The motive of schools is to provide knowledge and enable holistic development as a representation of the future generation. However violence in school has been common scene right from the 90’s. It begins with bullying and ragging which leads to murder-suicide. Although researchers claim that schools are safer than they were in the 90s, and school shootings are not more common than they used to be.
The main factors behind school shootings include family dysfunction and economically disadvantaged backdrop. One of the major problems with schools is the student and guidance counselor ratio. In large schools, for an average of about 400 students there is just one counselor thus the students who cause the trouble are still flying under the radar. Bullying, threatening or any other form of ill-treatment affects the mental well-being of the student which often leads to depression and eventually suicide.
Emma Fridel, a PhD student in the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Northeastern University who has been doing extensive research on school shootings, murder-suicide and homicide trends rightly points out that United States is facing a shortage of guidance counselors. Ms.Fridel has recommended increasing mental health resources for students as one measure to improve school safety, calling it a critical need that has been historically overlooked. Her research has also discovered that in areas where violence is commonplace, people are less likely to feel guilt for killing a romantic partner, family member, or acquaintance.
On an average of 51 averted incidents of school violence, the majority of the students involved in school shootings were discovered suspicious behaviour. Hence as preventive measure it is necessary to train students to monitor behaviour of their peers first. The next step towards preventing school violence would be developing comfortable rapport between staffs and students. It is also important that schools are encouraged to develop well-defined active shooters and emergency laws.
Umayal