Keeping City Schools Safe

In the wake of the devastation at Sandy Hook Elementary School, city schools are making sure that another disaster will be avoided.

All public schools in New York State, including New York City, already regularly practice lockdown drills, as well as evacuations and “shelter-ins,” where school exits are secured but students remain in class as normal.

Detailed floor plans of school buildings and emergency contact information of every student, staff and faculty are also on file, all of them kept strictly confidential. In addition, each principal has “emergency response plans” on file.

Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott, United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew and Council of School Supervisors and Administrators’ President Ernest Logan assured parents that the three agencies were working together along with teachers and staff to “make sure that our schools are safe and that staff and students have the support they need to move forward following this tragic event.”

Parents were referred to information on the Department of Education’s website that offers tips of how to help children deal with stressful situations.

“Especially in the days ahead, please be sure to take care of yourself, and be watchful for signs of stress, fear, or anxiety in your students,” said Walcott, Mulgrew and Logan in a statement. “As necessary, please alert the mental health professionals in your school who can assist those in need.”

Laurie Windsor, president of Community Education Council District 20, admitted that the events in Newtown were “every parent’s worst nightmare,” but said that she was “not nervous” about a mass shooting taking place in city schools.

“There are security agents at [every] door and safety is always a number one [priority],” explained Windsor, whose own children attend city public schools. “Our schools have safety committees that meet throughout the year, with safely plans in place. I am not worried at all.”

But the National Rifle Association (NRA), who kept quiet for a week after the shooting, announced on December 21 that the way to prevent another incident is to keep armed officers in every school.

City schools do have a “safety agent” at each entrance and visitors are required to show identification and sign in, but the agents do not have weapons.

NRA President Wayne LaPierre blamed the recent rash of mass shootings on violent video games and slasher flicks.

“In a race to the bottom, media conglomerates compete with one another to shock, violate and offend every standard of civilized society by bringing an ever-more-toxic mix of reckless behavior and criminal cruelty into our homes — every minute of every day of every month of every year,” he said. “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. Would you rather have your 911 call bring a good guy with a gun from a mile away … or a minute away?”

Local elected officials and Mayor Michael Bloomberg blasted the remarks.

“Instead of offering solutions to a problem they have helped create, they offered a paranoid, dystopian vision of a more dangerous and violent America where everyone is armed and no place is safe,” Bloomberg said of LaPierre’s remarks. “Leadership is about taking responsibility, especially in times of crisis. Today the NRA’s lobbyists blamed everyone but themselves for the crisis of gun violence.

Public Advocate Bill de Blasio called the NRA’s stance a “complete disgrace. Only the NRA would have the audacity to claim the solution to horrific school violence is to put more guns in our schools.”

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn agreed, calling the remarks “stupid, asinine, insensitive [and] ridiculous.”

Multiple members of the State Assembly and City Council are already in talks to pass legislation that limits access to both semi-automatic assault weapons and high capacity ammunition clips, in addition to legislation that would require weapons to be microstamped, making the weapon and fired bullets easily traceable.