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Many schools across the country have increased security and some have closed as school shooting threats continue to circulate on social media.

According to Everytown for Gun Safety, at least three dozen school shooting threats have been made on social media in the week since the deadly shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia. Dozens of children and teens have also been arrested as a result, USA Today reports.

More than 30 Georgia teens have been charged, often with felony terrorist threats, since the Apalachee shooting, according to 11 Alive. The state Department of Juvenile Justice said 24 teens were booked into its facilities in the 48 hours after the attack. Atlanta Public Schools also increased campus security Thursday due to “social media posts currently circulating about threats of violence,” the district police department said.

In Florida, arrests were made in two school threat cases over the weekend. A 13-year-old boy was arrested Sunday, accused of making social media threats against Madison County schools on Instagram. A 14-year-old high school student was arrested Saturday for allegedly making written threats to kill or conduct a mass shooting. She posted multiple stories on Instagram on Saturday that contained threats, including one post that listed several schools across Broward County. Two days after the Apalachee school shooting, a 13-year-old girl was arrested for threatening on Instagram to carry out a shooting at her Hillsborough County middle school.

In New Jersey, three people were taken into custody in connection to online threats made against schools in four districts. Screenshots from TikTok posted on community Facebook pages showed the threats and list of schools, including schools in the Woodbury, Deptford, Glassboro, and Haddon Heights districts.

Woodbury City School District Superintendent Andrew Bell posted a statement on its website saying schools would be closed on Monday. The threat was not believed to be credible, he wrote, but that the district was “exercising extreme caution to ensure the safety of our students, staff, and families.” He also urged families to “remain vigilant” and report any relevant information to law enforcement or school district officials. Deptford Township School District Superintendent Kevin Kanauss also decided to close its schools Monday “out of an abundance of caution.”

In Tennessee, 11 Knox County Schools students have been arrested in connection with threats made against the district. Since Sept. 6, the Knoxville Police Department arrested seven students and the Knox County Sheriff’s Office arrested four. All are between the ages of 11 and 14 and have been charged with threats of violence. A new state law makes it a felony to threaten to commit an act of mass violence at a school or school-related activity. The threats can also be classified as federal felonies, the FBI says. Knox County school officials said attendance was down about 25% on Sept. 11.

In Missouri, threats were made against several school buildings. A student was taken into custody Monday after allegedly making a “vague social media threat” on TikTok against a Lee’s Summit middle school. Another arrest was made on Monday after reports of Snapchat threats against Blue Springs High School. Also on Monday, a letter was sent to families after a bomb threat was reported at Eisenhower Middle School in Kansas City.

In Pennsylvania, the Susquenita School District canceled classes for all schools Monday following a school shooting threat made on social media that led to the arrest of a student. Another post allegedly listed the names of multiple students, according to ABC7. The school district said the Pennsylvania State Police are investigating the incident. A post made on Snapchat Wednesday night threatening a shooting at two middle schools in Pennsylvania’s Cumberland County.

Also in Pennsylvania, Lower Allen Township Borough of Police announced the person responsible for making threats on Snapchat against multiple middle schools in the West Shore School District on Sept. 11 has been identified. The juvenile suspect has not been charged but there was an increased police presence at schools Thursday.

In South Carolina, at least fifteen students have been charged with making threats of violence towards schools, The State reports. In North Carolina, another shooting threat posted on social media listed dozens of schools as targets.

“The threat was communicated via social media and listed over 40 North Carolina schools. Some schools had dates listed next to them,” the North Carolina Information Sharing and Analysis Center (NC ISAAC) wrote in a statement on Sept. 10. “Law enforcement has determined there is no credible threat.”

NC ISAAC also said the person behind the threats has been identified and “intervention has been conducted.”

On Monday, Sept. 9, dozens of students left Pisgah High School in Canton, N.C., after the school reportedly received threats of a potential school shooting. Students who walked out said the situation began on Friday when students reported social media threats to the school on Friday and Monday, ABC 13 reports. A threat was also made against Waynesville Middle School. Both schools are part of Haywood County Schools.

In Texas, the Llano Independent School District increased police presence on its campuses Thursday after being alerted to a potential school shooting threat on Wednesday. Authorities determined the threat had been circulating throughout the state. Two 12-year-old middle school students were also arrested Monday and charged in connection wih a school shooting threat in Laredo. The two girls are accused of posting, “I’m going to be a school shooter” in a Snapchat chat room. The school canceled classes as a result, as did neighboring Cigarroa High School. Both are facing felony charges of making terroristic threats. A judge ordered Tuesday that they be held for at least 10 days in a juvenile detention center.

“In my 25-span career, this is the youngest I’ve seen this drastic,” said Laredo Police Information Officer Joe Baeza. “Usually this [type of threat] isn’t coming from the female gender. Most of our troublemakers have been generally guys. These two young ladies have changed that dynamic.”

In St. Paul, Minn., two schools closed Thursday after receiving threats. St. Paul police said they are working with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension and district security but that they do not believe the threats are credible.

In Chula Vista, Calif., police launched an investigation after a 12-year-old reported receiving a text message from someone threatening a school shooting. Police did not believe the threat was credible and later determined the message was created by the student who first reported the incident. The child was arrested on multiple charges, including making criminal threats and filing a false police report.

How to Mitigate School Shooting Threats

Historically, after a high-profile school shooting, there has been a surge in student arrests linked to threats. In the two weeks following the 2018 Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, the Educator’s School Safety Network determined there were at least 638 threats made against schools.

Threats can significantly impact instruction time. Following the threats at Knox County, school officials said attendance was down about 25% on Sept. 11. According to the National Association of School Resource Officers (NASRO), preventing hoaxes from disrupting schools is the best way to reduce threats that aren’t real.

“When schools close or evacuate for a communicated threat that isn’t credible, the perpetrators get exactly what they want,” NASRO’s Executive Director Mo Canady, wrote in a post on its website.

Determining a threat’s credibility also takes up a lot of resources. Nick Suplina, senior vice president for law and policy of Everytown for Gun Safety, said there is at least one effective way to weed out non-credible threats.

“The best way to assess the legitimacy of a school shooting threat is to know if there’s access to a firearm, because it’s just bluster if there is no access,” he said.

Many experts agree that preventative measures are also crucial to mitigating threats, both credible and non-credible ones.

“We have to avoid both over-reacting and under-reacting to student threats, and behavioral threat assessment is the best way to do that,” said Dewey Cornell, a forensic clinical psychologist and professor of education at the University of Virginia.

David Riedman, creator of the K-12 School Shooting Database, said the incident in Georgia shows the need for “a standardized, national system for information reporting.”

“It’s that lots of different people in different agencies and different places all have the pieces of information that you would need to put together,” he said. “But unless you create a standardized system and a standardized playbook that everybody’s working towards, all of that piecemeal information is never going to get connected.”

Article Source: Campus Safety