UO expert drafts violence guide
An Education
Department panel
produced the school
safety guide in the wake
of the Thurston shooting
By Rob Moseley
Associate Editor
A student, armed with a semi
automatic rifle and two pistols,
opened fire in the Thurston High
School cafeteria on May 21, killing
two students and destroying the
serenity of a quiet community. Kip
Kinkel, 16, sits in Lane County Jail
charged with the crime.
A University administrator be
lieves that, armed with a docu
ment released by the U.S. Depart
ment of Education a month ago,
Thurston faculty and schools that
have suffered similar tragedies in
recent months could have gone a
long way to preventing the actions
of Kinkel and other students with
violent tendencies.
“I think it would have reduced
the likelihood of something like
this happening,” said Hill Walker,
co-director of the University’s In
stitute on Violence and Destruc
tive Behavior.
Walker participated this sum
mer in drafting a document titled
“Early Warning, Timely Response:
A Guide to Safe Schools.” The
guide was ordered by President
Clinton while visiting Springfield
in the wake of the Thurston
tragedy and mailed to schools
around the country Aug. 27.
The project was overseen by U.S.
Secretary of Education Richard Ri
ley and Attorney General Janet
Reno, who drew on the knowledge
of a panel that included “experts in
a variety of disciplines, as well as
principals, teachers, pupil person
nel staff, families and youth,” ac
cording to the guide.
Among those experts were
Walker and his IVDB co-director,
Jeff Sprague.
“One of the nice things about
the guide, in my view, is that it
synthesizes and distills very pow
erful research that’s taken place
over the last several decades on
this topic in the fields of psycholo
gy, corrections and education,”
Walker said.
The guide includes eight sec
tions with titles like “Characteris
tics of a School that is Safe and Re
sponsive to All Children,”
“Getting Help for Troubled Chil
dren,” and “Developing a Preven
tion and Response Plan,” but in
cludes just two major goals,
according to Walker.
“One is to tell people — educa
tors, parents, policy makers, com
munity leaders— what to look for
in terms of detecting the signs of
troubled youth,” Walker said.
“And the second part is, once you
know what to look for, once you
see it, what do you do next? What
are your next steps?”
According to the guide, that first
goal includes identifying early warn
ing signs, the first type of which
Walker termed “generic” signs.
More troubling are what Walker
calls "eminent” warning signs, in
cluding bringing weapons to school
with the intent to use them and ex
treme cruelty to animals, both of
which were characteristics Thurston
students said Kinkel displayed.
The Thurston incident was one
of no less than five on-campus
shootings to take place in the na
tion during the past school year.
Other shootings occurred in
Pearl, Miss., Oct. 1; Paducah, Ky.,
two months later; and Jonesboro,
Ark., March 24.
“While the same number, ap
proximately, of tragedies hap
pened this year that have hap
pened in previous years on school
campuses, for some reason this se
ries of tragedies galvanized public
concern and awareness about this
in a way that in previous years it
had not,” Walker said. “And with
respect to this past year, the
Thurston shooting seemed to
cause a sea change.”
According to a senior advisor to
Secretary Riley, one of the results
of that change has been the drafting
of 20 separate initiatives relating to
on-campus violence, Walker said.
Other reactions include a nation
al conference on violence to be
held Oct. 15, as well as a confer
ence hosted by Vice President Gore
“this next year on how to design
and supervise the space and the
physical plan of schools so as to
make them safer, to reduce student
conflict and eliminate areas that are
difficult to supervise,” Walker said.
While those conferences are
scheduled for later this year, the
guide to safer schools was conceived,
developed, produced and dissemi
nated in a two-month time span.
“I’m truly amazed that the gov
ernment could produce such a
quality document in a two month
period," Walker said.
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