Education Week - September 20, 2017 - 12

How Should Schools Prepare Students for a Shooting?
at Sandy Hook Elementary School in
Newtown, Conn. About 4,000 school
districts and 3,500 police departments
have ALICE-trained personnel, Crane
said.
Outspoken school safety consultant
Kenneth Trump, who regularly writes
about ALICE training, says it's not
supported by evidence and "preys on
the emotions of today's active shooter
frenzy that is spreading across the
nation." Trump and other critics say
schools shouldn't train young children
in the ALICE response when school
shootings, typically the focus of such
drills, are statistically rare.
But fires are also rare, Rambler
said, and that doesn't stop schools
from conducting regular fire drills.
The Akron district has never had a
school shooting or an attempted school
shooting either, he said.
Greg Crane, ALICE's creator, says
schools put children in danger if they
teach them to be "static targets."
Parents "don't have any problem
discussing an abduction and giving
children quite aggressive tactics in response," Crane said. "What do we tell
kids in stranger danger? Anything but
go with the guy. Bite, kick, yell. Anything but go sit in the corner and be
quiet."

Growing Use of Drills
Discussions over security are often
sparked by media coverage of shootings. Just last week, a student at a
Washington state high school shot
and killed a classmate and injured
three others before he was subdued
by a janitor.
Federal data show a growing use of
school-shooter drills, though it doesn't
distinguish between lockdown drills
and responses like ALICE. In the
2013-14 school year, 70 percent of public schools drilled students on how to
respond to a school shooting, including
71 percent of elementary schools, according to the most recent data available. In 2003-04, 47 percent of schools
involved students in shooter drills.
A 2013 federal report, created in
response to Sandy Hook, outlined a
safety response that called on school
staff to "consider trying to disrupt or
incapacitate the shooter by using aggressive force and items in their en-

Angelo Merendino for Education Week

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

vironment, such as fire extinguishers,
and chairs." It didn't advocate involving students.
That report, released by the U.S.
Department of Education on behalf of
a group of federal agencies, drew concern from some school safety consultants who said such a "run, hide, fight"
approach is unproven by research and
may even be dangerous in the event of
an actual shooting.
But it also inspired states and districts to update safety plans, leading
many to adopt ALICE and similar
training. A subsequent report by a
task force convened by Ohio's attorney
general, for example, recommended
that schools train students and staff
that, if a shooter enters a classroom,
they try to interfere with his shooting
accuracy by throwing books, computers, and phones. They may also need
to subdue the intruder, the report said.
In Akron, parents can opt their children out of the training, though few
do, Rambler said. Elementary students are told briefly about countering techniques, but the focus of their
discussions is on following teachers'
directions in unpredictable situations,
he said. In middle school, training is
"a little more complete," sometimes
including foam props that students
throw at school police officers as practice, Rambler said.
Countering an intruder "is literally
the last resort," Rambler said. "That

PULLOUT SECTION: Education Week's Calendar of Events & Professional Development Directory

Education WEEk
VOL. 32, NO. 1 * AUGUST 22, 2012

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edweek.org:

BREAKING NEWS DAILY

Split Erupts
Over NAEP
Exclusions

Debate Grows Around
Charter School Closure
Editors:
Even charter backers worry
that lax and inconsistent
standards will undermine
public confidence.

At Issue Is How Many ELLs,
Spec. Ed. Students to Test

1closure.h32

By Nirvi Shah

duced a range of sample test items to help those
vendors get an idea of what the states want, and
experts say they offer valuable insight into the
tests that are expected to emerge in 2014-15.
"What we are starting to see here are tests
that really get at a deeper understanding on
the part of students, not just superficial knowl-

