According to Richard, school shooting is a common phenomenon in American schools, especially in high school and colleges (2008). The shooting culprits are often students or criminals who have an agenda they want to express, to the government or school administrations. These shootings result to deaths of several individuals including students, and the long-term aftermath events that happen to those attacked is often massive, including depression and post-traumatic stress (Responding to Crisis, 2008). These shootings often happen abruptly. Thus, it is pertinent for the school safety committee to come up with a practical plan that is effective against these menace.
Several crisis intervention plans have been developed and proposed to be used in schools to handle emergency crises in schools and other social institutions. The acceptance rates of these plans have increased over time, as people learn and accept that terrorist or shooting attempts can happen anywhere and anytime (Richard, 2008). Several crisis intervention plans have six components: urgency' control, assessment disposition, referral, and follow-up. Each of these components is useful in ensuring that the situation is well managed, and all the cases are well taken care of, hence, reducing the possibility of leaving gaps behind. The planning committee should factor in these components when developing an intervention plan for schools and other institutions. According to Richard, the plans should be friendly to the user, accessible and familiar to all individuals in the school setting (2008). It should be an integral part of the school setting, and specific to a school tailored to meet all the needs of the individuals in that school in case of crisis.
A sample crisis intervention plan that can be applied in the event of an emergency is as follows:
First, the police department will be contacted immediately; to inform them of the shootout that is taking place in the school. The principle will give out the location, the exact time it started, and the appearance of the suspects in the crime scene. After contacting the police, a simple plan will be drafted as follows
Defining the scope: The plan to be developed should have goals and objectives that would ensure there are few casualties, and the recovery period is accelerated. The scope of our plan is to minimize the number of victims during the shooting, care for the injured, counseling the victims and to prevent future occurrence (Responding to Crisis, 2008). It might also include an effective communication strategy for the media, stakeholders, and parents. Our scope, in this case, is to find out the cause of the shooting in the school, come up with communication plan for media and the parents and to ensure that the shooting is stopped before casualties increase.
Assigning responsibilities- if the intervention plan has to work, all the parties including the principal, teachers, support staff, and students have to be assigned tasks and responsibilities. A coordinator should also be appointed to ensure that reports are only given to one key person who can be able to disseminate it to other members (Richard, 2008). In our case, the principal becomes the coordinator; the subordinate staff would help in the evacuation of students to safety, and the student leaders would assist in assembling and finding out the number of students present after they have been evacuated. The librarian would help in recording of student details and teachers would help in drafting a communication plan. The school counselor would help in giving guidance to the students and consulting them, as the team investigates the cause of the shooting (Responding to Crisis, 2008).
Designing an evacuation plan- the plan gives a full description on how the students will be brought to safety and their identifications noted including contacts to their parents and guardians. It also entails calming the students and directing them to a safety site where they will be safe from shootings in the compound. The librarian and the school caretaker will help the students settle, and a counselor will be assigned to calm the students down. Meanwhile, the teachers will be setting out a communication plan for the parents and media. The principal will help coordinate the activities as all the persons assigned tasks will report to the principal.
Presenting the communication plan- once the communication plan is ready, the principal will address the parents and the media using a microphone, this will be essential not only to calm them down but also to ask them to seek for safety away from the school premises. The communication plan will ensure that it captures all the details of the attack so that it can be presented to the media. The students will also be asked to provide any information that could lead to the source of the shootout. Information will also be collected from teaching and non-teaching staff then compiled and report drafted to be presented to the media (Responding to Crisis, 2008). In addition, the exact number of casualties will be confirmed for it to be included in the final report. Official briefing on the event will take place once an official report is released. Meanwhile, media can be allowed to cover the event as it happens, to raise awareness for the neighboring schools and the public on what is going on.
Recovery efforts: to take care of the casualties, ambulances will be called immediately to rush the injured to the hospital. Before the arrival of ambulances, First aid will be performed to casualties with the help of the school nurse and students trained in First Aid to ensure that the casualties are relieved from pain and blood loss. Referral systems will be developed to ensure that the casualties are taken to health facilities that can be traced back to the school. The principal will help in the establishment of these referral systems (Responding to Crisis, 2008). The school counselor will assist the students and give guidance on how to keep up with stressful situations such as shootings. Teachers will also assist the students to recover from the situation through counseling sessions before the culprits are captured and shootings stopped. The parents and media people will still be asked to stay out of the crime scene via social media, with the help of student leaders, and information technologist
Follow up on the shooting will be done, immediately the police and the ambulances arrive. The students, media, and parents will be informed on what is going on as rescue efforts continue. After the shooting is over and there is calm, another roll call will be taken to find out if all students are present, and check out for the missing individuals. The police will help with efforts to search the casualties to ensure that all the students and staff are found. As casualties are rushed to the hospital, continuous monitoring will be done on students to avoid a relapse of panic.
Ongoing sensitization, and development of an effective plan- once everything is under control, students will be released to meet their parents. In addition, friends and relatives of the casualties will be referred to the hospital to meet their children and relatives there (Responding to Crisis, 2008). Official communication will be released to the media and the parents. The principle will organize the staff to help in clearing the mess once the police investigations are finished. The school management will later hold meetings to develop an effective crisis intervention plan that will be effective in the case of similar attacks occur. Improvement of the various intervention plans will also be adopted to ensure that the school is ready if any emergency occurs. The developed should be shared with students and school staff to ensure that they are well prepared.
References
James, Richard K. (2008). Crisis Intervention Strategies (6thEdition).Brooks/Cole.
http://www.nelsonbrain.com/content/james00269_0495100269_02.01_chapter01.pdf
Responding to Crisis at a School, (2008) (6th ed., pp. 15,23,33,40,54). Los Angeles. Retrieved from http://smhp.psych.ucla.edu/pdfdocs/crisis/crisis.pdf
