During a school shooting lock down, if half of the classroom runs out of the building and the other half of the class stays barricaded in the room, where should the teacher go?

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTFe6LB4B/

Our schools don’t teach them to run. They shelter in place.

@Patience I think they're starting to change what they teach. As a kid I remember we were taught to stay and hide no matter what but as a teen we were taught to run if we could and to try and get out if possible.

I’m an office manager and our building by the World Trade Center in NYC says to run, find the exit and get out of there.

Not American but if I was a teacher, my job is to stay with the students who say as the adult in charge of their safety. If the rest get out that’s amazing but I would never sleep again if I knowingly left children to their death inside a class/cupboard. Can’t abandon kids 🥺

At the daycare I work at the goal is to shelter in place, be prepared to attack if necessary, and follow all instructions given by law enforcement. I don’t personally believe this is the best scenario but idk how to quickly respond with 8 infants and a flight of stairs between us and the exit

I can't imagine living in a country where this is even a thing 😭

I just had training this year for it and they said everyone is to stay barricaded in the classroom until law enforcement gives the all clear unless you know for sure that running is safer. I also teach at an elementary school so it’s a bit different than high school. I can’t imagine leaving kids in the classroom and running for safety with those who want to run. If I’m unsure and there are kids too scared to leave, I’m staying with them and protecting them as best as I can.

@Caroline learning about my kids doing the drills was tough but doing the training and then being at the school doing active shooter drills was another level of heartbreaking; especially when one of the kindergarten classes “failed” because the security guard knocked on the door just to test them and the teacher couldn’t grab the kid before they opened it. It infuriates me that this is even something we have to deal with.

They should make the decision based on where they are in the school, in the classroom, and what’s going on around them. If they can help kids get out safely, great. If it’s safer to stay in the room, then do that. I’ve been taught to stay put and hidden, but no one actually knows how they’ll react in a situation like this until they are in one so it’s hard to say what anyone should do.

This wasn't something they even taught when I was in school. We did have a protocol for bomb threats but never shootings. I was in high school when the Colombine shooting took place but they hadn't put anything in place before I graduated. There was a shooting at a nearby school my sophomore year and a kid got shot and killed in our school parking lot (targeted gang member) but I was still never really worried about getting shot at school. Maybe was my teenage feelings of invensability idk 🤷‍♀️. I am fearful for my daughter when she eventually goes to school though.

The fact this is even asked as a question is beyond comprehension 😥

I really don’t like the shelter in place thing. I always think if the class is on the ground floor then why not get out the window if possible. The only scenario I could see that not being good is if there were two shooters and one was outside but typically it’s one and I feel like it could be better to chance it then sit and wait. Idk. Just always been a thought.

Teachers are in charge of the CLASSROOM & the students within it. Captain goes down with the ship n all that jazz.

Damn what a horrible thing to even have to think about 😔i honestly dont know what i would do as my actions would probably also be influenced by how small the kids were. If they were little 4 year olds alone in a room idk if i could leave them. But i also know id worry about my own safety as despite having a duty of care for the school kids, im also a mum and would hate to leave them so early. I really feel sorry for americans and im glad that even tho the uk has their fair share of tragedy, its no where near as terrifying raising a child over here, and thats coming from a black woman in the "ghetto".

@Parker 又 if we’re meant to be a human shield on top of being an educator, a nurse, a social worker, a counselor, and everything else, we should at least be paid better.

@Victoria it’s just the logic I have I guess? Like the captain goes down with the ship logic ? I don’t employ you, I don’t plan to send my kids to public school, you’ve got an issue with the board of education not my logic

@Victoria I have a really hard time with the expectation of teachers staying behind. I can see how people would think they should but it feels like I would be selfish by expecting the teacher to possibly sacrifice their life. If the kids are younger, like elementary schoolers I think the teacher needs to force them to leave as well as they could. For older kids, idk if I’d expect them to stay back if there were a few that wanted to stay behind. I would hope the teacher would try everything they could to get them to come with but I wouldn’t blame them for leaving with the larger group.

At my school, we were told to flip all the tables so they face the door and hide behind them. But my welding teacher said if it ever happened for everyone to run to their cars because the junior and senior welding students parked right outside the welding shop. He told all the older kids to just take all the younger ones and drive away. I definitely don't think it's safe to be running around the hallways, but if you are close to an exit, it would make sense to leave. So my answer for the teacher would depend on that, but I think I would kind of hate a teacher for leaving my kid behind but also not really blame them since it could be a fight or flight response

Usually, elementary kids are taught to shelter in place. Once kids are older and in high school, they are taught different choices based on where the shooter is. Run, shelter, barricade.

