Security of Schools, VA Tech Massacre

[Johnboy976]

Undeniably the Virginia Tech shooting is a horrendous event. The worst in recent US history, as is concerned with shootings. What has me concerned is what is the safety level of Tulsa schools and colleges? Have they got something in place that would alert students a HECK of a lot better that VT?

[Johnboy976]

Here is some news from KOTV:

http://www.kotv.com/news/topstory/?id=125224

[Porky]

When someone this wacko goes on a killing spree there is no stopping them. We are all regulated enough as it is.  

What worries me is if the gun control people are going to start resurfacing again.

[deinstein]

We are fine. I'm a college student here in Tulsa, and please don't make my school an airport.

[tulsa1603]

quote:Originally posted by Johnboy976

Undeniably the Virginia Tech shooting is a horrendous event. The worst in recent US history, as is concerned with shootings. What has me concerned is what is the safety level of Tulsa schools and colleges? Have they got something in place that would alert students a HECK of a lot better that VT?

this is a very tragic story, but the way I see it, a college campus is a lot like a city.  26,000 students is a lot of people to notify and NOT cause pandemonium.  If there was a shooting in a city of 26,000, I don't think that everyone would expect to be notified immediately.  I think as tragic as it is, the powers that be probably handled it pretty well.  No one could predict this.  I thought that OU's announcement that they would start locking dormitories 24 hours a day seemed a little bit like overreacting.  What if another Whitman came to OU and started shooting people outside then they couldn't get in the building to be safe?  I'm sure this is all going to be argued to death in the coming months.

[Cubs]

quote: What worries me is if the gun control people are going to start resurfacing again.

Amen

[cannon_fodder]

1) Virginia Tech is about the same size as Owasso on any given school day.  There are more than 30,000 people that come and go from that campus each day.  What's more, it is spread over 2,600 acres.  

I am already tired of hearing the talking heads question why campus wasn't locked down after the first shootings.  If there is a murder in Owasso do they shut down the entire city and tell everyone to panic?  In my undergrad University of 16,000 or even at U of Tulsa at 5,000; there could be a murder on one end of campus and it would have no effect on other parts of the campus.  These are small cities.

Ordering a lock down of the entire campus or canceling classes because of the first double homicide would be a great way to make your college look like an ultra violent place while hindering the education process and making students feel like they are living in a big brother state.  In the end, it would have prevented nothing as the shooter was bent on a rampage and would simply have sought out the lock down congregations and murdered them.

Security on a scale this large would require draconian measures only seen at airports and in the Green Zone.  Certainly that would not foster the open college learning experience so boldly touted by Universities.  

2) Our brethren in Europe are already calling us antiquated barbarians that distort our own constitution to foster a violent society.  Furthermore, one paper in Italy actually wrote that the massacre was motivated by the fact that the world views America negatively in recent years.  As Europe hands more and more freedom to their governments for the perception of security I'd like to point out their subways are still getting bombed, their schools have suffered more shootings than ours, and their radical movements are still profound.  

I love it when people point fingers.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,477686,00.html

3) Gun control.  Some sick bastard went on a shooting spree with semi-automatic pistols.  Surely a renewed call will go out to ban assault rifles and mean looking firearms (the lobbyists set out to ban the most mean looking firearms with no concern for which ones are actually used by criminals nor their potential for such use).

Guns have been banned in Germany and Australia for years - with no effect on violent crime (with Germany marking increases in school shootings).  The United States saw no marked decline in violence during the assault weapons ban nor with increased registration under the Brady bill.  It is illegal to own or possess firearms in Iraq - but for some reason there is still gun violence there too.

Lets pretend we took all the guns away.  Unfortunately a person could go to Walgreen's and buy ingredients off the shelf to make a backpack into a huge bomb.  A stop by Lowe's for some nails and a walk into a cafeteria and we have the same result.  Lets ban everything that can be made into a bomb (cleaning supplies, health supplements, petroleum products, lp or propane, fertilizer, welding supplies, ad nauseum) and hope he doesnt just poison the food in a cafeteria or set pizza's out in the student union.

A person with a death wish has always and will always be able to reek havoc on a free society.  Ours is indeed a violent society born of a revolution and frontier life.  It doesnt appear that society has any real interest in changing, so lets let the lip service pass and mourn the dead and then move on with our lives.

[guido911]

Has anyone blamed Vision 2025, Lottery, or Indian compacts for this tragedy yet?

[DM]

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder

1)I am already tired of hearing the talking heads question why campus wasn't locked down after the first shootings.  If there is a murder in Owasso do they shut down the entire city and tell everyone to panic?  

