In instances of escalating threats of violence in schools, parents in the United States grapple with an extraordinarily challenging predicament.
An automated communication from Atlanta Public Schools reached out to parents and guardians of the district's 50,000 students on the evening of Wednesday, September 11, delivering a message of concern:
Following this, chat threads among local parents began buzzing with activity, raising questions that have become all too familiar for contemporary American parents:
Is it safe to send my kids to school tomorrow?
The latest incident, a shooting at Winder’s Apalachee High School, marked the nation's 45th school shooting of the year. Georgia authorities escalated the situation by detaining 24 youths accused of making threats against schools within the following 48 hours, as informed by CNN.
The state of Florida's Volusia County reported 282 fabricated threats of violence against schools during the initial month of the academic year, according to its law enforcement chief. He warned that any such threat, irrespective of its legitimacy, would result in dire consequences for the perpetrator:
Legit or not, "it's going to get your ass sent to jail."
Incredibly, such figures pale in comparison to the 35,000 threats received by the district housing Oxford High School since its tragic mass shooting in 2021, where a student took the lives of four peers, injured six others, and a teacher. According to an academic study, the district typically receives about 500 threats annually, but this drastic spike stems from a deeply ingrained menace towards school safety.
The issue of school violence threats plagues the nation, measuring beyond gun attacks and bombings, with no centralized organization tracking these occurrences.
“Schools likely silently manage thousands of school violence shooting threats that do not even make the headlines,” the researchers noted in the American Psychological Association’s Journal of Threat Assessment and Management in 2022.
The tense reality confronts American parents daily with the delicate balancing act between academic pursuits, sports engagements, and social bonding against the credibility of a threat of violence on campus, the enhanced presence of armed police officers, and the cost of keeping children home, melting away vital work hours.
Additionally, parents interpreting Atlanta Public Schools' September 11 alerts took different perspectives:
“An increase in ... social media threats” following the Apalachee shooting and related to “multiple schools” had propelled this district-wide alarm, Atlanta Public Schools spokesperson Seth Coleman clarified weeks later. Citing the City of Atlanta Police Department and Fulton County Sheriff’s Office, he revealed that the district had never issued a widespread warning in such a long time.
The initial unrest led to ongoing uncertainty for the parents:
“It becomes this intricate nightmare ... There's just no right answer,” said one concerned mother, acknowledging her family could sustain a temporary loss of income to keep her child safe at home.
The dilemma transcended a divide, leading to treading with caution around each other's choices, as one mother explained:
“I don't want you to feel judged if you send your kids to school; I don't want you to feel judged if you keep your kid home.”
“Because, like, this is an impossible situation.”
A 'War of Their Own'
The pervasiveness of school shootings in the United States, weak gun control policies, and public debate have also given rise to unparalleled defenses in educational facilities:
“It's just more police, more surveillance, armed officers. And that to me is very scary,” expressed an Atlanta-area mother, reflecting on her child's rising concerns concerning the reinforced windows in her security vestibule.
Facing the frightening reality, the concerned parent introduced a hypothetical solution to the conversation about their elementary school:
“A dad who received the Atlanta Public Schools alert spoke with his child about what happened in Winder and the lockdown drills conducted at her school 'in case there was anyone who was either bad – bad people – but also people who are just sick and in some cases ... can do bad things,' he informed CNN.
“The lesson boiled down to understanding that: ‘The school, it works really, really hard to practice with you certain procedures to keep the area safe. And so I feel like you're perfectly safe.’ But, this did happen at this school, and some people did die as a result........ I’m just trying to make her feel as safe as possible, but also I don’t want her to be naive,” the father explained.
Lastly, confronting the decision of 'send them to school or keep them home?' on September 12, anxious parents across Atlanta faced a challenging checkpoint:
Make the move to send them to school or hold them back?
After the arrival signal echoed throughout the area, two sets of parents compared their choices:
Fear 'postponed' to a less notable day
Lessons carried on that Thursday throughout the Atlanta region.
School district law enforcement officials were reassigned to focus more time on all elementary schools, and other local authorities were requested to carry out directed patrols at all APS schools, district spokesperson Coleman revealed weeks later. The Fulton County Sheriff's Office sent 11 motor and K-9 units to aid that day, they informed CNN later on; the Atlanta Police Department redirected CNN's inquiries towards Atlanta Public Schools.
School district police investigated around 20 threats related to the September 12 warning – 11 through its SaySomething.net reporting system, Coleman disclosed, adding: "Multiple threats/tips concentrated at six (6) particular school sites were received and handled on 9/12/2024."
In the end, three juveniles were handed over to law enforcement, Coleman reported, summarising the situation in the district's schools that day as "No instances of violence."
As the sun began to dip, another Atlanta-region mom touched base with a dad in her parent group chat:
Regardless, as many American parents are well aware, this wouldn't be the final such warning of school violence or the last campus security alert or the last time they'd need to ponder a potentially life-threatening decision about sending their kids to class.
Just two weeks later, as school violence threats persisted to surge from coast to coast, the federal Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency released the Anonymized Threat Response Guidance: A Toolkit for K-12 Schools "to aid ... schools and their law enforcement and community partners in creating customized methods to manage anonymous threats of violence."
"K-12 schools nationwide are grappling with an epidemic of anonymous threats of violence. School leaders require scalable solutions to handle these interminable and burdensome threats," the agency's director stated in a press release.
"Families, students, and educators shouldn't have to ponder whether they're safe when they walk into a classroom," an FBI official added.
However, despite this, numerous parents across the nation already comprehend how accurately the school threat research study's authors summed up their conclusion: "Threats of violence can inflict severe consequences for the safety and well-being of students, teachers, and other school staff. They can have a considerable impact on the overall learning environment, as well as on the physical and mental health of a community."
Earlier on September 12, the very same Atlanta-region mom who claimed she'd been "furious and crying constantly" also revealed to another mom the lingering fear her child harbored, even as he decided to attend class that day:
In light of the school threat, discussions among the parents escalated, with one questioning, "Us parents, should we send our kids to school tomorrow?" The escalation of threats led to increased anxiety among parents, forever having to consider the balance between safety and their children's education.
