Picture this. You are a student in 8th grade at Kentucky and you’re about to graduate and go to a high school. There is only one month left of school, when suddenly, in your math class, an announcement comes on the innercomm that there has been a shooting near your school. You think nothing at first, but on your way to your next class, you hear gunshots. BANG! BANG! BANG! You and your best friend run and hide somewhere. You hear footsteps near you and get scared. You hear someone running and a single bullet is heard fired. You peek out of your hiding place and see blood on the floor. Someone has been shot. The shooter starts to walk away, and you make a run for it. You hear more shots as you run. You panic and run as fast as possible. As you're running downstairs to the exit, your friend is shot in the leg. You hear his ear-piercing screech, and the sound forever rings in your ears. You have to choose if you leave him and make a quicker escape, or save him, which could risk your possibility of getting out of the building. You decide to help him, and the shooter starts to come down from the steps. You hear the stairs creaking as you start to run as fast as possible with your friend while making a call to the police. You make it out alive with your friend and run to a policeman and ask for help for your friend. Two days later, you’re on your bed, feeling depressed, when you get a call. You learn bad news. Your friend has lost his leg so he could survive the shot. You start to think of commiting suicide. You think of all the damage caused by only one person. You start to feel even more depressed. One week later, you start taking antidepressants for your depression. One day later, school starts up again. You’re scared of going back, but you still go. Five months later, you are put in the hospital for your attempted suicide. These causes are just a few of the causes caused by shootings in schools. 

Shootings are growing more common and the possibility to buy a gun is very easy, with the possible ways of buying a gun growing even easier. Congress has tried nothing to stop this. Only the people can stop this. Think of how you were pictured being almost killed. How do you think your parents felt? If it wasn’t for the weak gun laws in your community, lives would have been saved. Think of the other people that could be hurt in the future. Think about all the pain that would be saved. Think about that.

Mass shootings have been wreaking havoc on many people. There have been lives lost, and there have been many injuries. However, what many people don’t know is that school shootings also take a toll on people, specifically children. There are hundreds of school shootings every year, with 163 shootings since 2018. People ask themselves why these shootings happen, and the answer is answered by Joan Tupponce, as she writes  “It’s a simple question, but the answers are extremely complicated. There are some political overtones to it. Guns are ubiquitous in the U.S. There are more guns than people. The U.S. population is about 334 million and the number of guns in the U.S. is more than 390 million” (Tupponce 2). There are more guns than humans. Who knows what will happen. How will people end this? Can they end this? All these shootings, school or not school shootings, happen, and nobody knows what the main cause of it is. In most cases, though, it ties back to the 2nd amendment. The 2nd amendment is a law that gives people the right to bear arms, or own a gun.  The FindLaw Staff found that some people suspect that “At the time it was passed, it seems it was not intended to grant a right for private individuals to keep weapons for self-defense.” (FindLaw Staff 1) The 2nd amendment was something that no one knows why it was made in the first place. If we don’t do anything about these shootings, we will be living in a very different future. Thousands of lives will be lost, and people with guns will overpower everyone. Due to the vast amount of shootings in schools and  easy ways for people to obtain guns, the Congress should strengthen gun laws and safety across America because kids will feel more safe going to school and won’t worry about being shot.

Situations involving guns in schools and/or anywhere are mostly involved in something connecting the shooter and the target. Most people who have been shot have been found to be shot by someone who had a connection to the victim. Most people don’t know, but if they’re being targeted, it could be for something they did. Recent studies by Lisa Geller have found that “In more than two-thirds (68.2%) of mass shootings analyzed, the perpetrator either killed family or intimate partners or the shooter had a history of domestic violence” (Geller 1). If people were shot by someone they’ve always had a questionable history with, that wouldn’t stop them from injuring/killing their families. However, people won’t just kill people because of a history with that person. A psychologist named John Van Dreal addresses this, saying that “‘Someone went out of their way to target and kill children who look like our children, teachers who look like our teachers — and did it for no other reason than to hurt them,’ says Van Dreal. ‘And that's very personal’ “ (Chatterjee 1). An example of this was the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012, where a 20 year old named Adam Lanza broke into a school and killed 26 people, 20 of them being students. The reason for this shooting was…nothing. Lanza killed all of the students and teachers for nothing. Lanza was a sick, sick man, who decided to kill 26 innocent humans and himself for basically no reason. This is why shootings need to stop. This is why the Congress should do something about these shootings. This is why guns shouldn’t be allowed to be given to people. This is why school shootings happen.  

