Strategies Shared at U.S. Safe Schools Gathering

Washington

Preventing shootings and preparing for major crises in schools are as vital issues as ever for educators who gathered in the nation’s capital this week to discuss, debate, and advise one another on the sprawling range of health and safety matters in America’s schools.

With topics ranging from armed students storming campuses to schools’ responses to an influenza pandemic, more than 1,200 school administrators, police and security personnel, and mental-health providers were briefed on the ever-increasing role that schools must assume in preventing, responding, and coping with tragedy and catastrophe. The three-day annual conference is being sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education’s office of safe and drug-free schools.

In Thursday’s lunchtime address, Dr. Rajeev Venkayya, the special assistant to President Bush for biological defense policy, told conference participants that, just like a bomb scare or fire, schools must prepare for a flu pandemic in their communities. The pulmonary and critical-care specialist said school leaders need to be involved in planning for such an event with federal, state, and local emergency managers. For one, he said, leaders must be ready to...