Protect Our Children, Support Our Teachers
Written by Dr. Sarah Johnson
At Teaching Lab, our mission is to fundamentally shift the paradigm of teacher professional learning for educational equity, and we envision a world where teachers and students thrive together in communities that enable lifelong learning and meaningful lives.
Nothing contradicts this mission more than what has happened yet again – this time a horrific school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. Our hearts are shattered for the families of the 19 young students who lost their lives in yet another senseless shooting, and we grieve deeply for the family and loved ones of the beloved teachers who died trying to protect the children. These tragic losses of life are being mourned by all of us.
Help Lead The Movement
Robb Elementary marked the 30th school shooting in 2022. Students cannot thrive in an environment in which they must fear for their lives. Where students once had fire drills, they now endure live shooter drills. Yet according to Everytown Research & Policy, active shooter drills in schools are associated with increases in depression (39%), stress and anxiety (42%), and physiological health problems (23%) overall, including in children from as young as five years old up to high schoolers, their parents, and teachers.
Concerns over death increased by 22 percent, with words like blood, pain, clinics, and pills becoming a consistent feature of social media posts in school communities in the 90 days after a school drill. School administrators are only being proactive in trying to prepare for the worst, but are we truly so jaded that we accept school shootings practically as if they are acceptable, inevitable, even routine?
Why do we accept the grim fact that firearm deaths have become a fixture in American life? There were 1.5 million of them between 1968 and 2017 – and this means that more people lost their lives to gun violence in this country than soldiers were killed in every US conflict since 1775. In 2020 alone, more than 45,000 Americans died at the end of a barrel of a gun, whether by homicide or suicide; this represents a 25% increase from five years prior, and a 43% increase from 2010. In our country, we have a rate of 120.5 firearms per 100 residents, up from 88 per 100 in 2011; this far surpasses that of other countries around the world.
Let’s give our students a fighting chance in their young lives to grow up and realize their potential. Let’s give our teachers the opportunity to focus on teaching and supporting their students instead of needing to put them through stressful active shooter drills. Let’s decide that we care more about our children and our teachers – living, loving human beings who represent the future of our world and are deserving of a bright future.
How can we get to educational equity when the very sanctity of the school is being eroded? Moments of silence won’t fix this; standing up for and supporting our children and valued teachers must become the movement we are all willing to get in good trouble for. If this country really appreciates teachers, it must actualize the change that is needed. It really is as simple as this: classrooms shouldn’t be crime scenes.
Teaching Lab joins educators, organizations, and associations that are committed to ending gun violence in our nation’s public schools and communities. As a country, we owe children and educators our support and commitment to making schools safe and ensuring schools exist as they were intended: to be places where students learn, grow, and dream without fear of their lives being shattered by a school shooting.
How can you help end gun violence? Here are a few ideas:
Support gun violence research by donating to organizations like to Everytown.
Demand the implementation of Universal Background Checks and the ban of assault weapons to your elected official.
Get involved with school violence prevention programs like the Sandy Hook Promise.
Dr. Sarah Johnson is the CEO of Teaching Lab and was a high school science teacher and founder of a social justice student leadership program in Washington, DC and Oakland, CA. She has a Doctorate in Education Leadership from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, an M.A.T. from American University, and graduated summa cum laude with a B.S. in Neuroscience from Emory University.
