From a principal:

Diane I agree with all of the above and I would add more..

We need to think about untreated mental illness…. My colleagues and I encounter more students with serious mental illness each year. We need help dealing with violent students.The courts do not help and often parents are helpless.

These young people often turn to drugs which exacerbate the problem. They become more and more alienated….There are no support systems that work–when you seek support outside the school, you are told to put the student in special Ed. I cannot imagine that some of this will not be part of the story.

Every good principal would do what Dawn did, knowing all the while the futility ….. May God comfort her family.

[From the same principal]

Yesterday I sat and mourned with my fellow administrator over these tragic events, as we recognized how easily this could happen at any of our schools. Most people, especially the news media, are clueless about the kinds of things we deal with on a daily basis at a school. Crisis drills and lockdown drills are a part of our monthly drill cycle. We can only pray that in a real crisis we will be able to protect our students.

No school is safe as long as guns, especially automatic weapons, are allowed in our country. I will not rant about this now, but my legislators WILL hear from me today.
I mourn for the families of this school, but also for our country. It is time for some courageous conversations about gun control and also about mental health services, especially for children and young adults.