Students and staff at area schools engage in regular drills with law enforcement and first responders as they prepare for the unthinkable scenarios in which an active shooter or intruder was loose in the building.
The topic has gained additional attention in Chippewa Falls after serious threats from a student or students in the district from 2023 came to light earlier this year.
Police reports surfaced earlier this year referencing 2023 incidents that threatened the safety of Chippewa Area Unified School District students and teachers. The incidents involved student-written manifestos that reference the Columbine mass shootings. Parents, staff and the public were not notified of the threats at the time of the incidents in April and October of 2023.
While such threats are rare, and related incidents even less common, schools and first responders across the region are working diligently to prepare for the worst and ensure students and staff are well-informed of emergency procedures and ready to respond.
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Each school system in the area approaches the drills and training differently, but the goal for each is the same — to ensure everyone makes it home safe.
Drills more common
Active threat drills and training activities at schools have become the norm as school shootings continue to make headlines across the nation. According to data published by the Pew Research Center, school shootings are at a record high in the U.S. with 82 reported in 2023 alone.
In Winona County, Minnesota, first responders from across the region gather regularly to prepare for potential hostile events.
“While thankfully these are still low-frequency events, they are very impactful and we want to make sure we can respond quickly, prevent as many unfortunate deaths or injuries as we can and take care of the situation. Do our best to keep everybody safe,” Winona County Emergency Management director Ben Klinger said.
On April 6, law enforcement and other first responders practiced responding to an active shooter scenario at Winona’s Jefferson Elementary School. The training was sponsored by the Region One Emergency Management Joint Powers Board and funded by a grant.
Participants in the training included 22 law enforcement officers from six area police departments and four area sheriff’s offices, 35 fire and EMS responders from across the region, three dispatchers from Winona and Freeborn counties, 15 instructors and 31 volunteers from Winona State University Nursing, Riverland College EMS program, Goodview Police Reserves and the Winona County Dive Rescue Team.
The training started off with a historical review of active shooter events, lessons learned from them and new and current tactics to handle them.
The Chippewa Falls Police Department works closely with the Chippewa Falls Area Unified School District and McDonell Area Catholic Schools to coordinate active threat drills multiple times a year, according to top administrators at the schools.
“It's a very important part of what we do,” said Chippewa Falls Are Unified School District Superintendent Jeffrey Holmes. “I hate that we've gotten to a point in society where we have to do those things — harden our schools, like we do — but given everything that goes on in the world around us, we've got no option. We have to make sure that we're prepared to respond appropriately in emergency situations.”
Most drills involve sheltering in place, Holmes said, but the schools also practice safe evacuation procedures regularly.
“I've always been impressed with how well the students respond. They understand that they are important drills. They're very cooperative,” Holmes said. “Our staff do a good job of training the kids, talking the kids through it, and we have highly responsive kids.”
In La Crosse, Gundersen Health plays a role in disaster drill training each year, according to Carley Buisman, the manager of Gundersen’s Integrated Center for Education.
Students in the Wisconsin Academy of Rural Medicine help put on the drills with the aid of community members, including police, fire, EMS and La Crosse high school students in the Health Science Academy.
The Health Science Academy students were chosen in particular because of their knowledge and experience with the health care field.
“I think they are important for Gundersen, because the response time for our fire department, our police department and our ambulances really impact our patients here at Gundersen,” she said. “So if you have a patient that gets shot but doesn’t get taken to the hospital for an hour or two hours from when they were first shot, that decreases their life expectancy, especially if it is a wound that could end up in death or severe damage.”
This year’s drill, which took place in late March, was an active shooter training at La Crosse Central High School, held while no classes were going on during a break.
Participants were able to practice what would happen if a shooting like the practice scenarios actually occurred, so they have the knowledge to handle a real situation.
Tailored training
In addition to regular drills focused on their response, police in Chippewa Falls provide training for students and staff at area schools. That includes videos and discussions, said Chippewa Falls police Lt. Kerry Boos.
“The PowerPoint is curtailed to the audience. So obviously, staff being older, more mature, can handle some content that's maybe not necessarily appropriate for middle school aged students, or even high school aged,” Boos said. “So we're going to be a little bit more detailed on some signs of trouble and what to look for with staff. When it comes to the students, we try to keep it very basic, very simple. Just what they need to know, what they need to do in an active threat situation.”
At the recent Winona drill, participants broke into different disciplines to receive training before practice scenarios with everyone began.
Klinger said the practice scenarios included dispatchers receiving calls about the shooting, law enforcement responding and taking care of the threat and then EMS coming in to help rescue and treat patients.
Organizers work hard to ensure participants face stressors similar to what they would in a real scenario.
Afterward, participants take part in a debriefing.
In Winona County, trainings are held every three years, Klinger said, and other large-scale trainings are scheduled multiple times a year around the region.
First responder drills for active shooters and mass casualty events are held annually, Klinger said.
Preparations
McDonell Area Catholic Schools President Molly Bushman said prior to the first drill at its Chippewa Falls schools each fall, students receive “developmentally appropriate training and education” about threats.
In addition, parents receive a letter letting them know about an upcoming drill.
“We don't give them the exact day, but we’re just letting them know that they are welcome to talk with their child about it ahead of time,” Bushman said. “With the first drill in the year, they kind of get some advance notice, training and education. And then the second drill, they don't get that because we want at least one of the drills to be a little bit more of a reality check.”
Bushman said discussing the drills is an important part of the preparation and educational process.
To help high school age students with what can be stressful training, in La Crosse Buisman said discussions were held multiple times before and after the training.
“Some of the high school students did say that their heart rate went up and that it was a scary situation,” Buisman said.
Stress levels are raised, Klinger said, by making sure the pretend victims — who are portrayed by the volunteers — are highly vocal and screaming like a real victim would be.
Some of the more dramatic and realistic effects, such as the use of fire alarms or gunfire using blanks, are reserved for training professional first responders.
“It definitely raises your stress level and makes it pretty realistic, which is what we want for our emergency responders,” Klinger said.
No K-12 students were involved in the recent Winona training, as Klinger said it would have been too stressful for them.
“They should do their lockdown drills and that stuff, but not under stress like this training provides,” he said.
Bushman said at McDonell Catholic Schools preparation doesn’t just include drills but discussion around the need for the drills and the situations that have caused them to be necessary.
“We know that it’s a stressor on kids and staff, and we don't want to cause unnecessary worry before people really understand the process and the reason behind this. So then we take an educational role in that process. That's kind of our whole whole thing here,” Bushman said.