School Violence

Adramatic series of school shootings between 1995 and 1999 startled the nation. Deadly violence within schools struck fear in the public and particularly school-age youth across the nation. Beginning in 1989, there had been an increase in school violence, ranging from verbal harassment, threats of harm, and violent crime.

Overall national violent crime rates dropped after 1993 and continued at lower levels into the twenty-first century. Similarly, following a period of increased violence by juveniles (youth less than eighteen years of age) between 1989 and 1993, youth violence had begun to level off or decline as well. Crimes reported by schools dropped 10 percent between 1995 and 1999. The decrease in youth violence, however, was less than the overall trend.

Public concern about school violence rose significantly as school shootings dominated the media's attention from 1997 to 1999. This was despite the fact that these high-profile crimes occurred during a period in which violent deaths related to schools and school activities had decreased by 40 percent.

A school security camera shows Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold on a shooting spree at Columbine High School in 1999, killing thirteen people and injuring twenty-six others. (AP/Wide World Photos)

Suddenly in the late 1990s, some middle- and upper-class white youths were lashing out with planned acts of cold-blooded violence against their schoolmates and teachers. School violence was no longer considered an inner-city problem. In reaction to the rise in the number of multiple homicides, governments and school districts adopted new measures to identify and respond to possible problems before they erupted.

Though difficult, teachers and administrators turned to students for help; asking them to report threatening comments or dangerous activities. They also sought to reduce negative behavior such as bullying, which was generally ignored in the past or noticed but dismissed as typical adolescent behavior. As the United States entered the twenty-first century, the public considered schools to be dangerous places. Statistics actually indicated the opposite and showed that schools were the safest public places in the nation.