Mass. Schools Consider Training to Confront Active Shooters
Active Shooter Protocols in Education Settings
In Canton, Mass., and in a growing number of schools nationwide, police and school officials are training teachers, staff and, eventually, students that in some cases they should fight against armed attackers.
According to an article from the Boston Globe, the standard instructions for a Columbine-style event were to lock down and hide, but school officials in Canton have quietly adopted a program called ALICE (Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, Evacuate) this year. School personnel at Canton High School and Blue Hills Regional Technical School in Canton are being trained to make active decisions, such as barricading classroom doors; coordinating on-the-spot evacuations; and, if all else fails, throwing objects and using body weight to take down a shooter, the article says.