[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 134 (Thursday, October 20, 2005)]
[Senate]
[Page S11658]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       NATIONAL SAFE SCHOOLS WEEK

  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, October 16-22 is National Safe Schools 
Week. School violence, or even the threat of school violence, in too 
many of our schools instills fear in our students, and limits their 
ability to learn. It also can threaten and intimidate teachers and make 
instruction more difficult.
  National Safe Schools Week is intended to raise awareness of school 
safety issues and empower students, parents, teachers, and parents to 
do what they can to prevent violence in their schools. Congress should 
also do its part by passing common sense gun safety legislation and by 
funding important programs that help to reduce school violence.
  According to 2003 statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and 
Prevention, more than 950,000 students take a weapon to school each 
month, resulting in more than 1,400,000 students being injured or 
threatened with a weapon during the school year. In addition, every 
month, an estimated 840,000 students feel too unsafe to go to school. 
This is a problem which left unaddressed will continue to hold children 
back from reaching their full educational potential.
  Statistics cited by the PAX organization, one of the organizers of 
National Safe Schools Week, indicate that in 81 percent of the school 
shootings in our country, the attackers told other students of their 
plans prior to the attack. Further, students are responsible for 
tipping off school authorities in 93 percent of the cases where weapons 
are confiscated from students at school. To strengthen this fact, PAX 
created the Speak Up Campaign. The centerpiece of the campaign is a 
national hotline, 1-866-SPEAK-UP, where children and teenagers can call 
to anonymously report threats involving weapons at their school. Since 
the creation of the hotline in 2002, the Speak Up Campaign has received 
more than 7,000 calls which were then passed along to appropriate law 
enforcement officials.
  School violence threatens to put our children's safety and ability to 
learn in jeopardy. Our Nation's schools need our help to combat this 
ongoing problem. To start, we should adequately fund Federal grant 
programs like COPS. COPS hiring grants have been used to hire more than 
6,500 school resource officers since 1999. These officers help ensure a 
safe environment in and around our schools and collaborate with the 
school community to more effectively deal with school violence issues.
  We should also support common sense gun storage requirements to make 
it more difficult for children and teenagers to access guns and 
ammunition. Recently, I joined with 69 of my colleagues in voting for 
an amendment offered by Senator Kohl that would require licensed 
dealers, manufacturers, and importers to include a safe gun storage or 
gun safety device with every handgun they sell. Use of such storage 
devices could help prevent a child or teenager from acquiring a gun 
that they might use to injure or kill another student at school. 
Hopefully, Senator Kohl's amendment will become law.
  School violence has always posed a threat to students and teachers, 
but lethal and easily concealable guns have escalated the problem. Gun 
violence, not only affects students at a particular school, it has a 
rippling effect on students at schools in the same county, State, and 
in some cases, the entire country. I urge my colleagues to join me in 
supporting efforts to reduce the threat of violence, especially gun 
violence, to our schools.

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