The increased publicity of mass shootings and the COVID-19 pandemic have fueled American demand for firearm purchases. Firearm violence has largely been blamed on people with mental illnesses instead of firearm accessibility, despite the lack of population-level evidence associating mental illness with firearm violence perpetration. We support…

On April 20, 1999, two Columbine High School students started a shooting rampage, ultimately killing 12 students and one teacher, wounding 21 victims, then completing suicide. Using media frame analysis (MFA), we examined 265 transcribed major network television news stories aired during the 48 hours following the shooting. In these stories, we…

In response to the killing of 20 children and 6 adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School on December 17, 2012, this position statement argues that research supports a thoughtful approach to safer schools, guided by four key elements--balance, communication, connectedness, and support--along with strengthened attention to mental health needs in the…

This study explores the construction of discourses about childhood in the Greek daily press. It employs the theoretical frameworks of the new sociology of childhood and critical discourse analysis to question which discourses of childhood are constructed in the daily press presenting cases where children were the victimisers in school violent…

When a sexting message spreads to an unintended audience, it can adversely affect the victim's reputation. Sexting incidents constitute a potential school safety risk. Just as with other types of adolescent risk behavior, school nurses might have to initiate the first response when a sexting episode arises, but a school nurse's role goes…

Planning ahead, practicing your response for various scenarios, being open and honest, showing empathy and respect for other peoples' perspectives and assuring stakeholders that you have the situation covered are the foundations of communicating successfully during a crisis, experts say. This article provides strategies for Community College…

A new video game in which the player stalks and shoots fellow students and teachers in school settings is drawing fire from school district officials. "School Shooter: North American Tour 2012" is a first-person game that allows the player to move around a school and collect points by killing defenseless students and teachers. The game,…

In response to the February 14, 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, President Donald Trump established the Federal Commission on School Safety to review safety practices and make meaningful and actionable recommendations of best practices to keep students safe. The Commission conducted field visits,…

This paper provides a media analysis of three interrelated sets of newspaper articles dealing with youth, schooling and violence. Understanding the media as a dominant and powerful cultural text that creates the realities it describes, the paper takes a critical view of the 'standpoint' of recent media representations of the Cronulla (Sydney,…

In the past 10 years, violence taking place in schools has entered both popular and academic discourse. Frequently, the term "school violence" is used as a catch-all concept to refer to disorder and disruption in schools, as well as the unruliness of contemporary youth. This is apparent not only in the North American context, but in…

Traditionally, violent acts against children in Japan were considered private, isolated incidents largely outside the reach of government policy and legal action. Increasingly, however, public perception in Japan, mainly driven by the mass media, has shifted away from such complacency. A few well-publicized attacks on children have forced Mombusho…

The recent shootings at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute (Virginia Tech) shocked the nation and brought violence on college campuses to the forefront of the nation's attention. We surveyed college students and faculty/staff three weeks after the incident about their perceptions of the Virginia Tech shooting, subsequent media exposure, and school…

Argues that public perceptions of an epidemic of school violence are media-induced; asserts that violence in schools declined during the 1990s; supports assertion with evidence from the National School Safety Center; states the estimates of bullying in school are exaggerated. (PKP)

This brief examines the effects of media coverage of school violence on school violence. The news media take notice precisely because shootings in a school are unusual. The media did not take much notice of shootings in the 1980s and 1990s in inner city communities because these infractions were not judged to be anomalies; they did not measure up…

Recognizing increasing concerns about rising youth-related crime in Missouri, this Kids Count report on children and violence examines the impact of community and family violence on young perpetrators and victims, and explores characteristics of successful programs to prevent or reduce family and community violence in Missouri. Data suggest that…