@Parker 又my issue is the board of education and the majority of childcare centers share your logic

I really think this is age dependent. Sure high schoolers and even middle schoolers can run . But the littles, it would be so much harder for them. I never went into teaching(have my degreee but nope) it would have been with the littles and as much as I’d want to run to save myself for my own children sake, I’m staying to protect them.

In high school every teacher would tell us to be quiet and hide, expect for one. I still remember to this day he said “if there is ever a shooter here I want you all to promise to run out the back door and do not stop even if you have to go to someone’s house or building you do not stop running until you get there” and I always thought that was the best advice because I think it’s best to try your hardest to save yourself and potentially others instead of sitting in a classroom for who knows how long and wait for someone to come.

I’m a teacher, not a member of the military or law enforcement or some other emergency responder. The expectation that we should risk our own safety and potentially leave our families and own children without us is absolutely beyond ridiculous. All because some idiots don’t want to “give up their second amendment rights.” Guns are the number one cause of death for children in America!! If all of a sudden fishing became the number one cause of death, and it happened to be my life’s passion or even my livelihood, I would gladly give it up even if I had every right to keep doing it. I simply do not understand some people. And I say all of this as someone who has been teaching in the same school for 16 years. I’ve gone to weddings of parents of my students, a sweet sixteen, taught multiple kids in the same family, etc. AND I say all this as someone who has been involved in an actual lockdown due to a gunshot (it turned out to be cars shooting at each other, I guess it wasn’t

Intentional that it hit the school. We did not know that for around 30 minutes or so. I sat in a room with a bunch of 8 year olds who were being as quiet as they could and were silently freaking out and crying and praying, not knowing if I would ever see my own child again. I do not see how any mother can be against gun control. Like I actually think something is wrong in your brain.

@GMF I’m so so sorry but your type of thinking is what gets people killed. How do you expect people to protect their family? Do you seriously think one day if I’m walking with my daughter and a random stranger comes running towards us that he’s just gonna leave me alone because I’m screaming or yelling? No, criminals are going to do whatever the hell they want to do. So instead I will carry to ensure not only my safety but most importantly my daughters safety. Banning guns will do nothing, we have a drug ban yet we have the highest rate of young adult deaths due to drugs than ever before. Criminals do not follow the law ma’am it’s that simple.

@Patience And you know what, I absolutely agree with you. I also think if you have children you and the children should have to take a mandatory safety course. These are things that I and many others can get behind. The overall “ban them” mindset just isn’t helping anyone it’s like the saying “can’t bring a knife to a gun fight” literally because it’s a matter between life and death.

Im honestly not gonna judge the teacher either way because I can’t expect someone in that kind of extremely underpaid under appreciated job to be able to act in a way that trained professionals can’t even act. Teachers aren’t trained for that kind of thing and are being 100% failed by politicians who refuse to enforce common sense gun control. Whether a teachers immediate response is to fight flight or freeze we can’t judge them they aren’t there to put their own lives on the line to protect our kids we need to do that ourselves by demanding gun control

I was a high school teacher before becoming a stay at home mom. The first school I taught at ran ALICE drills monthly and we were trained to get out if we could. If we couldn't, barricade the door with literally everything we can grab. And if we didn't have time for that, be prepared to fight back. The other schools I taught at wanted us to shelter in place, but personally, the intense training I received at my first school, I would have continued to follow that. As the teacher, if I knew we could get out, I would get out and run with my students and lead them to the designated safe spaces outside the school (that only the teachers knew so a threat wouldn't know where we were going). My life matters too. There are people who love me and want me to come home too. If I determined the best course of action was to leave, I would have encouraged every one of my students to follow me out of the building. But I can't force them out, not when the majority of them were bigger than I am. So if they want to stay...

I'd have encouraged them to shut and barricade the door and let NO one in.

@Monica as some1 from the uk, guns are the problem. The looseness and attachment you americans have with guns is deffo the problem. But i agree that guns are so deeply engraved in your daily way of life that putting a ban wouldnt do much, atleast not for those of us living now. But saying that, its crazy to me how much you guys defend having guns. Most places do not have guns so easily accessible and as a result dont have to deal with gun crime on the scale you do. Yes america is big, but yall are way too damn free and entitled...no one needs a gun, its just as bad as the lil street boys we have in the uk saying they always need to be "strapped up" (carry a knife). Its just fuel to the fire.

