- published: 01 Dec 2014
- views: 215909
A school shooting is a form of mass shooting involving a gun attack on an educational institution, such as a school or university. The U.S. Secret Service defines them as shootings where schools are "deliberately selected as the location for the attack". These shootings have sparked a political debate over gun violence, zero tolerance policies and gun control. While educational institutions are subject to attacks by outside terrorist groups (for example the Garissa University College attack), this article mainly covers students who plan and carry out murders on their campuses.
The United States has the highest number of school-related shootings. From 2013 to October 2015 there were 142 school shootings in the United States.
School shootings are a topic of intense interest in the United States. A thorough study of 37 incidents involving 41 perpetrators in the United States from 1974 through June 2000 by the Secret Service warned against the belief that a certain "type" of student would be a perpetrator. Any profile would fit too many students to be useful and may not apply to a potential perpetrator. Some lived with both parents in "an ideal, All-American family." Some were children of divorce, or lived in foster homes. A few were loners, but most had close friends. Some experts such as Alan Lipman have warned against the dearth of empirical validity of profiling methods.