Posted: 10/14/2006 2:55:40 PM EDT
|
They got it through their thick heads....don't be a victim..fight back. seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2003304148_defending14.html Gunman in classroom? Texas students told to fight back By Jeff Carlton The Associated Press PREV 1 of 2 NEXT RESPONSE OPTIONS Burleson, Texas, teachers take part in a drill called the swarm technique during a training session. BURLESON, Texas — Youngsters in a suburban Fort Worth school district are being taught not to sit there like good boys and girls with their hands folded if a gunman invades the classroom, but to rush him and hit him with everything they have: books, pencils, legs and arms. "Getting under desks and praying for rescue from professionals is not a recipe for success," said Robin Browne, a major in the British Army reserve force and an instructor for Response Options, the company providing the training to the Burleson schools. That kind of fight-back advice is all but unheard of in schools, and some people fear it will get children killed. But school officials in Burleson said they are drawing on lessons learned from a string of disasters such as Columbine in 1999 and the Amish schoolhouse attack in Pennsylvania last week. The school system in the suburb of about 26,000 is believed to be the first in the nation training its teachers and students to fight back, Browne said. In Burleson, which has 10 schools and about 8,500 students, the training covers various emergencies, such as tornadoes, fires and situations in which first aid is required. Among the lessons: Use a belt as a sling for broken bones, and shoelaces make good tourniquets. Students also are instructed not to comply with a gunman's orders. Browne recommends students and teachers "react immediately to the sight of a gun by picking up anything and everything and throwing it at the head and body of the attacker and making as much noise as possible. Go toward him as fast as we can and bring [the gunman] down." Response Options trains students and teachers to "lock onto the attacker's limbs and use their body weight," Browne said. Everyday classroom objects, such as paperbacks and pencils, can become weapons. "We show [students and teachers] ... they can win," he said. "The fact that someone walks into a classroom with a gun does not make them a god. Five or six seventh-grade kids and a 95-pound art teacher can basically challenge, bring down and immobilize a 200-pound man with a gun." The fight-back training parallels a change in thinking that has occurred since the Sept. 11 attacks, when United Flight 93 made it clear the usual advice during a hijacking — don't try to be a hero, and no one will get hurt — no longer holds. Passengers aboard that flight rushed the hijackers, and the plane crashed into a Pennsylvania field instead of into its presumed target in Washington, D.C. Similarly, women and youngsters are often told by safety experts to kick, scream and claw their way out during a rape attempt or a child-snatching. In 1998 in Springfield, Ore., a 17-year-old high-school wrestling star with a bullet in his chest helped stop a rampage by tackling Kip Kinkel, 15, a freshman who had opened fire in the cafeteria. Kinkel killed two students and his parents, and wounded 22 other people. The wrestler survived. Hilda Quiroz, of the National School Safety Center, a nonprofit advocacy group in California, said she knows of no other school system in the country offering fight-back training and finds the strategy at Burleson troubling. "If kids are saved, then this is the most wonderful thing in the world. If kids are killed, people are going to wonder who's to blame," she said. "How much common sense will a student have in a time of panic?" Terry Grisham, spokesman for the Tarrant County, Texas, Sheriff's Department, said he, too, had concerns, though he had not seen details of the program. "You're telling kids to do what a tactical officer is trained to do, and they have a lot of guns and ballistic shields," he said. "If my school was teaching that, I'd be upset, frankly." Burleson straddles Tarrant and Johnson counties. Some students said they appreciated the training. "It's harder to hit a moving target than a target that is standing still," said Jessica Justice, 14, who received the training in the summer during freshman orientation at Burleson High. William Lassiter, manager of the North Carolina-based Center for Prevention of School Violence, said past attacks indicate that fighting back, at least by teachers and staff, has merit. "At Columbine, teachers told students to get down and get on the floors, and gunmen went around and shot people on the floors," Lassiter said. "I know [fighting back] ... sounds chaotic and I know it doesn't sound like a great solution, but it's better than leaving them there to get shot." Lassiter questioned, however, whether students should be included in the fight-back training: "That's going to scare the you-know-what out of them." Most of the freshman class at Burleson's high school underwent instruction during orientation; eventually, all Burleson students will receive some training, even the elementary-school children. "We want them to know if Miss Valley says to run out of the room screaming, that is exactly what they need to do," said Jeanie Gilbert, district director of emergency management. She said students and teachers should have "a fighting chance in every situation." Burleson High School Principal Paul Cash said he has received no complaints from parents about the training. Stacy Vaughn, president of the Parent-Teacher Organization at Norwood Elementary in Burleson, supports the program. "I feel like our kids should be armed with the information that these types of possibilities exist," Vaughn said. |