Poll: Most believe schools have become less safe

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

Twenty years after the Columbine High School shooting made practicing for armed intruders as routine as fire drills, many parents have only tepid confidence in the ability of schools to stop a gunman, according to a new poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

And while most Americans consider schools less safe than they were 20 years ago, the poll finds a majority say schools aren’t at fault for shootings. Bullying, the availability of guns, the internet and video games share more of the blame.

Half of Americans blame students being bullied a great deal for school shootings. Roughly a third say the same of the internet and television, music and video games.

By and large, schools themselves are less likely to be blamed: 59 percent put not much or no blame on schools for the shootings. While roughly 4 in 10 say schools have at least some responsibility, just 9 percent attribute a great deal of blame.

In the years since two Colorado teenagers gunned down 12 classmates and a teacher in the Denver suburb of Littleton, schools across the country have fixated on planning for threats that before had been unimaginable.