Earlier this year, I was appointed to the bipartisan House Select Committee on School Safety (visit the official website at https://schoolsafety.virginia.gov/index.asp). A lot happened last week with two days in Richmond and a local meeting on Friday. We began on Wednesday with the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission (JLARC) briefing the full committee. JLARC presented an informative study that examined Virginia’s school safety policies, what works well in other states, and general research on the subject. They concluded that there is no single approach that is effective in preventing school shootings. However, their research found that with better prevention, planning, and trainings we can make our schools even safer. After the presentation, we toured Meadowbrook High School in Chesterfield County. Touring the school provided a first-hand look at some of their infrastructure and procedural safety improvements.
Then, on Thursday the subcommittee on Prevention and Response Protocol met for the first time. We heard several impressive presentations from experts in the field. Sheriff Timothy C. Carter from the Virginia Sheriffs Association discussed the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that exists between the Shenandoah County Public School System and the local Sheriff’s office. MOU’s allow for cooperative information sharing between the school and police to create an environment where intervention is possible before it is too late.
Michael Reilly, the executive director of the Department of Fire Programs, discussed how school fires were a crisis in the early to mid 20th century. Nationwide, between 1908 and 1952 there were 785 deaths in school fires. Now we see very few fire-related fatalities, so what happened? Legislators, in collaboration with counties and schools, created fire codes to make sure buildings were safe, and instituted safety and training protocols that ensured students and faculty members knew exactly how to respond.
Doug Goodman, police chief for the town of Ashland, provided sobering statistics about school shootings across the country. According to the FBI, there were 160 active shooter incidents in the United States between 2000 and 2013 with 486 people killed. Somewhat surprisingly, 56 percent of shooters communicated their intentions to a third party. Schools need the resources to increase training of all school personnel and increase coordination between schools and local law enforcement.
Finally, the subcommittee heard from Dr. David Meyers, the superintendent of New Kent County Public Schools. He discussed current school procedures in his district and areas in need of improvement. One area that was in particular need of support was funding for mental health services. Currently, their ratio of students to counselors is 1:350. Early intervention strategies are critical to identifying students of concern, assessing their risk for engaging in violence and getting those students help.
On Friday, we convened the third meeting of my School Safety Advisory community roundtable to share what I had learned down in Richmond and discuss community concerns moving forward. One area of concern was the need for additional and more effective trainings. Rigid school lockdown procedures can be hurtful in an active shooter situation. In Parkland, students that were outside were told to come back into the school to follow lockdown procedures. A possible solution to this problem is to institute options-based response trainings. To institute such a protocol requires that schools coordinate with local police for active shooter trainings to ensure students and faculty are prepared in the event of a crisis. However, trainings can only do so much, 69 percent of school shootings take place in under five minutes. We all agreed prevention services are the key to stopping school shootings before they happen, such as identifying students that may be of harm to themselves and others. Unfortunately, right now, our schools are not equipped to give students the support they need. School Board Chair and Mount Vernon representative Karen Corbett Sanders and I agree that we need additional funding from the state to hire dedicated mental health professionals and social workers to give students the treatment they require. Mental health is just as important as physical health and it is time we treated it as such. I want to thank all the members of the community who took time out of their busy Friday to meet with me, including my colleagues, Del. Mark Sickles, who also sits on the Select Committee, Sen. Adam Ebbin, Fairfax County NAACP President Kofi Annan, and Fairfax County School Board Chair Karen Corbett Sanders.
I am hopeful that this Select Committee will craft some effective policy recommendations to build a healthier school community that ensures safe environments for students, teachers and others. The committee will meet over the course of the year completing our work by Nov. 15 and then include a final report containing legislative recommendations to the General Assembly on Dec. 15. I will continue to update you as it happens and please do not hesitate to reach out to my office (delpkrizek@house.virginia.gov) or the public comments page of the committee at https://schoolsafety.virginia.gov/comments.asp.