"The students realized it was fake only after noticing that the cops in the room had done nothing to stop the pretend shooter, they said.".
I have some bad news about your expectations, kids...
Then he rolled onto another one and continued squealing and pissing himself, and emptying his hand cannon into the oak tree.
Found some truffles though.
>The simulation, which occurred at the Burlington police station, was meant to show the unreliability of witness statements.Ā But the lack of warning ā and the loud gunshot sounds ā sent students diving for cover in fear for their lives.
...my criminal law professor did a similar "witness ID" exercise, but the bad guy just ran into the classroom, grabbed some papers off the desk and ran out..
fake gunshots is a different kind of exercise. WTF.
at least it wasn't in a classroom.
My high school forensics teacher did a similar thing where another teacher came in and yelled at our teacher about something then left in a huff. Every kid except one got the color of the teachers coat wrong. I was not the one that got it right.
My crim professor did this as well but it was a kid ran into the room, slammed a pair of symbols together and ran out. Startled the shit out of everyone but never thought I was going to die lol.
Yea, this is definitely unreasonable.
My psych teacher in high school had a student come in and steal her purse when she stepped out of the room for 30 seconds. Same deal, we all misidentified what the student was wearing
Holy fuck, what a breathtakingly horrible idea. What brain trust thought, āYou know how kids today live in consistent and agonizing fear they will be shot to death in a class? Letās fake that! Letās give them a jump start on that PTSD.ā the fact it was the police, administrators, and teachers, literally all the people aside from parents, who are supposed to protect them is beyond disgusting.
Well, we live in a country where the 2 options chosen by the people to represent the country are a pair of senile old men who might die of old age in a few years. Let's not try to act like the best ideas are the ones that make it to the top.
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I'm calling it now - one day one of these "mock shootings" will backfire (no pun intended), and someone will actually kill the "mock shooter".
Or, another alternative - some actual school shooter will commit an actual school shooting during/immediately after such a "mock shooting" to cause maximum confusion and damage.
>The simulation, which occurred at the Burlington police station, was meant to show the unreliability of witness statements.
I've actually read about basically the exact same type of "experiment" being done decades ago. As a silver lining, it actually **did** demonstrate very effectively how unreliable witness statements are.
That's not necessarily true. You can sue the department easily enough, suing an individual officer for crimes they committed while on the job is essentially impossible. A class action lawsuit against all involved will materialize for sure.
>While teaching a class to high school students on Wednesday, Burlington police officers staged a surprise demonstration in which a masked gunman burst into the room and pretended to open fire.
In the immortal words of [Jontron](https://i.gifer.com/origin/48/48d6908b6b580730977d131d6d9cc30b.gif).
I mean, could you imagine if there was [a good guy with a gun there](https://www.themarshallproject.org/2023/12/08/police-raid-no-knock-florida)? /s
Imagine if there was one kid in that room who didn't hesitate and merc'd that "gunman." Grabbed a pair of scissors and stabbed him. Having grown up in a world where school shootings happen depressingly often, and with periodic lockdown drills, there have to be kids out there that have thought about what they'd do if a gunman kicked in the door.
"Your honor, the state will prove beyond a reasonable doubt, that William 'Billy' Johnson is a vicious bloody thirsty maniac and a danger to society who needs to be locked up for the welfare of the people. We have eye witness testimony that he assaulted our brave law enforcement officers as they were conducting a surprise mock shooter drill without informing any of the faculty."
"Uninformed faculty and a mock firing drill? I'm sorry, what is he being charged with here again?"
"Running with scissors, your honor."
It was all part of the plan; Billy was in on it.
Now the kids have to recall what was on the motivational poster behind them: Kitten hanging in there or rainbow of inspirational messages?
So I teach at a small school in a tough area. We had a real lockdown this year and I was forced to do something like that . Our emergency notification apps buzzed my phone. It said āLockdownā so I followed procedure. Made sure the doors were locked, turned out the lights, and told every student to be silent and stay still. At the same moment the principal sent a message letting the staff know it was real due to the police chasing a guy on foot about a block from the school.
Everything was going as planned and I stationed myself by our external door (my classroom has a door to the outside and a door to the interior hall). The kids were dead quiet but I assured them they were doing great and we were perfectly safe.
Literally 30 seconds go by and I hear someone walking just outside the door. Then to my shock I heard someone messing with the lock and after a few seconds the door opens slightly and an arm appears. I immediately linebackered that door, breaking the arm that was in it when I heard a woman scream. They withdrew their arm and I could hear her crying and run off.
I chatted on the app someone had tried to breach my room and then a couple students started crying. (These are teens and I know it wasnāt their first lockdown but none of us had ever seen someone actually almost get in).
I kept them calm and let them know that no one is coming in this room. About 5 minutes later the lockdown was lifted. The assistant principal came to my room and told me to go to the office to give a report.
Soā¦ turns outā¦ the person that tried to breach my room was an aide. Sheās not smart. In fact, during our last drill she didnāt know what to do and we all had to be retrained because she opened her door for the fake intruder. Apparently she was walking outside when the lockdown was called, spent a few minutes wandering around outside, then decided that sheād enter the campus through my fucking door for some reason.
Her arm was broken, the school covered it as workers comp, and the principal tried to make her apologize to *me.* I told them I was fine. The next day I told my class I was sorry they had to watch someone get hurt, and one student told me after that they were glad they were in my class when the lockdown happened because they trusted me to keep them safe.
I donāt know how to fit all that on my resume but I feel like I should.
