Recent School Shooting Plots Point Out Importance of Youth Crime Watch Approach

by Terry Modglin, April 24, 2006

The two recent school shooting plots in North Pole, Alaska and Riverton, Kansas were thankfully uncovered by aware and motivated young people and citizens. These plots demonstrate that the potential for school shootings on a major scale, massacres, has not gone away given the accessibility of firearms and lethal technology to students.

The fact that middle school students were involved in the Alaska case is illustrative of the fact that many of our most dangerous problems - binge drinking, shootings, threats - have moved down to an even younger age group. It is true that even our middle schoolers have the potential to do things good or bad that will have a ripple effect around the country or even the world. And just as a US Secret Service study found five years ago, most of the students planning a school shooting tell someone else, usually another student, about it. Someone is likely to know about a potential school shooting and they will report if they know why it is important for them to act and know what to do.

Youth Crime Watch has recognized since the late 1970s that young people can make a substantial difference in making their school and community safer. Just as people had the good and decent sense to report the massacre plots in Alaska and Kansas, Youth Crime Watchers have been doing that for many years, in some cases preventing murder. Last year in Tampa, Florida middle schooler Randy Griffin reported another student making a bomb to blow up as many as 36 students and teachers. Youth Crime Watchers have likewise prevented murders when gang members or depressed students who had broken up with their boyfriend or girlfriend brought guns to schools with the intent to kill others.

What makes Youth Crime Watch the very best model to prevent school shootings and other crimes? First, our emphasis on reporting as a civic duty. Ask anyone who has been through a Youth Crime Watch training and you know they bring back to their school or neighborhood the ethic of reporting because it is the right thing to do to protect their community. Second, Youth Crime Watch has emphasized for years our optional component of student patrols, an approach that brings more reports more quickly because students trust their fellow students. Most of the Youth Crime Watch middle and high schools in Florida, for example, have patrols. Third, it's about values, ultimately. Do you care enough to be your brother's keeper? Our Youth Crime Watchers' actions say yes. Fourth, the practical, common sense nature of Youth Crime Watch is the reason that it has been supported by Congress, the US Department of Justice, and leaders in 25 states and 13 other countries.

The fact that these shootings were prevented should give us cause to thank those who had the courage to act, and to thank and commend the Youth Crime Watchers who do this prevention work every day. We should all stand up for Youth Crime Watchers for four reasons. First, they have the guts to do what is right whether or not it is popular. Second, they are smart enough to know that they can live in a better world and learn in a better, safer school without moving. Third, they do not just talk about the problem, they do something about it. Fourth, whether in patrols or a system reporting crime such as potential school shootings, they are ready to act every day.

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