@Tahirah Guns are not the problem, bad people using them in a bad way are the problem. You don’t blame the car for a drunk driver you blame the drunk driver for getting in the car. Simple as that, I’ve lived in both the suburbs and as a kid I lived in the inner city. Neither have felt “safe” enough to not want to protect myself. “Way too damn free and entitled” it’s almost as if that’s literally in our constitution but if you’re so mad about us wanting to be able to protect ourselves I think that says a lot more about you than me.

@Monica how can you say that guns aren’t the problem when other countries don’t have guns and don’t have school shootings?

@Lisa https://www.npr.org/2022/05/25/1101269886/the-onion-mass-shooting-satire the number has increased to the headline being republished 34 times since it was first published in 2014…

“‘No way to prevent this’ says only nation where this regularly happens” has been republished; 37 times since 2014… in a non-satirical way at this point. I do not understand why right to bear arms is more important than actively protecting children’s lives.

I think in this situation shouls really be up to the teacher. Realistically during a shooting there isn't much a teacher can do to save all the students anyway. The teacher shouldn't be responsible for the students in this case imo, they probably have a family and kids of their own so why should they risk their life for other kids?

As a teacher we’ve never told our kids to run we taught them to put whatever they could in front of that door and hide away from the door

I was a kindergarten teacher! At my school our procedure was to basically do whatever we thought was best. So we could have the kids run out of the building if needed. We practiced it too. But anyways. I would do my best to save and protect as many kids as I can. But I have children and a family too. I will not die for them. I am a teacher not a soldier. Dying to protect someone is not in my job description

The teacher will go where they feel safe! Parents please do not expect your teacher to lay down their life for your child. There are probably many that will out of the kindness of their heart but we should not expect this out of educators. Evil people will always exist even if you put policies in place to prevent shootings. Be apart of your children’s life’s and encourage them to participate in community events to instill empathy towards others. Church is a great option. Please educate yourself on gun safety. TELL YOUR KIDS about gun safety. Tell them about what they should do during an emergency. I know for a fact my child will be instructed to get out of building regardless of policy because the adult that is watching over them might be a coward (which is understandable) but also more likely. Also please don’t let your kids go to school with clothes or jewelry that easily catches the light in the dark in case they need to hide from an attacker.

@Lisa I will say it again, guns don’t kill people, people kill people. The same way a car doesn’t drive itself and crash, a person does that. How much more do I have to dumb it down for y’all

We DONT need guns period we DONT need them!!! An deranged human being is deadlier with it then without it. Period. Period. PERIOD.

And furthermore, GUNS ARE NOT PRO LIFE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

@Monica it’s always so funny how people try to use that argument to defend guns. A car’s purpose is transportation. Yes, people die in car accidents but the purpose of a car is NOT to kill people. The purpose of guns is to harm something. There’s no way around it. Obviously bad people are going to do bad things but acting like cars are equivalent to guns is ridiculous. It’s as insane an argument as people saying if someone killed someone with a pencil we wouldn’t be banning pencils. Well no, the pencil wasn’t used for its original purpose. The gun on the other hand? Yes, it was used to hurt people which is one of its intended purposes.

@Patience but this could be a scenario anywhere in the world?

@Patience I live in the UK and a madman with a gun could break in to my house but the odds of that happening are so incredibly incredibly low that me having a lethal weapon in my home is by far more dangerous.

@Patience wouldn’t making it incredibly difficult for people to buy and own guns be a start? I mean it worked in this country, we had one school shooting and we tightened the rules up and now we don’t have guns. So saying the ‘bad guys’ will still have guns doesn’t hold up very much because ‘bad guys’ incredibly rarely have guns here.

Im so tired of people ignorantly claiming it’s not a gun problem when it couldn’t be more obviously a gun problem

@Patience how about this scenerio, why do we need bump clips, why do we need the ability to turn it into an AR-15? I really would love to hear a scenario where someone was defending themselves but all I hear is people murdering people. So you can't change my mind.

@Meeka I don’t really care what you think. At the end of the day evil people exist in this world it will never be rainbows and lollipops y’all are living in a fantasy world with that mindset. So long as there are evil people in the world, I and many others will do what is necessary to protect our children. Goodbye

I’m really sad to be reading this kind of a poll on here because as a parent you should not have to be thinking about ways for your child to get out of school alive, adapting their clothing so that they can’t be noticed by a shooter, etc etc.