Hypothetical Scenario: What would you do if you were a student trapped inside a school with a shooter?

I've gone through “Active Shooter Training” for students not once, not twice, not three times…

SEVEN times.

Plus twice more as a teacher/school staff member.

I've experienced eight active shooter lockdown drills, and one which terrifyingly wasn't a drill.*

My main objectives, should the situation happen again when I'm a student (teachers and staff members should have specific plans, but I'm assuming they don't or aren't present), are the following:

1. Lockdown. Lock the doors and barricade them, turn off lights, get away from windows, silence electronic devices. Should take 20–30 seconds if everyone in the area works together.
2. Call the police and school security. Report exactly what we've seen or heard, and find out details of the response that is coming.
3. Form a plan. I'd quietly talk to the other students/teachers, spreading students out throughout the area (tight groupings are more easily targeted) and gathering those who are able to confront the attacker at the area’s entry point. Probably something like throwing books and papers at the attacker while ambushing them from the sides to take them out.
4. Discuss getting out of there. Things like if there is a viable exit, how to react when police arrive (always stay still and show open hands away from your body so they know you aren't an armed attacker), and where it is safe to meet up.

Some of the training I've experienced recommends different strategies. Evacuating immediately, hiding students, moving to safer areas, improvising weapons, etc. But the “shelter in place” plan is most recommended by the Department of Homeland Security when you can't easily evacuate— and as a student, chances are that I wouldn't know how to evacuate my school safely.

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*The not a drill event happened when I was in college. I was caught in a lockdown for over six hours while police searched the campus. There were no fatalities and I never saw the suspects. In this world we live in, it barely made the local news the next day.

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