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Safety Measures Are Not Enough, Astor Says

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In the aftermath of the fatal shooting at Saugus High School in Santa Clarita, Social Welfare Professor Ron Avi Astor joined the hosts of an EdSource Radio podcast to discuss the importance of school climate and social-emotional learning. Astor argued that law enforcement measures like metal detectors and random searches increase the school-to-prison pipeline and should be used judiciously, if ever. Instead, Astor recommended softening schools to create a better school climate and improve social-emotional learning. Astor pointed out the irony of school drills that assume that the shooter is an outsider, when most of the school shootings that have occurred in the United States have come from current or former students who have a grievance with the school or the school population. “It’s a misnomer that we’re protecting against outside terrorist groups,” Astor said. “The shooters themselves are learning exactly where the students are going, and they know all the drills.”

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Kaplan on Complex Epidemic of Gun Violence

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In the wake of mass shootings in Texas, Ohio and California, Social Welfare Professor Mark Kaplan shared his expertise on gun violence with KNX InDepth. About 300 people are shot, 100 fatally, each day in the United States, and two-thirds of all gun deaths are suicides, not homicides, he said. “The gun violence epidemic is not just one epidemic. It’s multiple epidemics,” he said. Limiting access to weapons could protect victims from catastrophic harm, Kaplan argued. The presence of guns “lethalize” violence and “that’s the central problem that we face today,” he said. Kaplan noted that “California is light-years ahead of most other states in terms of gun legislation” but that has not shielded it from weapons brought in across state lines. The state-by-state approach, with 50 often conflicting policies, is futile, he said. “It’s time that we begin thinking about a national approach to this problem, to this major, urgent public health problem,” he said on the program, beginning at minute 9:25.

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