In 1999 the Columbine High School massacre shined the light on school shootings, while also paving the way for techniques for future school shooters. School shootings are now the new normal in the 21st century. Schools have upgraded their security because of the ridiculous number of shootings taking place across the United States. Everyday parents send their children to school hoping that they get to see their child that night. Students go to school not knowing if an intruder will come into their school and turn their lives upside down.
These shootings effect the community and everyone within them, especially the students. These effects can change the student’s learning, and their mental health. One day I will be a teacher so learning about the effects school shootings can have on students learning will help me understand my students better. My research paper aims to determine the effects on student’s learning after a school shooting.
When a school shooting takes place, it has long term effects and its up to the individual on how long they recover from it. After a shooting students and family go through behavioral, cognitive, and psychological effects. The article A Trauma and Recovery Model for Victims and Their Families after a Catastrophic School Shooting: Focusing on Behavioral, Cognitive, and Psychological Effects and Needs Dr. Karin Jordan dissects the way the primary and secondary victim think after a school shooting has occurred.
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In the article the reader is given a chart over Trauma and recovery model for a catastrophic school shooting. This is where Jordan goes into the thought process of the students/people in the school and parents/family members. With the model it breaks down into two parts after the shooting has occurred. The loss of a loved one and reunification and it tell how both sets of groups recover. The first stage is the school shooting itself and this is where the primary victim will either fight, flight, or freeze. Research has shown that males generally will respond with fight, or flight, while female and children will respond with freezing (Perry, Polland, Blakley, Baker, & Vigilante, 1995).
At this time some can not fully process what is taking place, and that’s where the sense of suspension to reality takes place. The second stage is displacement and separation from family. Although the shooting is no longer taking place, they have to take further precautions before reuniting the families. At this time the victims try to connect with their family though technology, so they know they are safe. Others are still in the mind of shock and disbelief and show little emotion, while others are high in emotion. The next part is if the victim is dead. The parents will be in disbelief, sadden, and angry.
After a couple of months so family will create organizations and charities for families like them and fight for better security in school and try to reorganize their lives. The other stage is reunification, and this is where the victim looks back and thinks about what happened and trying to see if they knew anyone who died. They are crying uncontrollable as their with their family, glad to be alive. The recovery for them is that they will never be their normal self again. They can experience, relationship problems, self-destructive behavior, or delay in maturation, but sadly they will never look at life the same way again.
