Vassar Quarterly - Fall 2017 - 17

Vassar Today

New Research
Aims to Help
Prevent
School Shootings

AP-Ed Andrieski / Portrait, Karl Rabe

A recent study, authored by psychology professors Abby
Baird '91 and Debra Zeifman, with researcher Emma Roellke
'16, shines new light on mass school shootings. With "Alone
and adrift: The association between mass school shootings,
school size, and student support," published in the Social
Science Journal, the authors provide information that might
help prevent future mass school shootings.
The researchers' findings indicate that the school environment may influence
the likelihood of a student engaging in mass violence. More specifically, the stress
of transitioning from a small, supportive school to a larger, more sparsely staffed
school may be an important predictor of mass school shootings by already vulnerable students.
A conversation on the subject began between Baird and Zeifman when a Virginia
Tech student walked into a school building and killed 32 people in 2007. Over the
next few years, the two discussed details of mass murders at other schools-
Columbine, among others. They were seeking common elements. The interplay
between mental health issues and access to guns was already clear, Baird says. They
were looking for something else, something that would help predict which individuals might be more likely to commit violent acts.
One thing they noticed was that mass school shootings generally don't happen in
big cities; they almost always occur in suburban or rural districts, especially those
with large populations.
But as happens sometimes with research, the project was put on the back burner
while Baird and Zeifman engaged in other pursuits. It wasn't until a shooting scare
at nearby Arlington Central School District a few years back that Baird started
looking at their research again. The district, which has more than 9,700 students, is
enormous-and like other districts of similar size, it's the kind of place where many
students don't know one another.
"If you look at any footage from Columbine, [you will see that] they'd built
Columbine High School with extra wide hallways to handle hundreds of kids
changing classes," Baird says.

Emma Roellke '16, who served as a post-baccalaureate researcher in Vassar's psychology department,
began working with Baird as a student in Vassar's
Undergraduate Research Summer Institute (URSI).
They pored over data related to 22 incidents that had
occurred in schools across the U.S.-from Bethel,
Alaska, to Richmond, Virginia. The study had specific
parameters: Shootings in which interpersonal conflicts
were involved were ruled out. The acts had to take
place in middle or high schools, and there had to be
at least two victims that were either injured or killed.
"Mass school shooters were more likely to have
previously attended a smaller than average school and
transitioned to a larger than average school," Roellke
says. "They were also more likely to have come from
a more supportive school than their state average, in
terms of student-faculty ratios."
School shooters typically experienced a 95 percent
increase in enrollment size during their transition
from one school level to the next, the study found.
The researchers reasoned that at urban schools,
students were used to being around people they didn't
know-from strangers on city streets to fellow students
in the school hallways. The same could be said about
those who grew up in large suburban schools, Baird
says. But imagine someone from a small school-where
he or she knows all of their schoolmates and teachers
know all of their students-moving to a large school,
an environment that fosters feelings of anonymity.
In addition to providing a new perspective on
school shootings, the researchers hope to encourage
the current trend in some areas of the U.S. to break
up large school districts. Smaller districts with lower
student-teacher ratios are better for adolescents,
giving them the opportunity for closer relationships
with each other and their teachers, Baird says.
-Debbie Swartz

Researchers Emma Roellke '16 and Abby Baird '91.
Not shown, Debra Zeifman.
VA S S A R Q U A R T E R lY

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Vassar Quarterly - Fall 2017