The School Shootings That Weren't
The School Shootings That Weren't
We should know. But we don't.
This spring the U.S. Education Department reported that in the 2015-2016 school year, "nearly 240 schools ... reported at least 1 incident involving a school-related shooting." The number is far higher than most other estimates.
But NPR reached out to every one of those schools repeatedly over the course of three months and found that more than two-thirds of these reported incidents never happened. Child Trends, a nonpartisan nonprofit research organization, assisted NPR in analyzing data from the government's Civil Rights Data Collection.
We were able to confirm just 11 reported incidents, either directly with schools or through media reports.
In 161 cases, schools or districts attested that no incident took place or couldn't confirm one. In at least four cases, we found, something did happen, but it didn't meet the government's parameters for a shooting. About a quarter of schools didn't respond to our inquiries.
"When we're talking about such an important and rare event, [this] amount of data error could be very meaningful," says Deborah Temkin, a researcher and program director at Child Trends.
"I think someone pushed the wrong button," said Jeff Davis, an assistant superintendent there. The outgoing superintendent, Joe Richards, "has been here for almost 30 years and he doesn't remember any shooting," Davis added. "We are in this weird vortex of what's on this screen and what reality is."
That's some good reporting. I'm glad someone had a critical eye on the numbers.
Comments
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It’s too bad that school shootings are even a statistic that needs investigation.
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You're just downplaying the 346 school shootings so far this week.
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Fake news. Trump is covering these school shootings up. He doesnt care about the kids.
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Somebody HAS to do SOMETHING!!!
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If we didn't have school we wouldn't have school shootings
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Schools are too busy going on strike right now to worry about shootings.
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They count anything that happens close to a school. When you live in shit town with shit people they don't care if they commit crimes near a school. But counting stuff that isn't actually at the school is the liberals way of fudging numbers for political purposes.
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Read the article. The number is less the result of an agenda than really shitty survey design, data collection, and quality control.Sledog said:They count anything that happens close to a school. When you live in shit town with shit people they don't care if they commit crimes near a school. But counting stuff that isn't actually at the school is the liberals way of fudging numbers for political purposes.
Agendas come in after. -
ThudSledog said:They count anything that happens close to a school. When you live in shit town with shit people they don't care if they commit crimes near a school. But counting stuff that isn't actually at the school is the liberals way of fudging numbers for political purposes.
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Figures never lie but liars figure.ThomasFremont said:
ThudSledog said:They count anything that happens close to a school. When you live in shit town with shit people they don't care if they commit crimes near a school. But counting stuff that isn't actually at the school is the liberals way of fudging numbers for political purposes.
