Whenever a mass shooting takes place in schools, public discussion often focuses on laws or policies that might have prevented the tragedy. But averting school violence needs more than gun policy. It requires both prevention and crisis response that take students' emotional well-being ' not just their physical safety ' into account. School violence prevention also requires professionals ' counselors, psychologists and social workers ' who know how to create an emotionally safe environment, which research shows is critical to safe schools. Unfortunately, statistics show there is a critical shortage of such employees. Staffing shortages have become a major obstacle to creating schools that are emotionally safe for children. As school psychology professors who train future school psychologists, we know that school counselors, psychologists and social workers are in short supply. Though school shootings have led to increased hiring of police officers to serve in schools, the hiring of...
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