School shootings are a topic that nobody likes to discuss, and it’s for good reason. But eventually, you have to realize that gun violence has been, and will stay, a prominent issue for years. Recently, it’s only gotten worse. That’s what this article is going to cover: the recent rise in school shootings.
School shootings took a large dip during 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which is understandable. Less schools physically open means a lower risk of a school shooting. But after the pandemic lockdown, and when schools went back to a near-normal, school shootings returned as well, and spiked to record numbers. The situation has gotten so bad that, according to the National Library of Health (A part of News In Health) “Over the past few decades, school shootings in the USA have become relatively commonplace: there were more in 2021 than in any year since 1999”. Guns are also the leading cause of death of children and teens in America, which is in part due to these school shootings. The National Center for Education (NCEP) reported that between 2021 and 2022 ALONE, school shootings doubled to 327, with 188 deaths.
But there’s more to the story, and it all lies behind numbers. The National Library Of Health, in the same article, pointed out multiple statistics about these events. According to their research, 58% of school shooters had connections to the school they targeted, and 77% of the time, somebody knew of the shooter’s intentions before the shooting happened. The National Center for Education Statistics published findings in June 2022 which pointed out that, “The impacts on our nation’s youth are profound. Notably, gun violence disproportionately affects boys, especially Black boys, with much higher gun deaths per capita for this group than for any other group of youth. Likewise, Black girls are disproportionately affected compared to girls from other ethnic/racial groups….gun violence deaths resulting from school shootings are at their highest recorded levels ever.” Being an African-American male, this statistic is revealing.
Gun violence is a large issue in our society. But the problem isn’t usually rooted in the people themselves. It instead sprouts from social conditions. Do your own research so you can fully understand the issue and its complexity. Until researching to write this, I thought school shootings happened at a smaller scale. It is important for everyone to know the numbers because this shows how big of an issue it is.