Guns, Fights: The Mayors of our two towns and the police need to take control of Columbia high school or we will all be sorry
You need to work on your communication skills. I think your feelings may be similar to many who have already posted about this, but the headline adds nothing to the discussion.
What I am trying to say is school administrators need the mayors and police to step up and take control of the school. They are not equipped to deal with this situation nor should they be. The situation is toally out of control. There are a lot of scared kids/parents in town.
Most of this is beyond their control. The U.S. is a violent country with guns everywhere. A few school administrators can do nothing about it. Yelling at them won't help, either.
Who is yelling I am supportive of the administrators they need help from the town officials to stop what is happening. The amount of fights over the last week is insane. this needs to be stopped.
Help like what? One kid was handcuffed for an hour for getting into a shoving match outside school. Not sure how effective that is. Getting all authoritarian with teens rarely works, and much of this is not "serious" or dangerous. Guns in schools is another matter entirely, and is clearly being dealt with quickly and appropriately.
And, what krugle1 said--It's hardly "out of control".
For what it's worth, when I've dealt with undesirable behavior by HS students over the years (trampling my hedges to cut through my yard, cursing a blue streak in front of my pre-schooler, walking slowly in front of my moving car, I've called them on it as I would my own kids--and they respond accordingly--like good kids who are being boneheads, a little chagrined and apologetic.
We need to be able to tell the difference between boneheadedness and threat and not get too worked up about the former. Plus, HS students were *way* scarier in general to me when my kids were very young and I was far from my teenaged years. Now I have a highschooler, not so much.
It is distinctly "out of control" when any child brings a GUN to school. This happened twice in two days at two different schools. Unfortunately the fights at CHS become secondary now to the gun events but this is indeed very serious and should be address swiftly and with great concern by the administration and by the police.
how is it the fault of the mayor and the MPD that kids brought guns to school? Isn't this solely the fault of the kids themselves and the adults responsible for them? Unless someone has a foolproof method for identifying these kids ahead of time, all we can do is what was done -- make sure all the kids know that they need to be aware and report any weapons they see or hear about. Then take the appropriate measures to safeguard the kids and students while the police disarm the kid with a weapon.
rather than freak out, shouldn't we be relieved that the procedures in place worked and no one was hurt?
Just getting caught up on the CHS news this morning. Thank you.
LL_ said:
yahooyahoo said:MMS and CHS One a Glock and one an air soft gun.
what is the second school?
the gun laws have to change. that wont happen in this country - ever.
There Have Been 87 School Shootings Since Sandy Hook And Zero Gun Law Changeshttp://elitedaily.com/news/politics/america-averages-one-school-shooting-a-week/814769/
goodjob said:
the gun laws have to change. that wont happen in this country - ever.
There Have Been 87 School Shootings Since Sandy Hook And Zero Gun Law Changeshttp://elitedaily.com/news/politics/america-averages-one-school-shooting-a-week/814769/
Actually, in many states gun laws have become less restrictive!
Mayors have no authority to "take over a school". Police can come in when called for a crisis. They cannot simply walk in and declare they are in charge without the school administration asking them to. The school is not a crime scene. If the principal asks the cops to leave, they have to leave once the "crisis" is handled and done.
Are there "gangs" at CHS? I can state with reasonable certainty that gangs are not roaming the building, kids are not being pushed up against lockers and robbed, initiation rights, etc are not a thing here. Are there some who are wannabes? Could be. Who knows.
As for the guns, that appears to be a home control issue first. That issue is one where the police can be particularly blunt with a parent. Lock it up and keep it locked up so the kid doesn't use testosterone as an excuse to carry a weapon. For all I know there may be a lot of guns in homes in Maplewood and South Orange, bought by parents.
Unless everyone wants metal detectors, there is little that can be done about guns and the solution would not be "mayors and police take control of the schools."
Rumors in this day and age travel faster than in the past due to social media. One could try to ban cell phones in the school but most parents would not go for that -- almost every time a phone is taken from a kid the parents are angry, not at their kid but at the school. It is illegal for us to install a cell-phone blocker in the school under FCC regulations. The largest cell site in the two towns is across the street from the high school as the largest load center in the two towns is the high school. Since well north of 98% of all kids have a phone, even the hint of a fight is known to everyone within a few minutes. That helps create huge crowds in a very short period of time. As happened this week.
Kids rant a lot -- over the years I have broken up fights in stairwells and hallways (not a lot of them, but every couple of years) -- and talk about what they are going to do to so and so. They get suspended and things quiet down. I suspect this will quiet down soon (today, so far, seems to be quiet.) It would help if people on this message board refrained from spreading rumors as it doesn't help. The Admin team is doing very well. They are not going to e-mail the entire town every 15 minutes. Messages have gone out. Students have been spoken with today several times. Focus is to quiet things down rather than ramp them up so education can go forward.
I always appreciate Jude's perspective. I don't think panic is going to help us here
And guns in schools will keep on happening until the laws change. Even in little ol' Maplewood/SO.
max_weisenfeld said:
goodjob said:Actually, in many states gun laws have become less restrictive!
the gun laws have to change. that wont happen in this country - ever.
There Have Been 87 School Shootings Since Sandy Hook And Zero Gun Law Changeshttp://elitedaily.com/news/politics/america-averages-one-school-shooting-a-week/814769/
Once a child is found in school with a glock hand gun loaded with hollow point bullets, the best we can hope for is an effective reactive response and that is what we got at MMS and CHS.
Questions for the CHS and MMS teachers and administrators posting here: What sorts of programs are in place to identify children at risk of demonstrating such behavior before we are faced with a child with a gun? What identification/early intervention programs are presently in place? Are parents and community members who have the trust of the at risk child being brought in to help address the problems the child is experiencing before the child feels the need to act out in such a potentially dangerous manner? Does the mentoring program that works with at risk youth still exist and if so, does it work with middle school as well as high school aged youngsters? Are the peer counseling programs still in place and if so are they effective? If none or not enough of such programs are in place at this time, what can the community at large do to help establish the safety nets certain of our children obviously need?
ml1 said:
rather than freak out, shouldn't we be relieved that the procedures in place worked and no one was hurt?
Yes.
there's a natural inclination to blame people in authority any time something bad happens. and there's an inclination to say they should have been able to predict that it was going to happen and prevent it. But we do live in a world with laws and due process, even for kids. And unless someone has evidence that this kid was committing crimes at school with impunity, and the administration was aware and did nothing, I'm not sure what we should have expected them to do. Other than what they did do, which was go to Code Red and call the police. And now do a review of procedures to see if they could have prevented it.
if we want to live in a country with robust gun rights; a country with more than one gun per capita, we really aren't completely safe from potential gun violence. anywhere. I seriously don't know how we can assure ourselves that kids or adults for that matter, can't get their hands on guns and carry them into any place they want. too many people who own guns aren't responsible with them. they allow them to be stolen by criminals, or they leave them around where kids can grab them.
First -- to be clear- I know nothing about this incident and don't want to make an inference at all about this student and their living situation.
I was, and am, totally shocked by how many of my friends and neighbors here own guns. Both to hunt with as well as handguns. Some own lots of guns and enjoy going shooting pretty regularly.
IMO its hard to keep guns and gun incidents out of the community and schools when, in my estimation, there are quite a few guns throughout our community.
if only the other MMS kids had been armed. all it takes to stop a bad kid with a gun is a good kid with a gun.
What about gun owners being held accountable when these events occur? What are the laws regarding guns, such as those registered to a parent, being taken by the child to school? Are there any? I don't know to be honest, but I would be curious if anyone is familiar.
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