[WTH?] Teachers stage fake gunman attack

#1
MURFREESBORO, Tennessee (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. :confused:

"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 a 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." :rolleyes:
CNN Link

What's wrong with these people? Do they have any human decency or at least enough brain cells to figure out how traumatic it would be for young kids?
 
#2
This has happened in a few places. I'm a teacher and I can say that dealing with lock-down drills is not easy. Advertise it as a drill, and kids don't take it seriously. Treat it as the real thing, and this happens. It is a tough thing....but that said, this should not have been treated this way, especially with elementary students.

Fact is, we do a fire drill once a month and a lock-down drill for campus intruders twice a year. Number of kids killed in school shootings in the past 20 years = many. Number of kids killed in school fires in the past 20 years = 0. We're practicing the wrong thing.
 

VF21

Super Moderator Emeritus
SME
#3
Fact is, we do a fire drill once a month and a lock-down drill for campus intruders twice a year. Number of kids killed in school shootings in the past 20 years = many. Number of kids killed in school fires in the past 20 years = 0. We're practicing the wrong thing.
This should be a topic of discussion at the next PTA meeting everywhere. I don't envy you or any other teachers, D-Mass. It used to be the most dangerous part of your job was getting out of the way of an errant dodge ball. Now, you not only have to act - in some cases - as teacher, parent, confidante, etc., you also have to instill into your students the real and present dangers that face them in the world without reducing them to quivering masses of gelatinous goo.

I know people who have taught most of their lives and truly love the profession. It's a shame all this other stuff has become part of it.
 
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#4
This has happened in a few places. I'm a teacher and I can say that dealing with lock-down drills is not easy. Advertise it as a drill, and kids don't take it seriously. Treat it as the real thing, and this happens. It is a tough thing....but that said, this should not have been treated this way, especially with elementary students.

Fact is, we do a fire drill once a month and a lock-down drill for campus intruders twice a year. Number of kids killed in school shootings in the past 20 years = many. Number of kids killed in school fires in the past 20 years = 0. We're practicing the wrong thing.
I have and had quite a few teachers in my family. I don't envy teachers, D-Mass. Especially not for the money they get paid. It has to be a labor of love.

This was likely handled wrong, but I agree with you D-Mass. Kids don't take drills seriously. And I rememeber that from MY elementary school days.

(Of course that's when we used charred sticks to write on cave walls. ;) )
 

Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#5
Kids don't take it seriously....and now how seriously would they take it if it really happened?

That was just idiotic.

If the kids don't trust the adults because of stunts like this, then when there is a real crisis...
 
#6
Kids don't take it seriously....and now how seriously would they take it if it really happened?
I agree... and I'd also have to say that it isn't just "kids today" that don't take drills seriously. Most everyone that works in an office building has a routine fire drill, can we honestly say we take it more seriously than we did back in grade school? I've seen people head to the mini-mart rather than the correct meeting spot during office fire drills, people in meetings/conference calls ignore the drill entirely and been in one instance where the "drill" wasn't a drill at all yet a handful of people refused to evacuate.

We've become conditioned to ignore alarms of all kinds today - a mock attack like this is only taking it to the next level where we run the risk of actually conditioning people to the actual trauma. That could have severe consequences down the road.
 
#7
Number of kids killed in school fires in the past 20 years = 0. We're practicing the wrong thing.
Is that an actual statistic or is that your recollection?

Regardless, I think practicing fire drills is a good thing. You can still practice lock-down drills as well.
 

VF21

Super Moderator Emeritus
SME
#8
Is that an actual statistic or is that your recollection?

Regardless, I think practicing fire drills is a good thing. You can still practice lock-down drills as well.
Fire drills were instituted long before smoke detectors, sprinkler systems, etc. While I'm not advocating they be totally abandoned, I do think it's past time to bring them into the 21st century.

When I was in grade school, we had duck and cover drills, where we would get under our desks, and cover our heads. The threat? An atom bomb attack...
 
#9
I think I would get violent with those teachers if my child was subjected to that ridiculous mess. I'm not a violent person, but to have elementary age kids - 11 and under - crying under tables, with the lights off, begging for their lives?! You've got to be kidding me. I'd have their heads.

And I know it's got to be hard to get kids to understand just how serious this is, but that's taking it way too far. No one had the sense to veto this?

If you really want to get their attention, you show them how drastically people's lives are affected - even taken from them - because of these maniacs that shoot schools up. I wouldn't go so far as to show footage, but maybe show the campus after the rampage, and how families are torn apart. Then you sit down in an open format and have a frank discussion about it. Of course, you do all of this with the parents' consent, even inviting them to be present.

You DO NOT stage an attack, causing young children to think their lives are in danger.

I'm livid.
 

Mr. S£im Citrus

Doryphore of KingsFans.com
Staff member
#10
Well, I am violent, and if my son were subjected to this, I would be incarcerated over what I would do to those teachers.

Sorry D-Mass, but I'm going to respectfully disagree: you can NOT simulate a gun attack in a school and then tell the children that it's for real; that is absolutely reprehensible! Completely disregarding for the moment that it shows a lack of sensitivity to pull something like this so soon after what happened in Blacksburg, it is irresponsible on every level to do something like that to children and tell them that it was for real.