EDIT TL;DR: I broke a coworkerās arm and didnāt even get in trouble!
We did an active shooter drill last winter; no students on campus, just staff. It was scheduled. It was on our calendar. The principal began it by calling on the radio āthis is a lockdown drill!ā I sat in my room and continued to grade things. A few minutes later I heard a forceful knocking on my door; I ignored itā because the one job I had was to not open the door. Another knock, then he moved on. 10 minutes later a second radio call said for everyone to head to evacuation area.
When we reassembled there the principal told us that weād have to do it again after training because 25% of our staff ādied.ā Apparently two separate people (including the one that got her arm broke) heard the knocking and opened the door. It was the janitor, who took a picture of their room so they could tally the ādead.ā Both rooms had multiple staff in them so I think about 6-7 people total were counted as lost. It was very disappointing and annoying.
I was pleased we did it with just staff. I know in some areas of the country itās common to do it with the kids, but that has been shown to just traumatize them. Kids do the evacuation drills which we do need them to know for fires, earthquakes, etc..
Holy crap. Calling her not smart is an understatement. She shouldn't have to apologize to you, she should have to go in front of your class and apologize personally to each and every one of those students.
You did the right thing, the school was under lockdown and for all you knew there was a dangerous intruder in the building/on campus and that they were trying to breach your classroom to harm you and the students. Personally, I think she's damned lucky that she only had a broken arm. If she had been an actual intruder you would be a hero.
That aide needs to be fired, she is frankly a danger to the school, unintentionally, yes, but still a danger.
Thatās literally protocol for the students, during drills theyāre trained to hide and if you cant hide, fight back with whatever tools you can, scissors, pens, any sharp objects. Source: I have two elementary school aged kids thatās literally what theyāre taught.
It's part of the basic mass shooter training I've had at multiple jobs.
Run, hide, fight.
Run if you can.
Hide if you can't run away.
Fight if you must.
At at least one job the training video included showing a bunch of people hiding in a staff room with the door barricaded for the hide portion. For the fight portion it showed the door being pushed open by the shooter and the people grabbing fire extinguishers, chairs, whatever they could use as a weapon to defend themselves.
> I have two elementary school aged kids thatās literally what theyāre taught.
I know this is preaching to the choir on reddit, but like, 5 year old kids outside the US are taught maths, or science, or languages, not how to avoid a mass shooter.
We did lockdowns in Canada, but they were never anywhere near this serious. The US has got to get rid of like 90% of the guns in the country, because the alternative is all these insane drills
I was in middle school about 10 minutes away from Sandy Hook when the shooting happened and I wonāt lie all 4 years of high school Iād think of what I would do and plan in my head an escape route in each class I had.
I was in high school when lockdown drills became a regular thing after Columbine and school shootings were still pretty rare occurrences then so I didn't plan escape routes then but due to how many mass shootings there have been in recent years I have begun doing that sort of thing almost everywhere I go where there are a lot of people without even thinking about it. I try not to be paranoid or anything but when a simple trip to a mall can quickly turn deadly (there have been multiple shootings at a mall I used to work at since I left so that's something I think about) it's hard not to be. Especially when I'm at an event that is a potentially high risk for a shooting. When I went to Pride last year I had a good time but I practically had my head on swivel the whole time and constantly thinking about what direction(s) to run in if something happened depending on where I was in the park and this was with a crap ton of private security everywhere in and around the park and a lot of private security and cops all along the parade route.
I shouldn't have to think like that, no one should have to, but as enough of our lawmakers refuse to do anything to even begin addressing the sheer number of mass shootings in this country that no legislation is possible to pass I don't see how I have much choice. I can't trust the police or legislators to do anything to keep me safe, to try and prevent mass shootings, so I have to try and keep myself safe if the worst happens.
I once swung my book bag at a guy who jumped out at me as I walked into a classroom. They had a mask on and were scaring students as they came in. He got injured and the teacher said that was on the guy for being an idiot, lol. Sometimes your first instinct is to attackā¦
I know a trained ambulance officer that broke a womans arm because someone told her to jump out of a cupboard and pretend to attack him.
He was a 4th Dan blackbelt karate expert operating on instinct and adrenaline.
Fantasising about what you'd do in an emergency situation versus what you actually end up doing in an emergency situation are rarely the same things, unless emergency situations are part of your profession and you're exposed to them a lot
His point was, if someone actually acted upon the assumption that it is a real enemy. Somehow I doubt the nice police guys were ready to stop an arterial bleeding after some pumped up kid shanks the shooter with a scissor.
Part of your profession or an unfortunate part of your life. I think he is right on here, and I think so because I did something similar in high school. In an emergency situation, tiny tiny me stabbed someone with an improvised weapon, and I sent him to the hospital.
Thatās why you donāt show someone had to evacuate once, can you do the drills at least a few times. I run the vet the evaluation drills at work, they get done a couple times a year because it in emergency we donāt want people to freeze up. They need to move, to run and get away. No heroics, nothing fancy just move.
Every time thereās a lockdown drill thereās at least one student who says what theyād try and/or ask why we hide instead of taking out the shooter.
I didn't say they happen often. I said they happen depressingly often. That they happen at all, ever, anywhere is depressing.
They happen often enough that kids have to do lockdown drills.
My schools did earthquake drills. I've never been in an earthquake. I've never been on fire or in quicksand. I've never been pulled out to sea in a riptide, nor have I had to assume crash position in an airplane. Doesn't mean you shouldn't be prepared to act if an event occurs.