Despite a pending policy change
aimed at including more students
with disabilities and English-language learners in the "nation's report
card," the federal agency that administers the national testing program
appears to be softening the penalty
for states that fail to improve inclusion rates.
The disagreement underscores
the uneasy relationship between
the National Center for Education
Statistics, the federal agency that
administers the national tests, and
the National Assessment Governing
Board, the independent body that
sets policy for the exams. And it reflects an intensifying debate about
how to ensure that the National Assessment of Educational Progress, a
congressionally mandated set of tests
designed to take the national pulse
on student achievement, accurately
allows for state-by-state comparisons
of student achievement.
"These issues, as all issues with
students with disabilities and English-language learners, are hot potatoes," said Cornelia Orr, the governing board's executive director.
Two years ago, nagb adopted a policy that takes effect in January, during the next administration of naEp,
to limit how many students with disabilities and English-learners states
can be cut from the testing pool. The
policy says, essentially, that only students with severe cognitive disabilities and English-language learners
who have been in the country for less

PAGE 18 >

PAGE 28 >

EW STORY
DESIGNERS: WIDTH OF THIS BOX IS KEY.
DO NOT CHANGE WIDTH. (ZTMP NOTE)

DRUMMING UP BUSINESS: Elementary Principal Joann Riemersma, left, talks with residents in Grand Rapids, Mich., as part of a doorto-door drive to persuade more families to enroll their children in the city's regular public schools. Faced with declining enrollment
and competition from charter schools, many urban districts are undertaking similar marketing campaigns. PAGE 7

Districts Abandon Consortia Provide Preview of Common Tests
Grants Targeting
Those consortia have recently begun work with
By Catherine Gewertz
private vendors to develop items-questions and
Teacher Quality
As teachers begin shaping lessons for the com- tasks-for the tests. But each group has pro-

By Jaclyn Zubrzycki
Three big-city districts-Chicago,
Milwaukee, and New York-have
terminated federal grants aimed at
promoting performance-based compensation plans and professional
development for teachers and principals.
Overall, the 2010 Teacher Incentive Fund grants to the three districts
would have provided an $88 million
payout over five years-nearly 20
percent of the federal program's fiveyear budget of $442 million. All three
districts aimed to secure union support while meeting grant requirements during the yearlong planning
period permitted by the grant, but
none was ultimately able to accomplish that task.
In a time of fiscal austerity and attacks on teachers' unions, getting districts and unions to work together and
agree on teacher compensation and
evaluation is a challenging task. Recognizing that challenge, the U.S. Department of Education has adjusted its
PAGE 20 >

mon standards, many are wondering how to prepare their students for tests that won't be ready
for at least two years. But sample items being
drafted for those exams offer early ideas of what
lies ahead.
Two large groups of states are using federal
Race to the Top money to create new suites of
exams for the Common Core State Standards.

Debate Revs Up Around Closing
Low-Achieving Charter Schools
By Sean Cavanagh
One of the most vexing questions about charter schools-
when low-performing ones
should be shut down-is receiving new attention, amid concerns that lax and inconsistent
standards for closing them will
undermine the public's confidence in the sector.
Over the past few years, a
growing number of researchers, policymakers, and charter
school backers have called for
removing obstacles to closing
academically struggling schools,

though many barriers remain.
Numerous states have approved laws in recent years that
have raised or clarified standards for charter school performance, while also establishing
policies to make it easier for
charters to open and to secure
facilities and public funding.
Even so, state and local policies vary greatly in their expectations for charter schools, and
in the standards they set for
authorizers-the state, local, or
independent entities typically
charged with approving charters
PAGE 22 >

Jeffrey Phelps/AP

U.S. Education Department
Revises TIF Requirements

FISCAL FOCUS: Presidential candidate Mitt Romney campaigns with
Rep. Paul Ryan in Waukesha, Wis. The choice of Mr. Ryan for the
GOP ticket has elevated education spending as an issue. PAGE 24

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is, 'Do whatever you have to to stay
alive.' It's not, 'Go find the gunman
and throw something at them.' "