My only issue with the whole lock down thing is that the murderer was still on the loose and with a murder that just happened on school grounds. They should have had additional officers trying to locate this guy. Whenever a person with a gun is near a school here in Tulsa, I have noticed they lock down the school. Classes are still going on, but no one can get in the school. Maybe they VA Tech staff were in the middle of locking down certain areas and maybe they did have additional officers on the campus looking for this guy. Only time will tell what was going on during the 2 hours between the shootings. I personally am very interested to know what was going on during this time. But just like 9/11, we can never fully prevent crimes like this or plan for these things. We can only learn from these things and try to develop ways to stop it from happening again.

Jenks has a security system in place where with the click of a button the doors all magnetically lock. Union is working on installing the same type of system. This will not prevent a shooting, but it may help to save lives.

No, I don't think we should turn our schools into an airport type security. But when a murder or shooting has just taken place on any campus or near a campus, the staff should be notified and teachers should be able to go over to the doors and use the dead bolt on the door.

I will end my post on this note. Just like 9/11 and other horrific incidents that have happened in this country, normal everyday people that are caught in these situations are the ones that have helped to curb additional lives lost. Flight 93 saved countless lives. Those people at VA Tech that held the door while the gunman was shooting at the door preventing him from going back into the classroom saved many more lives from being lost. Last year (I think) a man was on the TU campus with a gun and students and faculty tackled him to the ground before anyone was shot.  What would you do in that situation? Hopefully none of us will every be in that situation, but we should also be prepared ourselves. Not paranoid. Prepared.

[cannon_fodder]

DM:  area schools have a campus of maybe 50 acres and up 2,000 students all under the care of a guardian.  VT has 30,000 students all over the age of majority and spread over 4 square miles.  It is more like a city than a school.

A lock down at a Jenks school is not comparable to a lock down at a major university.  The University is larger than twice the entire population of that city. I am of the opinion that the situation was handled appropriately.  They had no indication that further eminent danger persisted on campus and acted accordingly.

[DM]

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder

DM:  area schools have a campus of maybe 50 acres and up 2,000 students all under the care of a guardian.  VT has 30,000 students all over the age of majority and spread over 4 square miles.  It is more like a city than a school.

A lock down at a Jenks school is not comparable to a lock down at a major university.  The University is larger than twice the entire population of that city. I am of the opinion that the situation was handled appropriately.  They had no indication that further eminent danger persisted on campus and acted accordingly.

While I understand that it is a large school, I think that is even more of a case in this post-9/11 and Columbine world that they have a lockdown procedure in place. Maybe they don't. 2 hours is a long time and I am waiting to hear what was done in that 2 hours. Like I said before, this is a situation that we may not have been able to plan for. But we can certainly learn from this and make schools safer for the next time. Those 2 hours will be critical to finding out what could have been done.

[RLitterell]

quote:Originally posted by deinstein

We are fine. I'm a college student here in Tulsa, and please don't make my school an airport.

Awesome response!!!!!

[Conan71]

Lock-downs, gun-control, feel-good videos to help us identify loners and treat them with respect so they don't slaughter 30+ people is no deterrent.  Even if college campuses had lock-down policies, then the next big slaughter will happen in a movie theater, Wal-Mart or shopping mall.  People bent on taking out their rage will find a way and a place to carry it out.

As long as the media glorifies shootings like this with their media-van circus and non-stop coverage, it appeals to loner nut-jobs to make a pathetic final statement.

[iplaw]

Someone made a good point on the radio today.  Even if the rest of the school was locked down, he still would have been able to get into his OWN dorm and kill people...the classrooms were just unfortunate targets.

[cannon_fodder]

Great point IP.

Not to mention, as the University President said, they had to decide where to lock down all the commuters.  It probably would have been the basketball arena.  Which anyone that said they were a commuter could get into and have 10,000 readily available targets.  Then again, on an unarmed campus - where can a man with a gun go?  Anywhere he pleases.

I'm already finding the media trying to figure out "who is to blame."  Is it the school for failing to lock down?  The gun lobby?  George Bush?  Or society as a whole?  I have yet to hear a media outlet say this was a social reject that felt slighted by the world because of his own mental instability and in calculated and carefully planned attack decided to take his revenge because he was one sick and wicked man.

Some idiot South Korean VT student is to blame first and foremost.  Everything else is just speculation, possibilities, and BS.  At least he shot himself to save Virginia a a few thousand volts of electricity.