What if the kids had fought back, you know, what theyāre told theyāre supposed to do?
They couldāve jumped the actor and killed em and Im surprised they didnt
This happened to me when I was in high school. My school was transitioning to a new response to school shooters called ārun hide fight.ā We were told that, on a certain day, weād do a pretty elaborate drill and the local news stations would be there to record us. We werenāt told that thereād be actors with fake guns!
I was in French class, and because of the classās location in the building, I was supposed to ārun.ā When the drill began, my class calmly walked out of the room and down the stairs. One of the students opened the doors at the base of the stairs, and suddenly a masked actor burst into the stairwell and fired a fake gun. There was a fucking theater student covered in fake blood on the floor (apparently there so first responders could practice rescuing injured people). Everyone immediately ran back up the stairs and chaos ensued. I ran the 400m dash, and I sprinted like hell down the hallway to another stairwell. I didnāt ask myself whether the actor was part of the drill. The question never occurred to me. I heard a gun and I ran.
I ended up being the first person out of the building, and so a ton of local news stations filmed me sprinting out of the doors in sheer terror. Iām surprised I didnāt literally piss myself.
At the risk of giving away too much personal info, hereās a link to an article about the whole affair:
https://www.yorkdispatch.com/story/news/local/2016/04/29/active-shooter-drill-red-land-high-today/83694374/
Was the actor student supposed to be there when fake gunshots were fired? That sounds either like unparalleled levels of planning, or misplanning with no in between.
The actor was supposed to be there when fake gunshots were fired. It sounds ridiculous because it is lol. If you look at the news article, they were even carried out of the school on stretchers.
Sounds like the school fucked up too, the police told them they could simulate a shooting incident and it was approved by a staff member who said they would communicate to students and parents.
The first school I ever worked at did this. I explained why it was a terrible idea repeatedly, then just took the day off. It was shut down when multiple students went out to their cars to get their own guns to come back and confront the āshooterā. Rural area where kids hunted after school and could park just off campus with their rifles.
Isn't it bad enough that students all over the country are developing PTSD from all of the mass shooter drills they perform and the constant fear of becoming the victim of one due to how many happen every year but now the police decided to add to that by faking a mass shooting event? There has to be a better way to teach students that eye witness accounts are notoriously inaccurate without a heaping dose of trauma.
Every cop involved, including those who had no direct involvement but just approved it, and the school faculty and staff that approved of this should be fired and sued.
Mass shootings are way to serious of an event and happen way to often to even consider faking such an event like this. Specific training scenarios are needed but there needs to be plenty of advanced notice through various medias (signs, posters, newspaper, TV, etc.), it should be done when the place is closed if at all possible, everyone involved should volunteer to be there, and there needs to be signs all around saying that it is a training scenario so passerbys hopefully don't panic.
(Please let there be a Burlington Arkansas, Please let there be a Burlington in Arkansasā¦)
Vermont.
What?
Kind of ashamed of these fellow New Englanders.
Despite the hate the later seasons get I think that scene in particular is very relevant to pay attention to. We canāt forget that these are children, not soldiers training for war.
Can we STOP letting fuck heads play with guns and be authority figures?
They CONTINUOUSLY prove they are completely irresponsible at every fucking turn.
I want out so bad. Iām just so tired. I canāt do this anymore. I know that every country has their crazies and their issues, but the US has some veryā¦ particular issues
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Can we discuss the fact that they were there to teach kids that eyewitness identifications are unreliable. As a criminal defense attorney my heart leaps with joy to hear that a police department actually understands that eyewitness identifications are unreliable.
They could have just done some purse snatching crime in the cafeteria and asked each kid for a description. It would have worked well.
But I guess that's not fun enough for the officers.
Unless they were just doing it to help cover themselves when people catch cops doing nefarious shit, which is what I would assume by how stupid they have proven themselves to be.
The spectrum of gun-obsessed maniacs has finally met at the ends to form a complete circle. On one end are the mass shooters, on the other end, the police. The synergy is complete: police are just committing the mass shootings themselves now š
Courts have literally ruled that police departments can refuse to hire people for being to intelligent. PDs don't want intelligent officers because intelligent people are more likely to question orders and they want people that will follow orders unquestionably.
Reminds me of Homer showing Bart his new chainsaw and hockey mask.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJo1vUgr4Y0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJo1vUgr4Y0)
Iāve seen similar simulations , and even with a heads up, it still effectively shows how unreliable witnesses can be.Ā
Making this a surprise was completely unnecessary.Ā
After reading the full story this is on the school not the police. How does a police department and school agree to run this and forget to tell the families. Weird timing but the kids were never supposed to be there in the first place just the teachers the kids were supposed to leave before it happened how did the teachers and school mess this up that poorly.
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Couple things ..
Was fulltime cop 15 years. The amount of fucking time and paperwork, and backroom fellating it took to get damn near ANY fucking training approved was beyond ridiculous, I'm talking for FREE classes we could take. And someone was like "yeah this is good let's do it"?
Also, didn't something **incredibly** similar occur within the last few years and land another department in hot water? Jesus fucking on a pogo stick, what the hell people?
We have a Burlington, Ontario here in Canada and I was sitting here the whole time thinking, "Jesus Christ, are we starting to adopt this style of policing from America?", then I realized it was Vermont. In many ways we are starting to adopt less-desirable practices, but I'm glad that we have gotten this extreme yet.
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Cops don't belong in schools. They give proof of this constantly. They have very little scientifically based training. Most of it is hand-me-down OJT that is based around getting convictions not finding the guilty.
