has determined three reasons on which to blame the shootings. First, the nation blamed it on television’s violent programs. Following that, Americans gave the music recording companies the evil eye as well as attacking the gun manufacturers. All of these reasons involve material objects that are unable to think for themselves. Televisions and CD players do not control themselves, people control them. Finally, boundaries controlling the television programs children view should be set by the parents. The same explanation applies to firearms. How can it be a gun’s fault that a person killed another human being?
In conclusion, School Violence is a widespread issue that must be addressed. School shootings and bullying are some of the biggest issues in today’s school system. Many times the seed of the issue begins with bullying and ends with consequences like suicide and school shootings. They affect people as early as elementary school all the way to the college level, some even ending with death. Only together can we stop school violence if we take a stand and change the world.
In order to solve the problem of violence in schools, we must first find out who the problem is. Being that not every teenager is prone to participate in such violent acts as what happened at Columbine, there must be specific environment imposed on a particular biology to turn a teenager into an Eric Harris or a Dylan Klebold. These are not normal, healthy teenagers, and they don’t just become killers overnight. They become killers because they are already deeply disturbed individuals who can be sent over the edge by all sorts of innocuous influences. Violent teens often have specific characteristics that put them at high risk for committing these crimes. These high risked students may display some of the following traits. First, violent students often indicate their intentions before acting violently through drawings or writings. (Juhnke et. Al., 1999) They also make threats of violence towards others. Next, students prone to violent behavior tend to have a history of violence or aggression. (Juhnke et. Al., 1999) This may include other students, boyfriends/girlfriends, and animals. Violent students often have hypersensitivity toward criticism. (Juhnke et. Al., 1999) These students report perceptions of being teased, harassed or being picked on by those they were violent toward. This tormenting can also cause a student to isolate him or herself and withdrawal from friends and family, which is another sign that something is wrong. Another fairly obvious characteristic includes those children who are inappropriately given accress to firearms. (Juhnke et. Al., 1999) When students are given a gun, it gives them a sense of power. Some choose to take advantage of that power, as we have seen in numerous high school shoot...
"A Brief History of NRA." A Brief History of NRA. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Jan. 2015.
“That could never happen in my school.” This is one of the first thoughts that goes through a students mind when they hear about a school shooting. The fact is though, it can. School shootings can happen at any school at any time. Lack of security is only a small part of the problem. The major issue lies in the low morality of students and warning signs overlooked by administration.
This essay is going to talk about one of the deadliest school shootings that killed 13 students and injured several. On April 20, 1999 two teens went on a shooting spree killing 13 and wounded several more before turning the guns on to them killing themselves. The columbine shooting one of the worst shootings in U.S history raised a debate on the gun control and school safety. This essay is going to bring out the real cause of the shooters actions and apply two juvenile delinquency theories to them.
How safe do you feel when you attend school everyday? Many students and faculty don’t really think too much about school being a dangerous place; however, after a couple of school shootings had taken place their minds and thoughts may have changed completely. On April 16, 2007, in the town of Blacksburg Virginia, a college student who attended Virginia Tech, opened gunfire to his fellow classmates. This shooting has been considered to be the biggest massacre in all of American history. There are many things to be discussed in this major tragedy. Some of them include the events leading up to the shooting, the timeline that the shootings occurred, the causes, and the significance in this particular shooting. The Virginia Tech is only one of the several examples of the horrible behavior and violence in our school systems today.
In recent years, tragedies have been visited upon schools across the country. From Kentucky to Oregon to Colorado, the notion of schools as safe havens has been shattered by the sound of gunfire. These acts are not limited to any geographic regions or family backgrounds, nor do they have a single catalyst. Those who have committed such heinous acts have done so for different reasons, at different times, in different schools. But these acts of school violence have at least one thing in common- they have spurred all of us to take a look at what can be done to better protect children and teachers at school. Protecting our children is not simply a matter of public policy. It is a matter of strengthening basic values, of teaching children right from wrong, of instilling in them respect for others. We each have a responsibility to work to end youth violence and to keep schools safe for children and for those who teach them. Youth violence in many schools has reached universal proportions. It is not only happening in our high schools, it has also made its way into our elementary and middle schools. Everyone seems to have a different perspective on why there is such a problem with school safety. Some say it is the parents’ fault, some say it is the media, and others blame the schools. Yet, the question still remains. What can be done to make schools safer for the children and staff? One thing we need to do is learn to listen to our children and observe their behavior. According ...
The issue of school safety has become a controversial topic in the United States, due to tragic acts of violence occurring on a daily basis. American citizens should never have to cope with the negative impact of school violence, no matter how often they hear about the tragedies (Jones, "Parents" 1). In the past, schools were viewed as a safe place for children to get an education. Recently, the concern over violence in schools has taken a toll on many parents, school administrators, and legislatures (Eckland 1). Studies have shown that there are over 3 million acts of violence in American public schools each year. Not all occurrences are serious and deadly, but they occur on a daily basis throughout our country (Jones, “School” 6). This has caused many parents to worry about the well-being of their children while they are in class. This has also led to an increase in questions and concerns by parents and guardians. Many people have asked, “What are you doing about safety and security on my child’s campus” (Schimke 2). School violence is the cause of elevated worry and fear for their children, and school districts should enforce better security.
60% of school shootings in the US happen in small towns. Research on earlier shootings showed the attack is on a school because that is the center stage in a small town, where the shooter can affect the entire community. School shootings are far more frequent in America than in other countries. Although school shootings seem to be on the rise, school is still considered one of the safest places. In 2012 out of all youth homicides, less than 2% occur at school, and this percentage has been stable for the past decade. In 2010, there were about 828,000 nonfatal injuries at school among students 12 to 18 years old. Deaths resulting from schoo...
School shootings are becoming common place in the news as school violence is on the rise. Statistics state that 31.2 percent of parents said the leading cause for choosing homeschool over public school is “concern about the environment of other schools” (Burke, 2014). According to the CDC fact sheet Understanding School Violence, 12 percent of youth in grades 9-12 report being in a physical fight on school property while 5.9 percent reported that they felt unsafe at school and did not attend. Seven percent of teachers also report that they have been threatened or injured by a student (School Violence, 2013). While only 1 percent of all youth homicides occur at schools, violence does not need to result in a fatality in order to be a concern.