DENVER — Life in school for students across the country was much simpler and, some would say, more innocent before April 20, 1999, a day that would transform a longstanding cultural belief about just how safe kids were in the classroom.
Before that fateful spring day, schools prepared for little more than fire drills and just about anyone could come onto school grounds without administrators questioning why.
Though little has been accomplished on gun control in the U.S. since the Columbine High School massacre 25 years ago, the same cannot be said of our nation’s schools, which have seen some of the most drastic changes in their day-to-day routines.
“We used to just do fire drills and now we do things like lockdown drills, secure perimeter drills, safety and security drills for our staff, our students and for our leaders,” said David Weiss, the chief of schools for Jeffco Public Schools.
In the years since Columbine, the private security industry that focuses on education has grown to a $3.1-billion industry.
“Unfortunately, there have been other school shootings since Columbine. We study each of those to understand what led to them, and I think those all influence the training and the work that we do here in Jeffco,” Weiss said.
Columbine still remains both the deadliest mass shooting in Colorado, and the deadliest mass shooting at a school in our state. It remained the deadliest mass shooting at a K-12 school in U.S. history until Sandy Hook in December 2012, in which 20 children and 6 adults were killed, and the tragedy at Uvalde in 2022, which ended with 19 children and 2 adults dead.
According to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), nearly every school in the U.S. – 96% – now has a written plan for an active shooter situation, a 17% jump in the past 20 years.
The majority of schools across the country now take steps to secure buildings and classrooms by locking or monitoring doors and loading docks during certain hours (97%) or requiring visitors to sign in or check in and wear a badge once inside (98%), data from the NCES shows.
Campuses have also invested in panic buttons, metal detectors and cameras. If you want to visit your kid – be prepared to show some ID.
“We wouldn't have seen any of that 25 years ago. Our schools were just an open environment that people could come into,” said Jeff Pierson, the executive director of Safety and Security at Jeffco Public Schools.
Pierson talked to Denver7 recently about the evolution of school security in the last 25 years. He oversees 160 school safety personnel, some who are armed. There’s also threat assessment teams, an emergency management team, as well as campus supervisors, he said.
The district – which Columbine High school is a part of – even has its own 911 dispatch center.
“I think we've been forced into the gold standard. I think we are the only district with three school shootings across the nation,” Pierson said.
Pierson walked Denver7 through the Frank DeAngelis Community Safety Center in Wheat Ridge, a decommissioned elementary school turned training ground for law enforcement and educators around the country for an active shooter situation.
“We can give (people) different scenarios, whether it's just the escalation (of a shooting); it can be force on force (training), but the ability to walk into a facility and truly train... we've got sounds of a true environment here,” he said.
What would a person see on a school campus now that they wouldn't have seen 25 years ago?
“You'd see SROs (School Resource Officers) for sure,” Pierson said.
In recent years, however, there’s been growing concern about traumatizing students with these types of drills, mainly from advocates, parents and medical professionals.
The American Academy of Pediatrics has warned against having students participate in active shooter drills that are too realistic, stating in a recent publication that the practices – which at times include the use of real weapons or theatrical makeup to mimic a realistic image of blood – “occur despite an absence of research demonstrating their efficacy and with little guidance on how best to protect children and staff from unintended negative psychological and emotional harm from such exercises.”
Columbine: 25 Years Later
Safe2Tell, created after Columbine, 'making a difference,' Colorado AG says
Meanwhile, anonymous reporting systems have become an invaluable resource in preventing tragedy.
Safe2Tell was started in Colorado in 2004, five years after Columbine. The call center operates 24/7, 365 days a year.
“We know that there are planned attacks on schools that are stopped because of Safe2Tell,” said Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, as he explained how Safe2Tell was used to prevent a tragedy in Steamboat Springs in the fall of 2022 that could have ended similar to Columbine. “We have gotten information about planned attacks, we have shared that with school leaders and with law enforcement, and so we're making a difference.”
The attorney general said that over 160,000 reports have been made to Safe2Tell since the program’s inception, which is about 20,000 reports per year. The majority concern bullying and suicide but many are about credible threats to schools. Weiser said every call is looked into using an appropriate response.
“We're often going to work with school psychologists, school administrators, there may be community mental health professionals, and in some cases, it may be necessary to involve law enforcement,” Weiser said.
It’s difficult to measure if schools are safer today, as each new tragic incident continues to instill fear. Ultimately, educators said the culture of safety is building better relationships in schools and having a positive impact.
“I'm a dad here in Jeffco as well and, you know, for my kids, I think their school experience looks different for several reasons, and not just because of the safety factors,” said Weiss. “I think that the way we teach is different. I think the way that we talk about a culture of belonging is different. I think the way that mental health is involved in schools is different.”
Security leaders Denver7 spoke with said the future of school security will be in architecture. As new schools are built, they will be designed to keep students safer and prevent perpetrators from entering buildings.
“We're going to continue to see continued evolvement when it comes to design of schools and design a mechanism of how elite schools look like and how we can mitigate potential perpetrators entry in our schools at any given time,” Pierson said.
