While emergency drills may help schools feel safer, they contain underlying and often unintended moral messages about the nature of school and life itself.
America’s gun violence debate is at a fever pitch – but it’s part of a much deeper cultural reckoning.
A Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School student speaks during a rally with Thurgood Marshall Academy students in advance of Saturday’s March for Our Lives event in Washington
REUTERS/Eric Thayer
Student activists marching Saturday want Congress to enact comprehensive gun control. Here is a selection of stories from our archive that will help you understand the issues raised by the students.
Thousands of high school students across the US walked out of their schools to protest gun violence and to call for changes to gun laws.
EPA/Tannen Maury
Bronwyn E Wood, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington and Nick Munn, University of Waikato
Lowering the voting age to 16 would bring the age of political responsibility more in line with the age of criminal responsibility and the age of informed consent for medical procedures.
Police in front of Great Mills High School, the scene of a shooting on March 20, 2018, in Great Mills, Md.
Alex Brandon/AP
The debate over using school resource officers to prevent school shootings got a fresh airing, after an officer stopped a gunman at a Maryland high school. One researcher says training is key.
Students rally outside the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, on March 14, 2018 to protest gun violence.
Andrew Harnik/AP
In order to prevent school shootings, schools must use threat assessments like the ones that law enforcement uses to protect public figures, a leading expert on school safety argues on Capitol Hill.
The Trump administration aims to revisit school discipline policies.
Roman Bodnarchuk/Shutterstock
Despite the failure of zero tolerance discipline policies in schools, the Trump administration is targeting an Obama-era memo that sought to limit such policies.
Students from South Plantation High School, carrying placards, protest in support of gun control.
Carlos Garcia/Reuters
When students walked out of school to protest what they see as lax gun laws, some risked punishment from their schools. But it may be worth it to send a message, a First Amendment scholar argues.
Nikolas Cruz, who was charged with 17 counts of murder in the Parkland school shooting, in February 2018.
AP Photo/Mike Stocker
Florida does not have a ‘red flag’ law that would have let police seize Nikolas Cruz’s guns before he killed. But there are actions law enforcement could have taken to address his murderous impulses.
Protesters at the Vermont Statehouse on Feb. 20, 2018.
AP/Wilson Ring
The search for a direct causal connection from public opinion to specific policies, including gun control, may be like hunting for the holy grail. Many factors influence how legislation gets passed.
Nearly half of all teachers report experiencing a lot of daily stress.
AlenKadr/Shutterstock
Nearly half of all teachers report having high levels of daily stress. Research shows that when teachers are stressed out, it can negatively affect students and schools.
The U.S. Secret Service released a study of school shootings in 2002.
David Stuart Productions/Shutterstock.com
As the nation searches for ways to prevent the next school shooting, one scholar says answers can be found in a forgotten study the Secret Service did after the Columbine massacre.
Research shows that carrying a gun for self-defense comes with a host of risks.
Shutterstock.com
While President Donald Trump suggests arming teachers would be a good way to stop school shootings, research shows that carrying firearms comes with a host of troublesome risks.
Students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School visiting the Florida Legislature on Feb. 21, 2018, to discuss gun control and mental illness.
AP Photo/Gerald Strong
When mass shootings occur, some people insist the focus should be on mental illness, not gun control. A psychiatrist explains how that view misses the mark.
Samuel Zeif, an 18-year-old senior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., cries after speaking during a listening session with President Donald Trump in Washington on Feb. 21, 2018.
(AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
What are we to make of a society in which young children have a greater sense of moral courage and social responsibility than the zombie adults who make the laws that fail to protect them?
Late actor and former National Rifle Association President Charlton Heston held a rifle aloft at a 2002 get-out-the-vote rally.
AP Photo/Jim Cole
The group, founded in 1871, didn’t try to smother virtually all gun control efforts until the mid-1970s.
US President Donald Trump talks to high school students about safety on campus following the shooting deaths of 17 people at a Florida school.
Reuters/Jonathan Ernst
Research is the foundation for evidence-based policies. But because of funding prohibitions, there’s little US research to inform the contentious debate around gun violence and gun control.
Media portrayals of mass murderers may do more harm than good.
Atstock Productions/Shutterstock.com