TN teachers stage fake gunman attack on 6th graders (merged threads)

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Tennessee teachers stage fake gunman attack
Staged assault on 6th-graders unfolds on school trip; parents not amused

Updated: 2 hours, 59 minutes ago
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. - Staff members of an elementary school staged a fictitious gun attack on students during a class trip, telling them it was not a drill as the children cried and hid under tables.

The mock attack Thursday night was intended as a learning experience and lasted five minutes during the weeklong trip to a state park, said Scales Elementary School Assistant Principal Don Bartch, who led the trip.

“We got together and discussed what we would have done in a real situation,” he said.

But parents of the sixth-grade students were outraged.

“The children were in that room in the dark, begging for their lives, because they thought there was someone with a gun after them,” said Brandy Cole, whose son went on the trip.

Some parents said they were upset by the staff’s poor judgment in light of the April 16 shootings at Virginia Tech that left 33 students and professors dead, including the gunman.

During the last night of the trip, staff members convinced the 69 students that there was a gunman on the loose. They were told to lie on the floor or hide underneath tables and stay quiet. A teacher, disguised in a hooded sweat shirt, even pulled on a locked door.

After the lights went out, about 20 kids started to cry, 11-year-old Shay Naylor said.

“I was like, ‘Oh My God,’ “ she said. “At first I thought I was going to die. We flipped out.”

Principal Catherine Stephens declined to say whether the staff members involved would face disciplinary action, but said the situation “involved poor judgment.”

© 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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Well it was a wake up call. Unfortunately kids at that age are not in a position to do anything other than what they are told to do as a general rule.
To stage an incident scares them but provides them with very little in the way of real and usefull info on what to do. Training scenarios are useful and the more realistic the better but this strikes me as being more like a bad episode of "punked" rather than a useful event.
 
Yes, kids at that age are not well enough equipped to deal with a situation such as this...but...Do we want to teach them to simply lie on the floor and cover their eyes? Is this the end result of the 'exercise'?
 
Government School Idiocy

People, these are the things that we are allowing to happen in the name of education. If the teachers union in Tennessee is as strong as most of them, those "educators" involved in this terrible deed are probably tenured, and will be slapped on the wrist, at worse. If you have kids or grandkids in public schools, sell anything you must to put them in private school!!!! And the hell of it is, we still have to pay our taxes to support them!!:fire:
 
WHY? Why would they use 6th graders as test subjects? What knowledge or experience could possibly be gleamed from this group of utterly defenseless children?
 
“The children were in that room in the dark, begging for their lives, because they thought there was someone with a gun after them,”
Click to expand...
Emotional trauma is good for children, it provides many test subjects for psycho analysis in the future.
but then they probably have a pill they can give them to get over this
 
Everyone at that school should be fired that was involved in that. The principal obviously knew it was happening. That is just horrific. And that's odd to hear coming from me, I hate kids of any type.
 
Kids at that age are going to have trouble dealing with such a stressful situation. They were under the impression there was a gunman in the building, and anyone with half a brain can figure out they're in direct danger of losing their life.

I hope every single family with a student at that school sues the town. They had absolutely no right to place children under such a high amount of stress.

Oh, and don't think that just because it was fake doesn't mean those children won't have problems later on. Those children have to live with the fact that authoritative figures, whom should be those a child at that age looks up to and trust, voluntarily put them in what they perceived to be a direct threat on their life.

I hope everyone involved loses their job. There is absolutely no good reason for them to do such a thing. Last time I checked, the job of school employees is to educate their students. No where in any curriculum anywhere is there included a part about telling children they're about to die.
 
The one thing nobody mentioned: how many of these traumatized kiddies is going to grow up to be an anti? The idiots who planned this "drill" are almost certainly antis, and although the article never mentions it, I'm sure that the discussion took an anti-gun slant. Either way, kids are not equipped to deal with situations like this, and instead tend to develop a phobia of the components of the threat, such as the firearm...

Now when any of these kids enters a gun shop, he'll have horrible flashbacks and an urge to dive under the table.

--Len.
 
TN teachers stage fake gunman attack on 6th graders

Hmmm.

Is there any training value in doing this?

Part of me thinks yes ... sixth graders aren't exactly two-year olds.

If your kid was involved, wonder what you would be thinking.

-s

Teachers stage fake gunman attack on sixth graders

Story Highlights
• Staff members convinced 69 students there was a gunman on the loose
• Students cried and hid under tables during the fake attack
• Parents of the sixth graders were outraged
• Principal Catherine Stephens said the situation "involved poor judgment"


MURFREESBORO, Tennessee (AP) -- Staff members of an elementary school staged a fictitious gun attack on students during a class trip, telling them it was not a drill as the children cried and hid under tables.

The mock attack Thursday night was intended as a learning experience and lasted five minutes during the weeklong trip to a state park, said Scales Elementary School Assistant Principal Don Bartch, who led the trip.

"We got together and discussed what we would have done in a real situation," he said.

But parents of the sixth-grade students were outraged.

"The children were in that room in the dark, begging for their lives, because they thought there was someone with a gun after them," said Brandy Cole, whose son went on the trip.

Some parents said they were upset by the staff's poor judgment in light of the April 16 shootings at Virginia Tech that left 33 students and professors dead, including the gunman.

During the last night of the trip, staff members convinced the 69 students that there was a gunman on the loose. They were told to lie on the floor or hide underneath tables and stay quiet. A teacher, disguised in a hooded sweat shirt, even pulled on a locked door.

After the lights went out, about 20 kids started to cry, 11-year-old Shay Naylor said.

"I was like, 'Oh My God,' " she said. "At first I thought I was going to die. We flipped out."

Principal Catherine Stephens declined to say whether the staff members involved would face disciplinary action, but said the situation "involved poor judgment."
 
"I submit that what they did constitutes assault"

IANAL, but I'll bet your right about that. Look at all the trouble kids get into if they are even overheard talking about guns in school.

About them growing up to be antis, well, probably. But at 12 years of age, I wonder if any of them were wishing they had a gun of their own?

This is the dumbest damned thing I've heard of in some time. I wonder how many "counselors" they're going to have to bus in for this one? :rolleyes:
 
Teachers stage fake gunman attack

http://www.cnn.com/2007/EDUCATION/05/13/faked.attack.ap/index.html?eref=rss_topstories

"MURFREESBORO, Tennessee (AP) -- Staff members of an elementary school staged a fictitious gun attack on students during a class trip, telling them it was not a drill as the children cried and hid under tables."

Yet another reason schools should NOT be a "gun free zone". For their sake, they're lucky it was lest someone get shot. Do you think for one minute that the teachers would have performed this plan [without announcing it's a drill] if they knew there were armed citizens about?
 
Massive school personnel firings in 5...4...3...2...

Just when I think I've seen stupid, something like this comes up. :banghead: :fire: :cuss: If my kid had been in that, I'd be on the phone to the superintendent of schools demanding some serious changes in the administration and staff. Idjits.

Springmom
 
Wow. If I was the parents of one of those kids, I'd beat the everlovin' you-know-what out of whatever moron who thought that it was a good idea.

Unreal. and this is why I want my kids homeschooled, when and if I ever have any. Between the risk of the horny teachers, the idiot teachers, the downright stupid teachers and the general warzone that our pblic schools are becoming...junior is staying home with good old dad and learning his lessons in a safe place.
 
I believe we are going to see more of these type of "drills". We had a similar drill conducted at a HS in our area several months ago. Except it wasn't the teachers who conducted the drill, but instead the armed police. I expect to see more of this in the future.
 
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