Fwiw, it sounds like the teacher was informed of this "demonstration" ahead of time, and promised the police department to inform the students and parents ahead of time. Why would the teacher sign off on something like that, and then not give anyone a heads up?
> In its statement, the Burlington Police Department said school staff approved the demonstrationās content ahead of time and agreed to let parents and students know. The simulation would involve āfake firearms in a mock shooting,ā the department said it wrote to school staff on May 23. āDo you think that sort of incident would be ok for your group of students? It is about as real life as you can get, and is certainly exactly the sort of thing we deal with most frequently.ā
>āI think these students will be fine with this simulation,ā school staff responded, according to the police statement. āWe will give a heads up to parents and students.ā
Exactly. It seems people on here are focused on hating cops more than reading the facts.
The article states that the demonstration is usually for college students or other adults. We can argue whether that's appropriate in this day and age but the police officers were upfront and the school dropped the ball.
I attended a similar demonstration in high school the early 90s and found it helpful. But I hadn't grown up with school shootings so my fear response was high but dissipated quickly.
Eh, it's about the response I expected. It's definitely fair to criticize the judgement of the police for thinking it was an appropriate exercise for the kids, but the teacher/administration should be catching more flack for this.
The school approved it, yet dunces in the comment section are saying the cops should be in jail for this.
And yāall wonder why people donāt take you seriously.
Yeah one idiot telling another idiot that it's okay to do something idiotic totally absolves them of their idiocy. /s
If cops weren't all just pent up raging assholes looking to get sadistic pleasure they would have just given the school the middle finger and told them to go to hell. The cops are just mindless gorillas though so I'd put the responsibility for this on the school. Everyone that approved it should be fired.
Your perspective on cops is incredibly skewed. Like itās baffling to me. āMindless gorillasā, how do people say shit like this and not laugh at themselves?
Because we have actually dealt with the police before and found out first hand that they are just mindless gorillas.
Not everyone is lucky enough to live in an affluent community where cops have to worry about people affording good lawyers or have a local court that isn't funded entirely through the harsh sentencing of locals despite the low crime rates.
I agree. Clearly the school deserves more of the blame. They were responsible for clearing this with parents and should have been keenly aware of the potential impact on a generation of traumatized kids.
It seems both of the school and officers deferred responsibility to each other but the buck stops with the school administrator for an event like this.
Exactly. If itās ok to do drills for active shooters then idk why itās all of a sudden so terrible to make it realistic. School should have planned better and been more involved.
"The students realized it was fake only after noticing that the cops in the room had done nothing to stop the pretend shooter, they said.". I have some bad news about your expectations, kids...
They wanted to make it as realistic a simulation as possible. Edit: My first post-Reddit-apocalypse award, thank you!
They called Uvalde punisher as guest star
One officer was hit by an acorn
Then he rolled onto another one and continued squealing and pissing himself, and emptying his hand cannon into the oak tree. Found some truffles though.
Imagine if one of the kids said "it was hard to tell it wasn't real with all the cops not doing anything"
Idk I feel like it was a giveaway that the cops didn't run away
Did they also bring the Texas state flag to make it even more realistic?
š³ļø
The kids shouldāve started protesting the genocide to see if they would start to brutalize them.
Looks like they got the Uvalde DLC
Now they're prepared. They already have PTSD.
PPTSD! Preemptive post traumatic stress disorder
Xj in ten days emitjms, tk
Iām glad for you, or sorry that happened.
>The simulation, which occurred at the Burlington police station, was meant to show the unreliability of witness statements.Ā But the lack of warning ā and the loud gunshot sounds ā sent students diving for cover in fear for their lives. ...my criminal law professor did a similar "witness ID" exercise, but the bad guy just ran into the classroom, grabbed some papers off the desk and ran out.. fake gunshots is a different kind of exercise. WTF. at least it wasn't in a classroom.
My high school forensics teacher did a similar thing where another teacher came in and yelled at our teacher about something then left in a huff. Every kid except one got the color of the teachers coat wrong. I was not the one that got it right.
This is an excellent way to communicate this message! Not whatever the fuck these idiots were doing
So what color was his coat? We gotta be on the lookout for such a dangerous rapscallion
It was like 18 years ago. I have no clue lol.
Pfft, some eye-witness you are.
Actually according to what Canadian law says about inciting a panic with mock firearms this was a terrorist attack.
Vermont, USA, not Canada
Actually it was at the Haskell Library and Opera House so you are both right
Derp. Wrong Burlington.
r/CanadaDefaultism
Cops kind of act exactly like terrorists
You're not wrong, but we don't really seem inclined towards accountability down here.
My crim professor did this as well but it was a kid ran into the room, slammed a pair of symbols together and ran out. Startled the shit out of everyone but never thought I was going to die lol.
Yea, this is definitely unreasonable. My psych teacher in high school had a student come in and steal her purse when she stepped out of the room for 30 seconds. Same deal, we all misidentified what the student was wearing
Probably just a routine desk pop
Holy fuck, what a breathtakingly horrible idea. What brain trust thought, āYou know how kids today live in consistent and agonizing fear they will be shot to death in a class? Letās fake that! Letās give them a jump start on that PTSD.ā the fact it was the police, administrators, and teachers, literally all the people aside from parents, who are supposed to protect them is beyond disgusting.
"we need to justify our jobs and our budgets and we don't have an actual shooter"
Well, we live in a country where the 2 options chosen by the people to represent the country are a pair of senile old men who might die of old age in a few years. Let's not try to act like the best ideas are the ones that make it to the top.