Planning a Response
Greg Crane said schools decide how
detailed they want to be in their hypothetical discussions of violence, but
most involve students in some level of
training.
The Cranes worked with a children's author to publish a book called
I'm Not Scared ... I'm Prepared! that
many schools use to train younger
students. But some parents have been
concerned about what some districts
teach their children in ALICE drills,
particularly when it comes to the
counter step.
In 2015, an Alabama middle school
made headlines when its principal
asked students to keep canned goods
in their desks to hurl at attackers.
At the time, ALICE co-founder Lisa
Crane said the use of canned goods is
not something ALICE trainers would
advocate, but it's also not something
they would discourage.
In some districts, parents have
started petitions or turned out to
school board meetings in opposition to
active-shooter drills, saying they don't
want to expose their young children to
such discussions of violence.
"My daughter's 8-years-old and she
reads the newspaper and she gets nervous about stories about murders and
other things happening in the neighborhood, so I'm very concerned about
what impact it will have on her to be
told that there's a potential that someone might walk through the door and
shoot her classroom," a father said at
a public meeting after the Anchorage
district announced ALICE training
plans last year.
At the National Association of
School Resource Officers conference
in Washington in July, Officer Ingrid
Herriott told school-based police officers and safety directors how she customized ALICE training for elementary, middle, and high school students
when she was a school resource officer
at Southwest Allen County Schools in
Fort Wayne, Ind.
She showed a video she said schools
could use to explain ALICE to elementary school children. In it, a school of-

Helena Wolfe-Wilder, a 5th
grade teacher at Forest Hills
Community Learning Center,
instructs her students to keep
still while she secures a door.
The Akron, Ohio, school
recently organized a drill to
prepare students and staff for
how to respond to a gunman
on campus.

ficer explains "stranger danger" to a
plush dog named Safety Pup. Police
officers are in uniforms, teachers have
lanyards and name tags, and strangers are other adults students don't recognize, the video says. The officer then
explains ALICE, advising students to
listen to their teacher for directions.
Middle school students quickly
learn to barricade doors with desks,
Herriott said. She walked middle
school students through drills by
showing videos produced by the district's high school students using fake
guns to act out school intruder scenarios. In one such video, a student in
a library pretends to hit the gunman
over the head with a chair.
At that age, the idea of a shooting
"isn't something that's above and
beyond what they are seeing in the
media and the video games they are
playing," she said. For high school students, Herriott gave internet surveys
after training to learn about concerns,
and had principals make follow-up
videos to respond to them.
NASRO worked with the National
Association of School Psychologists to
address concerns about the psychological effects of safety drills. Those
recommendations call for plans that
are as sensitive to local and regional
concerns, like wildfires and earthquakes, as they are to statistically less
probable events, like shootings.
Steve Brock, a professor of school
psychology at California State University, Sacramento, helped draft that
guidance. He said there's not enough
research to support ALICE and similar training in schools.

Minimizing Student Anxiety

When it comes
to these kinds of
activities, schools
need to proceed
cautiously."
STEVE BROCK
School psychology professor,
California State University,
Sacramento

The most important thing a teacher
can do in a shooting situation is remember to lock the classroom door, he
said, and it's not necessary to "unnecessarily frighten" students by walking
them through more elaborate hypothetical scenarios.
"When it comes to these kinds of
activities, schools need to proceed cautiously," he said.
Brock advocates for lockdown drills,
which he calls "tried and true" for a
variety of crises, ranging from intruders to an intoxicated parent. Such
drills have actually been shown to
lessen student anxiety, he said. He
recommends schools train young students to pretend there's a strange dog
in the hallway that they are trying to
stay safe from, rather than talking
about "bad guys" or shootings.
But some parents and teachers say
responses like ALICE ease their fears
that children would be "sitting ducks"
in a shooting situation.
After Matt Holland, a 3rd-grade
teacher in Alexandria, Va., learned
about ALICE in his own staff training
this summer, he called his 7-year-old
daughter's school in a neighboring district to ask leaders to transition away
from a lockdown approach.
"While, yes, statistically speaking,
the chances [of a shooting] are very
slim," Holland said, "I don't want,
heaven forbid, something to happen
to my students or my daughter and
to say, 'There was a small chance it
would happen, and it happened. And
no one ever planned for it.' "

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Education Week - September 20, 2017

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