Guns in Schools

The Death Toll

The gun violence archive defines a school shooting as “an incident that occurs on property of the elementary, secondary or college campus where there is a death or injury from gunfire.” The archive, a nonprofit that began tracking school shootings in 2014, after a gunman killed 20 first-graders and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012, has recorded 239 subsequent school shootings nationwide, with 438 people shot and 138 killed.

Our list—which begins in 1999 with Columbine High School and ends this past December in Indiana—is more expansive. Some media outlets don’t count incidents that result in no fatalities or injuries. We decided to include them to show the scope of the problem of guns on campuses, which receive little publicity except in local news when there are no victims. It remains alarming to us if someone shoots into a ceiling or brandishes a weapon in a classroom. (Note: We did not include shooters among the dead if they were shot by police or died by their own hand.)

There are disturbing trends: Adolescents committed a majority of the shootings, demonstrating how easy it is for minors to get their hands on guns. Although we did not indicate motives, a concerning number of incidents happened before, during or after basketball or football games. And January and February are indeed the cruelest months.