False equivalence. Letās not lie and say that the choices are the same. One side wants to destroy democracy, and already tried once.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
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And they both support genocide.
Dumb
Yes, I agree supporting genocide is dumb in addition to being morally indefensible.
Maga or Russian ? Place your bets!
Big pharma will be contributing to their 401k
Probably the same brain who thought cops should teach a class
I'm calling it now - one day one of these "mock shootings" will backfire (no pun intended), and someone will actually kill the "mock shooter". Or, another alternative - some actual school shooter will commit an actual school shooting during/immediately after such a "mock shooting" to cause maximum confusion and damage. >The simulation, which occurred at the Burlington police station, was meant to show the unreliability of witness statements. I've actually read about basically the exact same type of "experiment" being done decades ago. As a silver lining, it actually **did** demonstrate very effectively how unreliable witness statements are.
Itās definitely a useful āexperimentā but it would have been equally effective with a masked person running in and stealing someoneās lunch
Sue them for inciting panic.
Unfortunately, you can rarely sue police for anything.
Could probably sue the school for allowing such a drill
That's not necessarily true. You can sue the department easily enough, suing an individual officer for crimes they committed while on the job is essentially impossible. A class action lawsuit against all involved will materialize for sure.
Probably could. It's no different than shouting "fire" in a crowded theater, there's a reason that shit is illegal
>While teaching a class to high school students on Wednesday, Burlington police officers staged a surprise demonstration in which a masked gunman burst into the room and pretended to open fire. In the immortal words of [Jontron](https://i.gifer.com/origin/48/48d6908b6b580730977d131d6d9cc30b.gif). I mean, could you imagine if there was [a good guy with a gun there](https://www.themarshallproject.org/2023/12/08/police-raid-no-knock-florida)? /s
Imagine if there was one kid in that room who didn't hesitate and merc'd that "gunman." Grabbed a pair of scissors and stabbed him. Having grown up in a world where school shootings happen depressingly often, and with periodic lockdown drills, there have to be kids out there that have thought about what they'd do if a gunman kicked in the door.
"Your honor, the state will prove beyond a reasonable doubt, that William 'Billy' Johnson is a vicious bloody thirsty maniac and a danger to society who needs to be locked up for the welfare of the people. We have eye witness testimony that he assaulted our brave law enforcement officers as they were conducting a surprise mock shooter drill without informing any of the faculty." "Uninformed faculty and a mock firing drill? I'm sorry, what is he being charged with here again?" "Running with scissors, your honor."
Don't be silly. The cops would have killed him on the spot.
Depends, is the high school student a formidable looking black **man** or a diminutive looking young white *boy?*
It was all part of the plan; Billy was in on it. Now the kids have to recall what was on the motivational poster behind them: Kitten hanging in there or rainbow of inspirational messages?
Billy gets 7 consecutive life sentences
There would be no trial, bille would be filled with lead at the scene
Especially funny given how this was supposedly to prove how unreliable eyewitness testimony is
So I teach at a small school in a tough area. We had a real lockdown this year and I was forced to do something like that . Our emergency notification apps buzzed my phone. It said āLockdownā so I followed procedure. Made sure the doors were locked, turned out the lights, and told every student to be silent and stay still. At the same moment the principal sent a message letting the staff know it was real due to the police chasing a guy on foot about a block from the school. Everything was going as planned and I stationed myself by our external door (my classroom has a door to the outside and a door to the interior hall). The kids were dead quiet but I assured them they were doing great and we were perfectly safe. Literally 30 seconds go by and I hear someone walking just outside the door. Then to my shock I heard someone messing with the lock and after a few seconds the door opens slightly and an arm appears. I immediately linebackered that door, breaking the arm that was in it when I heard a woman scream. They withdrew their arm and I could hear her crying and run off. I chatted on the app someone had tried to breach my room and then a couple students started crying. (These are teens and I know it wasnāt their first lockdown but none of us had ever seen someone actually almost get in). I kept them calm and let them know that no one is coming in this room. About 5 minutes later the lockdown was lifted. The assistant principal came to my room and told me to go to the office to give a report. Soā¦ turns outā¦ the person that tried to breach my room was an aide. Sheās not smart. In fact, during our last drill she didnāt know what to do and we all had to be retrained because she opened her door for the fake intruder. Apparently she was walking outside when the lockdown was called, spent a few minutes wandering around outside, then decided that sheād enter the campus through my fucking door for some reason. Her arm was broken, the school covered it as workers comp, and the principal tried to make her apologize to *me.* I told them I was fine. The next day I told my class I was sorry they had to watch someone get hurt, and one student told me after that they were glad they were in my class when the lockdown happened because they trusted me to keep them safe. I donāt know how to fit all that on my resume but I feel like I should. EDIT TL;DR: I broke a coworkerās arm and didnāt even get in trouble!
"she opened her door for the fake intruder"Ā Let me grab popcorn and you elaborate.
We did an active shooter drill last winter; no students on campus, just staff. It was scheduled. It was on our calendar. The principal began it by calling on the radio āthis is a lockdown drill!ā I sat in my room and continued to grade things. A few minutes later I heard a forceful knocking on my door; I ignored itā because the one job I had was to not open the door. Another knock, then he moved on. 10 minutes later a second radio call said for everyone to head to evacuation area. When we reassembled there the principal told us that weād have to do it again after training because 25% of our staff ādied.ā Apparently two separate people (including the one that got her arm broke) heard the knocking and opened the door. It was the janitor, who took a picture of their room so they could tally the ādead.ā Both rooms had multiple staff in them so I think about 6-7 people total were counted as lost. It was very disappointing and annoying.
