Preparing Teachers for the Unthinkable: The Psychological Impacts of a Multi-Option Active Assailant Protocol

• In Event: Research on School Violence

Abstract

We examined the psychological impact of a school district’s multi-option active assailant response training on 180 teachers. In this district the teachers take an online training and then have a day where they participate in a functional exercise. To determine the impact of this training, we asked teachers about a variety of positive and negative psychological outcomes from this exercise as well as how scared they felt after fire and tornado drills. Approximately, 90% of teachers experience no harm with their feelings of fear staying the same or decreasing after the training, which is comparable to how they feel after completing fire or tornado drills.

Authors

• Cheryl Lero Jonson, Xavier University

• Melissa M. Moon, Northern Kentucky University

• Brooke Miller Gialopsos, Seattle University