Taking Aim at Gun Violence in Schools

The College of Education hosted a “crucial conversation” with the community Tuesday on a troubling and challenging issue in education—gun violence in schools.

Two Lehigh alumni, Bethlehem Area School Superintendent Joseph Roy ’09 Ph.D. and psychologist and author Peter Langman ’00 Ph.D., offered their expertise in a 90-minute dialog with the program’s moderator and the audience, including teachers and school administrators.

“I truly wish that we did not have to have this conversation tonight about gun violence in schools,” said College of Education Dean William Gaudelli. “I wish that it could be some other focus, something more constructive rather than destructive, an idea that gives us hope rather than filling us with despair.

“But this is what is before us, thrust into prominence by a 24-7 media focus and catastrophes in schools too numerous to bear,” he said. Even one school shooting is one too many, he added.

Questions at the event centered on perceptions and frequency of school shootings, possible warning signs, prevention, and lessons learned, including from the 2018 attack that resulted in the deaths of 17 students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida.

In an exchange with moderator Nicole Johnson, assistant professor of counseling psychology, Roy and Langman offered some hopeful perspectives.

“Overall, schools are the safest places our kids can be,” Langman said. In his talks, he often makes the point that “when it comes to school safety, prepare, but don’t panic.”

Langman said that people’s fears are often magnified and distorted by statistics that can be alarming. Getting accurate data can be complicated, he said, because the definitions of mass school shootings differ among people and groups.