“Death is a billion-dollar business.
They can’t even
pass a law where it takes seven days
to get a gun.
Why don’t you have to go through the
same screening?
you do to get a driver’s license.
It’s totally insane.”
~Jon Cusack, American actor, producer, screenwriter
After I wrote my first book on the shooting at the
Appalachian School of Law, it was common for parents to thank me, but also to
say the subject matter was so disturbing they could not read what I had
written. They would usually then encourage me to keep working for campus
safety. Most said they had children in university or about ready to enter; the
subject was just too terrifying for them to even think about. But they are
exactly the people who need to be the most concerned; they are the people with
the most at stake—the safety and lives of their children.
No matter how painful the subject of school
shootings and school safety is, all parents must think about it and think what
they can do to protect their most valuable legacies, their daughters and sons.
While we will never completely eliminate school shootings, a great deal can be
done to dramatically reduce the number of these shootings and to make them a
very rare occurrence. Parents can play a key role in this effort.
In upcoming posts I will be addressing a number of
subjects dealing with what parents can do to help ensure the safety of their
children:
1.
Questions
parents need to ask of schools;
2.
Examples of
schools where good policies are in place;
3.
Accountability—do
states hold school officials (including holding school presidents accountable
for incompetence resulting in death and injuries to others); and
4.
Do parents
really want to send their children to a school in a state (such as Virginia)
that pays school presidents over $800,000 a year, guarantees a retired state
school president $100,000 in salary just to teach one course—but if their child
is killed, limits the amount a private citizen can sue a school for to
$100,000?
(To be continued)
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