Twenty years after the Columbine High School massacre, students raised in an era of mass shootings are attuned to any potential threat, reports the Denver Post. The paper ’s investigation of lockout and lockdown data gathered from the state’s 25 largest school districts demonstrates it’s a rare week when students aren’t shuttered within a building to protect them from a hazard. For the 18 school districts that provided at least two decades of data, the amount of lockouts — events where the doors were locked, but classes continued as normal — rose into the 2017-18 school year by 52 percent in the 2016-17 school year. They resulted from police action but students were also retained by districts inside because coyotes or bears had wandered into the area.
Lockdowns increased by 55 percent at the time for those districts, though they only accounted for about one of every seven incidents. Lockdowns were a response to a threat within a school. About 10 percent were because somebody hit on an alarm. The data are an undercount, because many districts don’t track security events, but it does provide a window into the adventures of Colorado students. “It’s become as regular as fire drills,” said Melissa Craven, director of emergency management at Denver Public Schools, whose year were tops among all districts. “We don’t have many students that have begun their career with us who aren’t. ”
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