Sheepdogs Named in Chardon Shooting

Two Sheepdogs that heroically acted in the Chardon High School shooting are now named.  Coach Frank Hall yelled, "Hey!" after the shooting started.  This startled the shooter, then Hall chased the shooter out of the school.  Teacher Joseph Ricci grabbed one of the wounded students, pulled them into his room, then administered first aid.  Both of these actions showed great courage, and demonstrated great love for the students in their charge.


Kenneth Trump is quoted in an article on MSNBC as saying about Coach Hall, "It's not something you can train somebody to do, it's inside the person."  After the comment he made about the woman who attempted to disarm a shooter at a school board meeting, it would appear that the end result is what makes a person's actions heroic.  I would say that the actions of the woman were heroic, even if unsuccessful.  Coach Hall's actions were just as heroic, and were successful.


As can be discerned by my blog, I disagree with Trump's assessment.  I served in the Army for 12 years, eight of them as an Infantry Drill Sergeant.  I took civilians and taught them how to react in stressful, violent moments.  It can, and has been, taught.  The Sheepdog mindset is all about getting educators to think how they would react, to provide them with the experiences so that they can use pattern-matching and recognition to come up with the best decision.

If teachers and staff are trained properly, are given numerous scenarios to consider, and utilize mental simulations, they can reach the point where they will hear a gun shot, and know what to do.  It can be done, and it must be done.  A great first step is "Safe Topics - The First Thirty Seconds", a new product developed by Safe Havens International.

As Michael Dorn, Executive Director of Safe Havens International writes, "Emergency reference charts should not be viewed as an instructional manual to follow step by step during the first critical seconds of a crisis. Instead they are a valuable tool to help staff develop what Dr. Gary Klein refers to as a base of knowledge. Klein’s research shows that people can perform exceptionally well in making life and death decisions but they need practice using a concept known as mental simulation. For school employees to get increased benefit from this research – based concept, they need to be provided appropriate responses to a wide array of situations rather than just a few situations that we fear the most like active shooter situations."

If there is any lesson to be learned from this tragedy, it's that the people who watch out for our kids during the day need to be taught how to protect our kids when the wolves come howling into our safe schools.  If educators don't want to develop that skill, they're in the wrong profession.