Living with fear: Readers react to school killings

I'm really scared to go to school now. I feel like any minute I'm going to be shot. I'm a girl so I feel that if I do experience a school shooting I will be one of the top victims. I have trouble sleeping sometimes and get all cold and shaky inside. I told someone but they just said that nothing like that will ever happen in my school. Should I believe them? I'm so scared!
— Esther

As much as we would like to prevent these hideous crimes, there is really no way to control enraged, and deranged individuals who do not have respect for themselves, life or others. In a rural town such as Lancaster County, there is no logical reason for metal detectors, security personnel, etc., for a one-room school house. Society needs to reach these type of people at younger ages when such grievous offenses have permanently hurt them ... in order to not have them lash out years later for unresolved offenses that build up in a person like a time bomb. It is the same mind set as terrorists. Revenge! For what? God only knows! That's why we keep fighting to stop it.
— Joseph Serao, Manalapan, N.J.

Listening to the events in the U.S.A., I do not feel safe sending kids to school anymore. Besides bullies, drugs, sex offenders and just mean teachers or students, (school) is not a safe haven anymore for kids just being kids.
— Silvia Taft, Barstow, Calif.

Unfortunately this is no different than the terrorists who made their way into the United States. [We need] true convictions that it takes both school officials and parents to monitor [children] daily and to get away from the belief it is someone else's problem to solve. I have a 13-year-old daughter and it sickens me to think of the mentally deranged individuals in this "land of the free." But, to crawl in a hole and break away from society can be much more damaging for everyone. Prayer is the ultimate answer to all. God be with the families.
— L. Hopkins, Wentzville, Mont.

Actually, I have a suggestion. We take great pains to guard our banks, even providing a "panic button" in the event of a hold-up. I question why we do not afford similar protection to our children. I suggest a similar "panic button" be established in schools which would alert police to such an incident. Such would shorten response time and would have the potential of lessening the loss of life.
— Pat, Reading, Pa.

I am a teacher and just e-mailed my superintendent last night about the lack of security in our school. Even though no doors are locked during the day and anyone can enter, he responded by telling me that he felt we were "one of the safest schools". After 2 e-mails to him letting him know that my own family members have entered the building on numerous occasions and came to my classroom "unnoticed", he agreed to lock some of the doors. It is incredible to be that our "school leaders" still have the mentality that "it cannot happen here."
— Anonymous

I think they are all copycat crimes. I was 13 when Columbine happened and that scared me to death. For weeks and days after my suburban school clamped down on everything. Over the years the fear subsided. I am now a senior in college and reading this story makes me sick. How can anyone do this to innocent people and take their lives? If I was a mother I would have no qualms about sending my children to school, your risks go up every day when you leave the house and that includes going to school. I am saddened by this recent shooting spree on schools, but what can one do?
— Katie, Purchase, N.Y.

In 1974 the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" was removed from school walls all over the country. The Bible teaches "be angry and sin not." This angry man needed God's teachings as we all do to guide us through life outside the garden of Eden. Only in submitting to higher teachings and ideals that protect good can such terrible tragedies be avoided. The last 30-plus years testify to the demise we all too often see around us. Without acknowledging and seeking to uphold God's law, such horrendous acts and worse will continue to increase.
— Amy Jensen, Auburn, Ala.

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