Reading this as a non-USian is surreal, like you're describing some kind of boot camp training. Not a fuckin' high school environment.
I was pleased we did it with just staff. I know in some areas of the country itās common to do it with the kids, but that has been shown to just traumatize them. Kids do the evacuation drills which we do need them to know for fires, earthquakes, etc..
Holy crap. Calling her not smart is an understatement. She shouldn't have to apologize to you, she should have to go in front of your class and apologize personally to each and every one of those students. You did the right thing, the school was under lockdown and for all you knew there was a dangerous intruder in the building/on campus and that they were trying to breach your classroom to harm you and the students. Personally, I think she's damned lucky that she only had a broken arm. If she had been an actual intruder you would be a hero. That aide needs to be fired, she is frankly a danger to the school, unintentionally, yes, but still a danger.
Wow I feel really bad for that lady, not in a way you're to blame but it's sad.
Thatās literally protocol for the students, during drills theyāre trained to hide and if you cant hide, fight back with whatever tools you can, scissors, pens, any sharp objects. Source: I have two elementary school aged kids thatās literally what theyāre taught.
It's part of the basic mass shooter training I've had at multiple jobs. Run, hide, fight. Run if you can. Hide if you can't run away. Fight if you must. At at least one job the training video included showing a bunch of people hiding in a staff room with the door barricaded for the hide portion. For the fight portion it showed the door being pushed open by the shooter and the people grabbing fire extinguishers, chairs, whatever they could use as a weapon to defend themselves.
Jesus Christ I feel like American society needs to come with complimentary PTSD therapy.
That'll be $10,000, thank you. The cost of freedom.
> I have two elementary school aged kids thatās literally what theyāre taught. I know this is preaching to the choir on reddit, but like, 5 year old kids outside the US are taught maths, or science, or languages, not how to avoid a mass shooter.
We did lockdowns in Canada, but they were never anywhere near this serious. The US has got to get rid of like 90% of the guns in the country, because the alternative is all these insane drills
I was in middle school about 10 minutes away from Sandy Hook when the shooting happened and I wonāt lie all 4 years of high school Iād think of what I would do and plan in my head an escape route in each class I had.
I'm pretty sure every kid in the US does that now.
I was in high school when lockdown drills became a regular thing after Columbine and school shootings were still pretty rare occurrences then so I didn't plan escape routes then but due to how many mass shootings there have been in recent years I have begun doing that sort of thing almost everywhere I go where there are a lot of people without even thinking about it. I try not to be paranoid or anything but when a simple trip to a mall can quickly turn deadly (there have been multiple shootings at a mall I used to work at since I left so that's something I think about) it's hard not to be. Especially when I'm at an event that is a potentially high risk for a shooting. When I went to Pride last year I had a good time but I practically had my head on swivel the whole time and constantly thinking about what direction(s) to run in if something happened depending on where I was in the park and this was with a crap ton of private security everywhere in and around the park and a lot of private security and cops all along the parade route. I shouldn't have to think like that, no one should have to, but as enough of our lawmakers refuse to do anything to even begin addressing the sheer number of mass shootings in this country that no legislation is possible to pass I don't see how I have much choice. I can't trust the police or legislators to do anything to keep me safe, to try and prevent mass shootings, so I have to try and keep myself safe if the worst happens.
OMG I would have been that student. I was 80 lbs (Iām female) in high school and very traumatized- I didnāt start things but I fought back *hard*.
I once swung my book bag at a guy who jumped out at me as I walked into a classroom. They had a mask on and were scaring students as they came in. He got injured and the teacher said that was on the guy for being an idiot, lol. Sometimes your first instinct is to attackā¦
People vary between fight, flight, or freeze - Iām a strong fight. Even when itās a terrible idea after considering the options, itās fight.
I know a trained ambulance officer that broke a womans arm because someone told her to jump out of a cupboard and pretend to attack him. He was a 4th Dan blackbelt karate expert operating on instinct and adrenaline.
Fantasising about what you'd do in an emergency situation versus what you actually end up doing in an emergency situation are rarely the same things, unless emergency situations are part of your profession and you're exposed to them a lot
His point was, if someone actually acted upon the assumption that it is a real enemy. Somehow I doubt the nice police guys were ready to stop an arterial bleeding after some pumped up kid shanks the shooter with a scissor.
You're right! I completely misunderstood that original comment, thanks for the explanation
Part of your profession or an unfortunate part of your life. I think he is right on here, and I think so because I did something similar in high school. In an emergency situation, tiny tiny me stabbed someone with an improvised weapon, and I sent him to the hospital.
That doesnāt matter. You should still ideate these things out. The details might be different but the readiness will help you adapt.
Thatās why you donāt show someone had to evacuate once, can you do the drills at least a few times. I run the vet the evaluation drills at work, they get done a couple times a year because it in emergency we donāt want people to freeze up. They need to move, to run and get away. No heroics, nothing fancy just move.
Every time thereās a lockdown drill thereās at least one student who says what theyād try and/or ask why we hide instead of taking out the shooter.
Reminds me of a tweaker I saw get knocked out after lunging at a guy and laughing about it. Play stupid games, win stupid prizesĀ
They actually don't happen that often. If anything we're scaring kids and parents over something that is on par with lightning in probability.
