For a parent there is nothing more important than the safety of their children. You think about it constantly from the day they are born. Historically, parents have viewed schools as safe havens. Columbine and other incidents of school violence raise deep concerns for many parents and leave them with yet another knot in their stomach. Recent incidents, including that in Lancaster, Pennsylvania on Monday, tightened that knot yet again. While all of the facts have yet to emerge as of the writing of this piece, it is clearly one of the most horrible instances of school violence in the history of this country.

Over the past decade schools in the United States have replaced the standard fire drill we were used to as children, with drills dealing with a wider variety of emergencies. Some of these involve situations of possible threats of violence either inside of the school building or from outside. While the actual circumstances of a school emergency are likely to be unique, by training for a variety of different kinds of emergencies, schools hope that both staff and students will learn how to think and act should a real emergency happen.

The best advice I heard in the media over the past couple of days was that given by a police officer from Rockland or Westchester. His words echoed those of other professionals in the aftermath of other incidents of school violence. He talked about preparation on the part of school officials and police departments and the importance of drills to teach people what to do in an emergency. He stressed, however, that the best thing parents and staff can do was to take seriously any rumors they hear and pass them on to either school staff or law enforcement. While not all potential perpetrators of school violence talk about it with someone in advance, many do drop hints. Clearly such was the case in Columbine. Most of the people who talk about something never act on it, but it is better to have a story checked out than wake up to news of a story such as Columbine or Lancaster.

Most of us who work in schools, including those of us in Herricks, have children of our own. We are as concerned about the safety of the children of this community as we are about the safety of our own children. Anything that we can do together to ensure the safety of all children is worth the time and effort.