Jeremy Didn't Speak at Ferrum Today.....

As you all know, I have accepted a position at Ferrum College in Virginia. A nice quite place where it seems that not much happens. Well, until I saw the news today.

Below are exerpts from a FoxNews Article (http://www.foxnews.com/).

Ferrum College canceled classes and went on lockdown Tuesday as police searched for a man who was seen with a handgun on campus, officials said.
College President Jennifer Braaten activated an alert system and ordered the lockdown after a member of the housekeeping staff reported seeing a young man walk into a residence hall about 7:30 a.m. with the handgun, Franklin County Sheriff Ewell Hunt said at a news conference.

"Basically, he told the housekeeper not to say anything about it and he continued on," Hunt said.

Authorities had searched approximately half the campus, he said.
There have been no reports of threats and no one on campus had been harmed, Hunt said.
Hunt told The Roanoke Times that police questioned two people as persons of interest. A nearby elementary school also was locked down.

"No one has been hurt, no one is in a panic mode," Braaten said at the news conference.
State police sent troopers to the campus, as well as officers from Franklin, Patrick and Henry counties, school spokeswoman Natalie Faunce said.

More than 900 of the school's 1,200 students live on campus, and Braaten said they were being sent to a central location.

"The students are OK," Faunce said.

The private school affiliated with the United Methodist Church is in a rural setting 35 miles south of Roanoke.

Faunce said the lockdown was a precaution.

"Ever since Virginia Tech, we can't be careful enough," she said. "That's where we are."

***********************************************

Now as some of your may or may not know, Ferrum is not too far from Virginia Tech (about an hour I think). I think that there response was admirable and appropriate to keep their students safe, and feel proud I am going to a school with such a good system in place.

***

What made me a bit thoughtful was the fact that I was having to inspect the campus security measures at any University to feel safe. The events that happened at Virginia Tech and other schools (More recently in Illinois) really have changed how we are able to look at safety on college campuses. as well as any other areas where there are large quantities of people that weapons are not allowed. I learned recently that if you have a concealed carry permit in Utah that it is in fact legal for you to carry weapons on school campuses, as long as they are not private. Thus, the University of Utah you can carry a weapon with the correct permits, at Brigham Young University you cannot. Ferrum, as a private school, has the ability to make their own rules regarding this aside from other state institutions.

***

Now, I am not trying to start a debate, but I think that the world we live in has changed massively since people my age were children, and since my parents went to College. Ever since 9/11 we have had to change security measures that are taken at every airport and bus terminal, and are much more vigilant about what goes on around us. Some people advocate basically everyone packing a weapon. I do not think that this is the answer. Is the answer increased security? We all know that at larger institutions the cost of having armed security guards in every classroom would be far too much. Even in every building. Same thing with smaller schools. The next option is allowing those who are trained properly with permits to carry weapons on campuses. As these people are few and far between in many states I am not sure that this is the answer to anything either. I do not know who these people are, and even if they are able to obtain a permit if I would feel comfortable with them in my classroom with a weapon. Have they had a mental health background check, are they prone to angry outburts, etc? We do knot know if they are trustworthy with good intentions. I would like to know why they believe that they are competant to carry a weapon, and why they would like to. All this information is not accessible to the general public. There are too many variables to be SURE of anything. As an experimental psychologist I do not like having this much variance unaccounted for.

***

Looking at the shooting that occured at the Trolley Square Mall in Salt Lake City we know that the shooter was stopped by an off duty police officer. His ability to stop this person before they could harm others had mainly to do with being in the right place at the right time. Could the gunman at VA Tech been stopped if someone there had a weapon. Possibly. We will never know. The "what if's?" that come from these types of situations never seem to lead to concrete answers of how we can protect ourselves against people who want to harm us, or have lost their mental capacity to make rational decisions. Sadly, I think that I have come to the conclusion that no matter what type of precautions we take that there will always be people that are going to be able to work around these systems.

***

Psychology has worked to try to profile the people that are likely to commit these types of attacks. Most feel that they have been ostracized, have failed, have been rejected by their peers, and so forth. Some have a history of mild to severe mental illness - then again so do a lot of people. Early intervention programs for children who are likely to be "rejected" by their peers are being advocated. I think that these are good, as the children do in fact need this intervention. Does it really help to stop our problem? It may stop a few that would have done something in the future, but we all know that you cannot be successful with every intervention. It will take years before we are able to fully research the profiles of shooters to understand much about them, if anything that would be useful to prevention.

***

My only conclusions are that there is not much more that we CAN do to isolate ourselves from possible harm from people who want to do it. I also believe that the more we try to protect ourselves we are limiting how we live our lives. The freedoms we have in the United States are much different from other countries. We do not see the defense of our nation on a day to day basis. The more changes that are made, the more likely we are to become a country with less freedoms and a lack of feeling safe at home, at work, or at school. Again, I do not believe I have any answers, but thought I would share my thoughts. Any comments are more than welcome.

***

UPDATE

I guess that some of the information that I was given was wrong, and the man with the gun was never found. The school decided to let students go home early for Spring Break (which would have started this weekend) and cancelled classes for the rest of the week. From what the news stories are saying it sounds like there was a man in the dorm either looking for someone with a weapon out, or at least wandering around doing the same. No good. They have a picture they have released, and hopefully he is found soon. Again, I think that what the school has been able to do will help things immensly. Many of the students are from the relatively immediate area and will be able to go home and spend time with their families. That is something I am sure that they will all need after this scare, and hopefully when they return on March 10 all will be well in Virginia.

***

Unfortunately, there have been two other similar incidents since this one. They seem to be growing in number exponentially. I am not sure how much is media attention, and how much is just an increase in violence - we are a very violent society despite our amazing attempts at civilized living. Many people want to confine this to certain areas or groups, but the truth is that violence is everywhere, be it domestic or gang related. We see it on television constantly, in video games, play fighting between children, and even shootings now in elementary schools. The new question is how does one shelter their children from this...or even should you shelter them if you could? Wanting to have children in the near future (next five or so years) it scares me to be a parent. I would not say that it was easier for our parents, but the things that we will be faced with are almost unimaginable. If things keep changing at the rate they have I guess we can only rely on our own faith and judgment that all will be ok in the end. Still, quite scary.