Everyone teacher involved in this needs to be fired. Right now. The principal needs to go door-to-door and personally apologize to the parents of all the children that were subjected to this. Not call them on the phone; he needs to apologize in person.
 

VF21

Super Moderator Emeritus
SME
#11
Sorry D-Mass, but I'm going to respectfully disagree: you can NOT simulate a gun attack in a school and then tell the children that it's for real; that is absolutely reprehensible! Completely disregarding for the moment that it shows a lack of sensitivity to pull something like this so soon after what happened in Blacksburg, it is irresponsible on every level to do something like that to children and tell them that it was for real.
I don't think he was saying you should simulate a gun attack and tell the kids it's for real. I think he was saying there needs to be some kind of drill set up that will emphasize the dangers without scaring the crap out of the kids. At least that's the impression I got. What I thought he was saying is that we should be focusing more on teaching kids how to respond to this kind of potential threat than to have meaningless fire drills once a month...
 

Mr. S£im Citrus

Doryphore of KingsFans.com
Staff member
#12
Perhaps this is so. And, as a veteran, I can definitely appreciate the value of preparing for a "worst case scenario." But you can't just spring that on kids and tell them that it's for real.
 

VF21

Super Moderator Emeritus
SME
#13
Perhaps this is so. And, as a veteran, I can definitely appreciate the value of preparing for a "worst case scenario." But you can't just spring that on kids and tell them that it's for real.
I think we're all pretty much in agreement about that part. I read the article again and then actually used my kitchen timer to mark the passing of 5 minutes. I cannot even begin to imagine the fear of those kids during that time.

The bear on my back porch was one of the most terrifying moments of my life and he was only there for about three minutes...
 

Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#15
:confused: Why is a fire drill meaningles again? Why can't we have a fire drill one month and a lock-down drill the next? Why do I feel the need to defend fire drills?

Well, they were pretty much completely worthless where I went to school, just because we were talking about all first floor schools with every classroom with a door to the outside. It was ridiculous. Good excuse for some just to cut school though. ;)

In general, I think these things make the adults feel better than the kids. In a multistory building...maybe. (Of course I have always been one of those aforementioned peeps who ignored the fire drills in my multistory buildings as an adult too, so should be taken for what its worth.)
 

HndsmCelt

Hall of Famer
#16
Yup lock downs were never really about actuall student safty, just showing tax paying parents that the school is doing Something. Fact is if a nut with a gun wants to shoot up a school there nothing that can be done, but what administrator wants to actually tell parents that?

Simulating an attack and telling kids it's real is straight out tramatization and the yahoo's who planed it ought o be prosececuted for abuse. Im no saying the kids will be scared for life but this stunt had NOTING o offer and losts of potential harm.
 
#17
Well, they were pretty much completely worthless where I went to school, just because we were talking about all first floor schools with every classroom with a door to the outside. It was ridiculous. Good excuse for some just to cut school though. ;)

In general, I think these things make the adults feel better than the kids. In a multistory building...maybe. (Of course I have always been one of those aforementioned peeps who ignored the fire drills in my multistory buildings as an adult too, so should be taken for what its worth.)
I guess I think of fire drills to be like some vaccinations. Maybe they don't actually help in part because they have become so common that kids learn early on what to do. In the event of something happening, it reduces panic if you've done it so many times before. Even if people don't act like its a real threat, they still aren't panicking.

Same with lockdown drills. You do it a couple times a year, most people don't take it seriously, but at least they get an idea for what a good course of action to take is and are less panicked when an actual alarm goes off.
 
#18
I don't think he was saying you should simulate a gun attack and tell the kids it's for real. I think he was saying there needs to be some kind of drill set up that will emphasize the dangers without scaring the crap out of the kids. At least that's the impression I got. What I thought he was saying is that we should be focusing more on teaching kids how to respond to this kind of potential threat than to have meaningless fire drills once a month...
Exactly...thank you. This drill was flat-out irresponsible and immoral.

As far as my statistic about the number of students killed in school fires in the past 20 years goes, it was a stat I heard from my former assistant principal. He didn't show me the exact reference, but I believe it...he's a guy who does his research. It's not that fire drills are completely irrelevant, it's just that they need to be updated...just like VF stated.
 
#19
I guess I think of fire drills to be like some vaccinations. Maybe they don't actually help in part because they have become so common that kids learn early on what to do. In the event of something happening, it reduces panic if you've done it so many times before. Even if people don't act like its a real threat, they still aren't panicking.

Same with lockdown drills. You do it a couple times a year, most people don't take it seriously, but at least they get an idea for what a good course of action to take is and are less panicked when an actual alarm goes off.
It would have the same effect, but the key difference is that if a gunman is shooting on a campus, there is no course of action - panicked or not - that would keep you safe. If a gunman wants to enter a classroom or a cafeteria, what could the students do? Drop and hide? Isn't that natural inclination anyways?

Growing up in Southern California, we had earthquake drills in elementary school. We always knew it was a drill and not the real thing, of course. But had there actually been a serious earthquake during school hours, that drill probably wouldn't have helped keep the kids calm. Maybe for some of them, but third and fourth graders tend to throw reason out the window when they're genuinely scared.

Like Slim said, whoever is in charge of those lame-brain "teachers" should personally go door-to-door like one of Jehovah's Witnesses and apologize to each parent/student face to face. Anything short of that is irresponsible.