Seventy percent of parents responding to a recent poll said they were at least somewhat concerned “about the risk their child faces from school shootings,” and 35 percent were “very or extremely concerned.”
The online survey of 1,012 U.S. parents of children under the age of 18 who are enrolled in day care, preschool, or school was conducted in July by the Harris Poll on behalf of Save the Children. The results formed the basis of the child-welfare group’s annual disaster-preparedness report card, which was released last week.
Sixty-six percent of respondents said they were at least somewhat concerned about the risk their children face from natural disasters, and 55 percent said they were at least somewhat concerned about the risk their children face from terrorism.
But, while parents fear the effects of disasters at school, many of them are uninformed about schools’ preparedness efforts, the report card says. Sixty-three percent of respondents said they were not very familiar with emergency plans at their children’s schools or child-care settings.