Shootings at schools make students scared to go to school and make families worried for their children. When a shooting happens in a school, students will most likely be killed and/or hurt. However, when a shooting happens near a school, even the slightest damage is done. Kids may start to become paranoid that if they go to school, they will be shot by someone, and they’re parents may get worried for them. Studies by Rossin Maya-Slater show that “While many students are physically unharmed, studies have consistently found consequences to their mental health, educational, and economic trajectories that last for years, and potentially decades, to come” (Slater 4). This could end up breaking the students' minds. There is a certain pill called an “Antidepressant,” which mostly helps with stopping depression and anxiety. Slater found something shocking that ties in with this pill. She found that “the average monthly number of antidepressant prescriptions written to youth under age 20 by providers located near schools that experienced a fatal shooting was 21.3 percent higher relative to providers located farther away in the two to three years following a shooting than in the two years before” (Slater 4). This shows that children are affected by shootings, even if not right next to them. The shootings that happen in or outside of schools can cause mental issues in their brain So badly, in fact, that students are taking pills so they can stop feeling depressed. If we didn’t allow guns to the public, none of this would happen.

The ability for people to easily buy guns is getting out of control and is starting to take a toll on students, physically and mentally. People who buy guns may not mean bad intentions, but others may want to do harm with their brand new gun. In other words, schools are being put at risk of a chance of a shooting. Indivisible staff showed that  “Under current federal law, an 18 year old can legally buy a semi-automatic rifle” (Indivisible 5) What’s more,  “Some states have passed laws to increase the minimum age to 21 for certain types of gun sales, but states could pass laws to make 21 the minimum age for all gun purchases” (Indivisible 5). It’s not going to be long until people under the age of 13 can buy guns. What’s happening to the world? Has Congress even thought of the consequences? Kids could bring guns to school. How many deaths would there be then? What would we do then? Age isn’t just the only problem with people getting shot, however. An even worse reason people are being shot is because of gender and skin differences. Indivisible found something that supports this claim, saying “Trayvon Martin, an unarmed 17-year-old teenager, was shot walking home because he ‘looked suspicious’ (read: because he was black). His killer, George Zimmerman, was found not guilty due to Florida’s “shoot first” or “stand your ground” law, which allows a person to use deadly force in a public place in self-defense, even if such force can be avoided by the person’s retreat” (Indivisible 9). People are just shooting people because of differences. We’re all just people! We don’t need to kill each other because of looks. I wouldn’t want to say that all of this is because of mankind, but it is. If it wasn’t for our decisions, countless lives would’ve been saved. Think about Sandy Hook. If it wasn’t for us, the shooting at Sandy Hook may not have happened. If it wasn’t for us, we would all be safe from the dangers of shootings.

Students and Staff in schools are afraid to go to school after a shooting occurs, which could mean a need for a security system. School shootings are becoming even more common, and there is barely a system to check for guns going into a school. Shown on a graph, in 2020, there were 62 school shootings, which is still a lot, but in 2021 there were 193 shootings in schools. That’s over 100 more shootings than in 2020. If this number keeps rising, in 2024, there could be over 300 shootings in schools. However, if we had security, like a security team and metal detector, at every school, it may not completely stop shootings, but it could decrease deaths by being shot in a shooting. If we actually tried, “Prevention efforts can also reduce the relatively rare occasions when severe mental illness contributes to homicide or the more common circumstances when depression or other mental illness contributes to suicide” (Apa.org  1).  As you can see, adding security can reduce stress and mental health issues. Many lives will be saved not just from shootings, but from students feeling so depressed, they kill themselves. We have the necessary funds to make this possible, too, as PBS states “There is already roughly $100 billion sitting in the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund that can be used for this purpose.” What’s more “Schools should have secured, limited entry points, and increased funding for school resource officers. School officials with prior military or law enforcement experience should be allowed to carry firearms” (PBS 3). If we had these procedures, schools would be at less risk of being the host of a shooting, or at least less likely to be shot by a shooter. These procedures are active at some schools, and if at all schools, our community would be much safer.

