Back-to-school fear a new reality
In age of mass shootings, annual return brings added concerns about guns, security
For West Hartford resident Kate Martin, this school year is different because it’s the first year that all four of her children will be in school.
Her youngest — twins — start preschool this year. It’s also the year they start lockdown drills.
“I know even at the age of 3 they do lockdown drills,” Martin said. “My anxiety is a little higher about this year, because I know this is the first time two of my children will be experiencing something that has a deeper meaning than they understand.”
Back-to-school season is a hectic time for parents, teachers and students. But increasingly, parents are worried not only about school supplies and bus routes, but also about gun violence and mass shootings.
Schools across the state will start up the 2019-20 school year this week, with a bevy opening their doors on Aug. 28 and 29. In the Hartford area, Farmington schools open Monday morning.
Martin, who is also the co-lead of the Hartford area Moms Demand Action group, hasn’t explained her anxiety to her children, she said, because she doesn’t feel they’re old enough to carry the knowledge that their schools could be the target of active shooters.
At the same time, she wants her children to take the lockdown drills seriously. During the drills, Martin said her children do understand the concept of “something bad” being in their school, but their minds don’t jump to active shooters.
Her 5-year-old thought the drills involved a stranger in the school. Her 8-year-old thought it was a bear.
“They’re not at an age yet where I would ever consider telling them the reality,” Martin said.
The ‘new reality’ in schools
The new reality of frequent mass shootings — including the recent shootings at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, and in a nightlife area in Dayton, Ohio — has sent shockwaves into communities across the country.
Even schools that have not
been a direct target have drastically changed their security protocols, particularly after the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School and the 2018 shooting at a high school in Parkland, Fla.
“We used to let anyone walk in and welcome anyone into our schools,” Alan B. Bookman, superintendent of Glastonbury Public Schools, said. “Those days are gone, and that’s the new reality. … We not only want the students to feel safe, but we also want parents to have a sense of security.”
Bookman said the district has “hardened” the school buildings through locked doors, security guards and cameras.
West Hartford Public Schools Superintendent Tom Moore listed the same security protocols in the town’s schools. Last year, West Hartford also placed trauma kits in its school buildings.
“Since Sandy Hook, West Hartford has spent literally millions of dollars on increases in security,” Moore said. “I’m trying to do everything we can.”
Moore said that security upgrades, even though they’re often costly, have full support from the community.
“It’s the one area I don’t get pushback on,” Moore said.
However, Moore said there was a bit of annoyance around some of the security measures when they were first implemented. Visitors to the schools would get annoyed, for instance, that they had to sign in at the front office.
Now, everyone seems to understand.
Glastonbury resident Tracy Furey, co-president of the Glastonbury Parent Teacher Student Organization, said she felt some of that annoyance initially. She currently has one child still in the public school system and said she remembers when the schools were welcoming and open.
“It was jarring for us as young parents to go up and ring the bell and show your license to get in,” Furey said. “But it’s the new normal for today’s elementary school parents. This is just the way it is now.”
A ‘general sense of anxiety’
Martin is of that generation whose children all started school after the Sandy Hook shooting. She said she feels a “general sense of anxiety” much of the time.
“To some extent, we’ve been seeing these mass shootings for so many years now,” Martin said. “It’s just this pervasive undertone.”
That undertone persists for parents outside of the school year as well.
Martin said that she also worries about gun safety whenher children have playdates at other children’s homes. She asks whether there are any guns in the other family’s home, she said. If there are guns, Martin asks if they’re properly locked away.
But even when their children are well past the age of playdates, the worries continue.
West Hartford resident Laura Marks, who is also a member of Moms Demand Action, has three children. This year, her middle child is starting college in Pennsylvania.
Currently, her gun violence concerns focus on her new college student.
Some of that worry comes from “knowing Pennsylvania doesn’t have the kind of laws Connecticut has,” Marks said.
Pennsylvania’s gun laws are looser than Connecticut’s, which has some of the strictest gun laws in the nation.
“It’s hard enough sending your kid to college,” Marks said. “But then with this added worry.”
At the same time, Marks said she’s aware that a shooting could take place anywhere.
“It doesn’t matter if you’re at college. It could happen to me while I’m sitting at church,” Marks said. “It can happen anywhere.”
Not ‘normal’
Moore said that parental concern about gun violence spiked after the Sandy Hook shooting. Since then, the levels of worry have stayed about the same, he said.
But one thing has changed: Increasingly, Moore said, he sees parents taking action and taking a stance. Even students have become activists against gun violence, Moore said, particularly after the high schoolers from Parkland took on that role in 2018.
Both Martin and Marks said that Moms Demand Action has been a positive outlet for their worries.
“It does make me feel, honestly, less anxious about what’s happening in the world because it has made me feel more empowered,” Martin said. “A lot of us feel a real urgency about this problem, and this has allowed me to feel more effective.”
Part of that activism, Marks said, is refusing to accept frequent mass shootings as a normality.
“There’s nothing normal about what we’re living through, and you can’t normalize what we’re going through right now,” Marks said. “Operating as if these are normal times isn’t going to cut it.”