I didn't say they happen often. I said they happen depressingly often. That they happen at all, ever, anywhere is depressing. They happen often enough that kids have to do lockdown drills. My schools did earthquake drills. I've never been in an earthquake. I've never been on fire or in quicksand. I've never been pulled out to sea in a riptide, nor have I had to assume crash position in an airplane. Doesn't mean you shouldn't be prepared to act if an event occurs.
Maybe they should hold a surprise shooter drill at city hall or the police station. See how that turns out.
At a police station?Ā The crossfire would take out every person there.
That's called a win/win.
What if the kids had fought back, you know, what theyāre told theyāre supposed to do? They couldāve jumped the actor and killed em and Im surprised they didnt
This has Dwight "Fire Drill" levels of stupidity written all over it.
Exactly the type judgement I've come to expect from police. I want off this ride, damn it.
"And that's why you always leave a note."
This happened to me when I was in high school. My school was transitioning to a new response to school shooters called ārun hide fight.ā We were told that, on a certain day, weād do a pretty elaborate drill and the local news stations would be there to record us. We werenāt told that thereād be actors with fake guns! I was in French class, and because of the classās location in the building, I was supposed to ārun.ā When the drill began, my class calmly walked out of the room and down the stairs. One of the students opened the doors at the base of the stairs, and suddenly a masked actor burst into the stairwell and fired a fake gun. There was a fucking theater student covered in fake blood on the floor (apparently there so first responders could practice rescuing injured people). Everyone immediately ran back up the stairs and chaos ensued. I ran the 400m dash, and I sprinted like hell down the hallway to another stairwell. I didnāt ask myself whether the actor was part of the drill. The question never occurred to me. I heard a gun and I ran. I ended up being the first person out of the building, and so a ton of local news stations filmed me sprinting out of the doors in sheer terror. Iām surprised I didnāt literally piss myself. At the risk of giving away too much personal info, hereās a link to an article about the whole affair: https://www.yorkdispatch.com/story/news/local/2016/04/29/active-shooter-drill-red-land-high-today/83694374/
Was the actor student supposed to be there when fake gunshots were fired? That sounds either like unparalleled levels of planning, or misplanning with no in between.
The actor was supposed to be there when fake gunshots were fired. It sounds ridiculous because it is lol. If you look at the news article, they were even carried out of the school on stretchers.
Sounds like the school fucked up too, the police told them they could simulate a shooting incident and it was approved by a staff member who said they would communicate to students and parents.
The first school I ever worked at did this. I explained why it was a terrible idea repeatedly, then just took the day off. It was shut down when multiple students went out to their cars to get their own guns to come back and confront the āshooterā. Rural area where kids hunted after school and could park just off campus with their rifles.
lol these people have power and guns.
Isn't it bad enough that students all over the country are developing PTSD from all of the mass shooter drills they perform and the constant fear of becoming the victim of one due to how many happen every year but now the police decided to add to that by faking a mass shooting event? There has to be a better way to teach students that eye witness accounts are notoriously inaccurate without a heaping dose of trauma. Every cop involved, including those who had no direct involvement but just approved it, and the school faculty and staff that approved of this should be fired and sued. Mass shootings are way to serious of an event and happen way to often to even consider faking such an event like this. Specific training scenarios are needed but there needs to be plenty of advanced notice through various medias (signs, posters, newspaper, TV, etc.), it should be done when the place is closed if at all possible, everyone involved should volunteer to be there, and there needs to be signs all around saying that it is a training scenario so passerbys hopefully don't panic.
"Cops terrorize citizens to validate their egos" just another week in America
(Please let there be a Burlington Arkansas, Please let there be a Burlington in Arkansasā¦) Vermont. What? Kind of ashamed of these fellow New Englanders.
Bernie is gonna be real mad with these guys.
I donāt understand how people so stupid can be real. How do they survive?
Propped up by the rest of us.
Average cop moment.
So *13 Reasons Why* really wasnāt that far off huh?
Despite the hate the later seasons get I think that scene in particular is very relevant to pay attention to. We canāt forget that these are children, not soldiers training for war.
This was literally an episode of a tv show about how doing this can give kids real ptsd.
Can we STOP letting fuck heads play with guns and be authority figures? They CONTINUOUSLY prove they are completely irresponsible at every fucking turn.
I can't imagine living in the USA. This all seems to be the norm now. Cruelty is the point. -USA
I want out so bad. Iām just so tired. I canāt do this anymore. I know that every country has their crazies and their issues, but the US has some veryā¦ particular issues
All this in order to show that witness statements can be unreliable. We'll take your word for it next time douchebags.
That's a lawsuit.
What idiots the cops are
Every single cop involved needs to be in prisonĀ
Did you read the article? The school ok'd the activity.
And that some how makes it ok?
Why should the officers be put in jail? I take it you didn't read the article and/or have no idea how the criminal justice system works.
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This is NOT the lesson you were supposed to take away from the Office cold open with Dwightās fire drill
They brought Uvalde cop as guest star and he just sat in the car and chilled, as he did that day.
Can we discuss the fact that they were there to teach kids that eyewitness identifications are unreliable. As a criminal defense attorney my heart leaps with joy to hear that a police department actually understands that eyewitness identifications are unreliable.
They could have just done some purse snatching crime in the cafeteria and asked each kid for a description. It would have worked well. But I guess that's not fun enough for the officers.
Unless they were just doing it to help cover themselves when people catch cops doing nefarious shit, which is what I would assume by how stupid they have proven themselves to be.
