Active shooter preparedness: Past, present and future

There was a time, not too long ago, the term “active shooter” did not exist in the mainstream. These days, sadly, it is now deeply embedded in our everyday lives. It has taken on many meanings, created industries, and has produced generations of Americans unaware of a world without the risk of targeted gun violence.

How did we get here? The data is undeniable. Over the past few decades, the proliferation of targeted public mass shootings has been staggering. This unabated and uniquely American risk is producing two groups in our society; those who have been directly impacted by a specific event and those who have yet to. And those numbers are only moving in one direction. Even more incomprehensible, is a growing segment of our population impacted by multiple active shooter incidents.

History has shown active shooter attacks, notably occurring in and around buildings and campuses, culminated from an offender successfully overcoming and circumventing security postures. In other words, everything that institution implemented — in both action and integration — failed to prevent and mitigate that specific tragedy. Some recent highly-publicized incidents even included large pre-deployed security and police presence to no avail.

Past Preparedness

 Mitigating gun violence is very complex. Preventing and preparing for an active shooter attack is no easy task. It never will be. In my experience, it is filled with institutional challenges and factors dictated by subjective “best practices”, individual fears, institutional culture, and optics, to name a few. And frankly, many decisions are based on assumptions, calculated risk, and unintended bias. Moreover, we’ve all been part of conversations where clairvoyance was inserted; “Well, if it happens here, it will happen like this,” that consequently shaped preparedness via hubris omnipotence rather than the reality of the vast risk vectors beyond anyone’s control. When applied to active shooter mitigation, the concept of control — especially for a threat dictated by an offender cohort who has all the practical and tactical advantages over his unsuspecting population — is an illusion.

Like all sectors and industries, institutions and those charged with active shooter readiness vary greatly. While many have a dedicated security professional, there are equally as many institutions that are managed collaterally by staff from human resources, facilities, risk management, legal, compliance, etc. Could this be a contributing factor to how cut and paste policies and preparedness — many of which are just to check-the-box — are standing currently in countless institutions? I know I have seen my share. We all have.

Current Correction

With relatively 25-plus years of conscious hindsight, we are still struggling with understanding what active shooter preparedness is and its long-term impact. This is evident in our current course corrections and actions occurring in industry, legislation, and judication. In the past few decades, we may have overshot what effective preparedness is in both theory and application. Remember, the prior generation didn’t hand over a manual or playbook to us. In 2024, we are still the founders, architects and keepers of active shooter preparedness. This is happening on our watch.

Were we short-sighted? Current state legislation to entirely eliminate school active shooter training drills to remediate the decades of trauma-inflicted on students is a clear indication of corrective action. Legislating schools to administer a mandatory “grace period” during a fire alarm activation to validate a genuine evacuation emergency, rather than to be intentionally drawn out of secured rooms, is upon us. Again, history has shown how fire alarm activations complicate our preparedness.

Mitigating gun violence is very complex. Preventing and preparing for an active shooter attack is no easy task. It never will be.

Newly established school safety state agencies, workplace violence prevention state mandates, the weekly roll-out of the newest training acronym, and backed-up docket calendars ready to test post-incident litigation, are all evident of our past and future.

Future in Failure?

What do you think of when you hear the term “active shooter”? Many recall a specific tragic event by name or town often summarized in a single word; Columbine, Parkland, Las Vegas, Uvalde. Some think of victim names. Others think of firearms or the 2nd Amendment. I think of catastrophic failure. In other words, how can we understand our limitations and underperformance in all our violence mitigation disciplines — in both technology and human response — and integrate dimensional fore-sight rather than hind-sight.

In my experience, very few institutions, if any at all, prepare for an active shooter attack with this failure lens. It’s unlikely any security professional responsible for this risk landscape would freely admit their respective prevention strategies could fail. Having a realistic understanding of how every preparedness strategy can not only succeed, but also can fail, is a mark of a comprehensive and holistic approach. As much as we think people and things “rise to the occasion” during violent events, we all know they’re always marred with underperformance at every level.

We have made progress. The advances in gunshot detection, training and behavioral threat assessment are on the right track. Moving forward, however, I believe our future lies in the progress we have yet to make. Today there is an incredible amount of focus on prevention, which is laudable; however, history has proven our current preventative strategies, in both the public and private sectors, are still collectively ineffective in curtailing the active shooter threat. This may be the reason why there are so many government agencies, at every level, entering the active shooter space.

I freely admit, I don’t have the answer. What I do know is we all have the distinction of being security professionals operating in The Age of Active Shooter. I’m sure we can all agree this is a distinction none of us wanted. Nevertheless, our everyday collective efforts and grind, regardless of industry or discipline, is required to reach that future sooner than later. The next “(fill in the blank) Strong” locations are depending on it.