The gun laws are at an all time low and are growing lower, which is why we need to do something about it before our schools are affected by these laws. Some states are already as low as they can be, where crime is really bad and a shooting is very common. Take Rhode Island for example, as the Everytown Research team states “a state like Rhode Island has low gun violence relative to the strength of its laws—likely due in part to its very low gun ownership rate (it’s fourth-lowest in the nation)” (Everytown Research & Policy 3). If places with gun laws keep on slowly falling, then hundreds of schools will host shootings and lives will be lost. We need to strengthen these gun laws before we all are shot. There was a study led by the Everytown Research & Policy Staff looking at guns that showed up in shootings, and the results showed something shocking.  “Out of all guns showing up at crime scenes after crossing state lines, four out of five come from states that lack good background check laws” (Everytown Research & Policy 2). This means if you live in a place with a bad policy for gun laws, then you might need to move, which would be a problem. Say you are trying to leave the state to get to a place with a more secure law. Now, there are multiple problems with this. For one, if you’re trying to move to one place in particular, there would probably be limited places to move to. What’s more, if you were a child, your family would have to pay for you to get into a school, even if they could get you into one. This could leave them with not a lot of money, making you and your family have a limited supply of backup money if something went wrong. Everytown Research states that “When we compare the states head-to-head on the top 50 gun safety policies, a clear pattern emerges. States with strong laws see less gun violence. Indeed, the 14 states that have failed to put basic protections into place—’national failures’ on our scale—have nearly triple the rate of gun deaths as the eight national gun safety leaders” (Everytown Research & Policy 1). This means if you had stayed in a place with bad laws, you’d have triple the chance of being shot, even in schools. If we strengthened the gun laws, schools and your community would be at a lower risk of being shot. 

As you can see, lives have been lost due to mass shootings in schools. If we fixed the laws in some places, Our economy and the world would be at less risk of death than it is now. If we didn’t fix the laws, and you lived in a poor city with weak gun laws, you would have to be careful when at a school. Not just a school, either. Anywhere. Even at your house there would be a risk of being shot since someone may try and rob you. I know that you don’t want a situation like the situation shown earlier in this essay to happen to someone else, so make a change. Stand up for your belief and state your statement. Do what’s right for the world. Do what’s right to change the future that’s ahead of you.

Works Cited

Chatterjee, Rhitu. “School Shooters: Understanding Their Path to Violence Is Key to Prevention.” NPR, 29 May 2022, www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/02/10/690372199/school-shooters-whats-their-path-to-violence.

Geller, Lisa. “Study: Two-Thirds of Mass Shootings Linked to Domestic Violence.” The Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence, 1 June 2021, efsgv.org/press/study-two-thirds-of-mass-shootings-linked-to-domestic-violence/.

Geller, Lisa. “Study: Two-Thirds of Mass Shootings Linked to Domestic Violence.” The Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence, 1 June 2021, efsgv.org/press/study-two-thirds-of-mass-shootings-linked-to-domestic-violence/.

N/A, N/A. “Gun Safety Policies Save Lives.” Everytown Research & Policy, 8 May 2023, everytownresearch.org/rankings/.

N/A, N/A. “Gun Violence in Kentucky - Everystat.Org.” Gun Violence in Gun Violence, Jan. 2022, everystat.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Gun-Violence-in-Kentucky-2.pdf.

N/A, N/A. “How States Can Prevent Gun Violence.” Indivisible, indivisible.org/resource/how-states-can-prevent-gun-violence.

N/A, N/A. “How to Stop Shootings and Gun Violence in Schools: A Plan to Keep Students Safe.” Everytown Research & Policy, 8 May 2023, everytownresearch.org/report/how-to-stop-shootings-and-gun-violence-in-schools/.

N/A, N/A. “We Asked Every Senator What Action Should Be Taken on Guns. Here’s What They Said.” PBS, 26 May 2022, www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/what-action-should-be-taken-on-guns-we-asked-every-senator.

N/A. “Gun Violence: Prediction, Prevention, and Policy.” American Psychological Association, 2013, www.apa.org/pubs/reports/gun-violence-prevention.

Rossin-Slater, Maya. “Surviving a School Shooting: Impacts on the Mental Health, Education, and Earnings of American Youth.” Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR), June 2022, siepr.stanford.edu/publications/health/surviving-school-shooting-impacts-mental-health-education-and-earnings-american.

Tupponce, Joan. “Why Do School Shootings Keep Happening in the United States?” VCU News, 17 June 2022, news.vcu.edu/article/2022/06/why-do-school-shootings-keep-happening-in-the-united-states.