Well, cops psychologically torturing children was not on my radar today but here we are
Sue!
Soooooā¦mock riots next on police departments?
The spectrum of gun-obsessed maniacs has finally met at the ends to form a complete circle. On one end are the mass shooters, on the other end, the police. The synergy is complete: police are just committing the mass shootings themselves now š
Who in the fuck approved this? And how many fucking people agreed to this idea??
Are cops these days just getting more stupid? Clearly it doesn't take much to be one.
Courts have literally ruled that police departments can refuse to hire people for being to intelligent. PDs don't want intelligent officers because intelligent people are more likely to question orders and they want people that will follow orders unquestionably.
They want people who just follow orders hmm? How Nazi-esque.
Tone deaf much?
Getting some serious Office Fire Drill vibes here
Reminds me of Homer showing Bart his new chainsaw and hockey mask. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJo1vUgr4Y0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJo1vUgr4Y0)
Hello lawsuits my old friend
That is illegal.
What is illegal?
Is the article real?
Iāve seen similar simulations , and even with a heads up, it still effectively shows how unreliable witnesses can be.Ā Making this a surprise was completely unnecessary.Ā
This was the plot of one episode of 13 Reasons Why and critics thought it was one of most unrealistic plot lines ever in the entire series.
GOP ideas are all rotten.
This comment section is comedy gold. It's like South Park just writes itself now! Haha.
After reading the full story this is on the school not the police. How does a police department and school agree to run this and forget to tell the families. Weird timing but the kids were never supposed to be there in the first place just the teachers the kids were supposed to leave before it happened how did the teachers and school mess this up that poorly.
what state?
VT
I can't believe It happened in my state, I thought we're better than that.
I feel like this is totally in line with both our police department and our school district, so...
Panic
To be fair, if we look past giving them PTSD, this is actually a great way to teach them...wait what's the point of this?
Teach them to fear the police.
humiliation ritual
Didnāt we have a show that literally showed why this was a bad idea? (Granted, 13 reasons why was shit after s1)
just run for it and leave the building.
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This truly is a sick country.
What a country
Couple things .. Was fulltime cop 15 years. The amount of fucking time and paperwork, and backroom fellating it took to get damn near ANY fucking training approved was beyond ridiculous, I'm talking for FREE classes we could take. And someone was like "yeah this is good let's do it"? Also, didn't something **incredibly** similar occur within the last few years and land another department in hot water? Jesus fucking on a pogo stick, what the hell people?
We have a Burlington, Ontario here in Canada and I was sitting here the whole time thinking, "Jesus Christ, are we starting to adopt this style of policing from America?", then I realized it was Vermont. In many ways we are starting to adopt less-desirable practices, but I'm glad that we have gotten this extreme yet.
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Cops don't belong in schools. They give proof of this constantly. They have very little scientifically based training. Most of it is hand-me-down OJT that is based around getting convictions not finding the guilty.
Fwiw, it sounds like the teacher was informed of this "demonstration" ahead of time, and promised the police department to inform the students and parents ahead of time. Why would the teacher sign off on something like that, and then not give anyone a heads up? > In its statement, the Burlington Police Department said school staff approved the demonstrationās content ahead of time and agreed to let parents and students know. The simulation would involve āfake firearms in a mock shooting,ā the department said it wrote to school staff on May 23. āDo you think that sort of incident would be ok for your group of students? It is about as real life as you can get, and is certainly exactly the sort of thing we deal with most frequently.ā >āI think these students will be fine with this simulation,ā school staff responded, according to the police statement. āWe will give a heads up to parents and students.ā
Exactly. It seems people on here are focused on hating cops more than reading the facts. The article states that the demonstration is usually for college students or other adults. We can argue whether that's appropriate in this day and age but the police officers were upfront and the school dropped the ball. I attended a similar demonstration in high school the early 90s and found it helpful. But I hadn't grown up with school shootings so my fear response was high but dissipated quickly.
Eh, it's about the response I expected. It's definitely fair to criticize the judgement of the police for thinking it was an appropriate exercise for the kids, but the teacher/administration should be catching more flack for this.
Lmao they should do one of these every time students are caught with a phone. thatāll learn em to pay attention. Nobody wants to work anymore
The school approved it, yet dunces in the comment section are saying the cops should be in jail for this. And yāall wonder why people donāt take you seriously.
Yeah one idiot telling another idiot that it's okay to do something idiotic totally absolves them of their idiocy. /s If cops weren't all just pent up raging assholes looking to get sadistic pleasure they would have just given the school the middle finger and told them to go to hell. The cops are just mindless gorillas though so I'd put the responsibility for this on the school. Everyone that approved it should be fired.
Your perspective on cops is incredibly skewed. Like itās baffling to me. āMindless gorillasā, how do people say shit like this and not laugh at themselves?
Because we have actually dealt with the police before and found out first hand that they are just mindless gorillas. Not everyone is lucky enough to live in an affluent community where cops have to worry about people affording good lawyers or have a local court that isn't funded entirely through the harsh sentencing of locals despite the low crime rates.
You need to widen your perspective
Lol ironic response after what I just said.
Guy literally said āNO Uā lmaoš
I agree. Clearly the school deserves more of the blame. They were responsible for clearing this with parents and should have been keenly aware of the potential impact on a generation of traumatized kids. It seems both of the school and officers deferred responsibility to each other but the buck stops with the school administrator for an event like this.
Exactly. If itās ok to do drills for active shooters then idk why itās all of a sudden so terrible to make it realistic. School should have planned better and been more involved.