Safety Drills: Protecting Students Throughout the Years

Safety drills in school have changed severely in the past couple years. We have gone from training students on duck and cover drills to help protect from nuclear threats to teaching kids on how to barricade classrooms in the case of school shootings. The main threats on schools have changed dramatically from the 1990’s to today, going from being scared of other countries attacking America to being afraid of the student struggling with his or her mental health next to you in math. Schools have had to pick what tragic events are more possible, and which one to try to prevent.

          In the 1990’s, drills inside of schools were a lot different. During this time, we were very worried about nuclear war between countries. This was a time where many countries were creating the nuclear bomb, and we were also getting closer to the end of the Cold War, which was causing some concern for our country. Schools were teaching students drills on how to protect themselves as much as possible from the blast of a nuclear bomb. This drill was called the “ Duck and Cover” drill, where students would go underneath their desks in a protective position. This wouldn’t do much against the blast, but it’s about all that people could do.

          Today, we have completely different drills protecting against a whole new type of threat, school shootings. Instead of ducking and covering from bombs, we have now been taught to barricade doors, turn off lights, and hide from potential threats inside of our school. Even though nuclear threats are still possible, we as a country have decided that school shootings are a lot more common, so we focus more on those. We have trained for these sad occasions, and hopefully this can save many lives over time.