Recordings
Lola
Age 11, 6th Grade
“You're just sitting with your knees on your chest and you're just sitting there afraid. You're thinking of all the things that could be happening. Is it a drill? Is it not a drill? If it's not a drill who's in the school?”
Ashley
Mother of Two, Preschool Facilitator
“If you're saying, "This is not a drill, this is not a drill," are they really going to take it seriously when it really is the real thing?”
Jennifer
High School English Teacher
“You are supposed to have it together. They're supposed to be kids, and it puts you in this space where you don't know anything. I couldn't have helped them. They know that, and there's just a sickness.”
Graedy
Age 13, 8th Grade
“The teachers were trying to comfort the crying kids to their best abilities and also trying to keep them quiet because while this was a code red, they thought that there was a shooter in the building, that they were all going
to die.”
Kai
Age 14, 9th Grade
“I started crying a little bit because I was a little scared. I wasn't really paying attention to anyone else. I was more so thinking too much to myself. I had my hands like this, my knees were up to my face and I was balled in.”
Leo
High School Graduate
“I guess they made me feel safe, but at the same time, I don't know how much it would help. But I don't know what a better solution would be, I guess, because everybody just running, trying to get out of the school freaking out wouldn't be better.”
Aliyah
Age 9, 3rd Grade
“I went under the table where one of [my friends] was sitting down and I saw her shaking because she was so scared. I was just tapping my feet and I was like, "I want to go to my mom. I want to see her again."
Maddox
Age 12, 7th Grade
“My fellow schoolmates talking about drills, like, "That color red drill was really scary." Yes, it was. A lot of them, they stay silent, they don't really talk about it. They don't want to think about them.”
Dhilan
Age 7, 1st Grade
“The alarm kept going on and my ears felt like they were burning. Because of the noise, and I feel like the policemen out the window are actually evil spies in disguise.”
Amanda M.
Special Education Teacher
“I would do anything that I could to keep my students safe. I don't know that this is the right way to do it. I don't know.”
Sri
Age 20, High School Graduate
“I feel like that's kind of trauma-inducing, just to spring it up on kids, and I don't think it's necessary either. If we're constantly doing these drills and we don't know whether it's real or not.”
Malik
Age 11, 5th Grade
“I kept thinking that since I was the nearest to the door if anyone got in, I would be the first one to die. I just felt like, "This is it for me. I'm dead. I'm not going to make it." I could hardly even think. That's all I could hear in my mind.
Mike
High School Physics Teacher
“Are there ways they could maybe do it better? I'm sure this isn't something you can test. There's no science here. The perception of us doing something to keep the students safe, I think, often wins out over keeping the
students safe.”
Annabelle
High School English Teacher
“I think they should keep doing drills [b]ecause I like doing it. It makes me feel safer. It's practice before something bad happens.”
Stacy
High School English Teacher
“I think the terror, the code, I think they should do away with it. We shouldn't be screwing with kids’ mental health more than we already are. It's a horrible sound, horrible like a car alarm, like a searing car.”
Tennessee
Age 12, 7th Grade
“The older you get, the more we used to it you are. It's a little scary. It's a little panicky, and when it starts to go on through a while, I remember this one where it lasted three periods in fifth grade.”
Amanda H.
Preschool and Kindergarten Teacher
“I've seen some kids that get very scared, some kids who don't really realize it's a serious situation, and they're just laughing and having a good time. They may come to me the next day and say, "That was scary.”
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