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NPR questions school shooting numbers


milq

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Listening this morning and heard this story.

 

Short version: NPR and Child Trends could confirm only 11 of the 235 reported school shootings from the 15-16 school year. Clerical errors in reporting tend to be the bulk of it.

 

Shameful that such poorly gathered and unverified “data” can be used to influence policy.

 

https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/08/27/640323347/the-school-shootings-that-werent

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The Education Department, asked for comment on our reporting, noted that it relies on school districts to provide accurate information in the survey responses ...

 

... at one school where a shooting was reported, Callahan Middle School [in Nassau, FL], on Nov. 21, 2015, a Saturday, a student took a picture of himself at home holding a gun and posted it to social media.

...

At Redan Middle School [in DeKalb County, GA], there is a report of a toy cap gun fired on a school bus — not a shooting.

...

For example, the Omro school district in Wisconsin wanted to know whether a consensual paintball-gun fight involving several students should be considered an "attack with a weapon" or a "possession of a firearm."

...

And there's another factor at work as well: the law of really, really big numbers. [Researcher and program director at Child Trends Deborah] Temkin notes that "240 schools is less than half of 1 percent," of the schools in the survey. "It's in the margin of error."

So part of the problem of misreporting is that some schools responding to the Dept of Ed survey appear not to know what a firearm is, including that a picture of a gun on the Internet is not the same as a physical gun on the school grounds, much less the discharge of a firearm. The other part is just understanding statistics.

 

For comparison, the Everytown for Gun Safety database, citing media reports, listed just 29 shootings at K-12 schools between mid-August 2015 and June 2016.

... which is more than 11, but less than 235 (and is still probably inflated).
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Sounds like they operate on the same model as the Gun Violence Archive that started at Slate, which uses crowd sourced info and included the shooter when calculating deaths and injuries.

 

A gang shooting after hours on a street adjoining school property? School shooting.

 

A bullet hole discovered in the window of a college near public lands, with no record of how long it had been there? School shooting.

 

The suicide of a teacher using a gun in the school parking lot? School shooting.

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Sounds like they operate on the same model as the Gun Violence Archive that started at Slate, which uses crowd sourced info and included the shooter when calculating deaths and injuries.

Well, the Dept of Ed criteria were fairly clear, I think. Was a firearm discharged (even if no one was injured) on school property, at a school event (even if held off school property), or on a school bus?

 

However, the survey responses were sometimes supplied by people who seem not to have understood those criteria, if a paintball gun (which was discharged, but isn't a firearm) and a picture of a firearm (which cannot even be discharged) were somehow points of confusion.

 

Then statistics comes in. The number of schools that were confused about the criteria was small compared to the total number of schools responding, but if you look at just the raw numbers (11 verifiable vs. 235 reported incidents) it seems like a 20x bigger deal than it really is.

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Don't forget that it was "Dumbo's" former chief of staff Rahm Emmanuel that stated "never let a tragedy to go to waste".

They will use any means, fair or foul, to achieve their ends.

 

It seems to be Rand Paul who first first mis-characterized (and misquoted) Emanuel's 2008 comments for his own partisan gain... thus sort of being guilty of what he claimed Emanuel meant to say.

 

Part of what Emanuel said frequently has been cited by conservatives to show that the left supposedly wants to exploit circumstances to ram its agenda through. That Emanuel quote is: "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste."

In context, though, Emanuel wasn't talking about partisan gain or advancing any particular "agenda," as Paul claimed. Emanuel specifically urged addressing longstanding problems with "ideas from both parties" when a crisis presents the opportunity. He used the energy crisis of the 1970s as an example of an opportunity lost:

Rand Paul, Jan. 12, 2011:

Well, these are the kind of things that I think some on the left decide and manufacture even before the events occur. I mean, this is part of the playbook of Rahm Emanuel where they say any crisis should be used to their advantage to further their agenda. So I'm not surprised that they do it, I do think they should be ashamed of themselves for doing it.

 

Emanuel, Nov. 19, 2008:

You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before. I think America as a whole in 1973 and 1974, and not just my view but obviously the administration's, missed the opportunity to deal with the energy crisis that was before us. For a long time our entire energy policy came down to cheap oil. This is an opportunity, what used to be long-term problems, be they in the health care area, energy area, education area, fiscal area, tax area, regulatory reform area, things that we have postponed for too long, that were long-term, are now immediate and must be dealt with. This crisis provides the opportunity, for us, as I would say, the opportunity to do things that you could not do before. The good news, I suppose, if you want to see a silver lining, is the problems are big enough that they lend themselves to ideas from both parties for the solution.

 

I have no love for Rahm. Accuracy is, however, our friend.

 

The other item, highlighted in red above... for years I have asked folks on this forum to refrain from seemingly clever yet ignorant name calling references which were plentiful from conservatives during the Obama Administration, and persist to this day as evidenced in multiple threads. Liberals are guilty as well.

I was not a fan of Bush nor am I a fan of Trump...

I'd love to have Bush back in the White House in place of Trump.

 

We all, must treat all, with respect... whether we agree with them or not.

If we don't, we all lose.

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There are lies, damn lies, and statistics. A misatributed Mark Twain quote, but very relevant here.

 

Somehow people think that by editorializing numbers it makes it more believable.

 

Most people get their news online, however hard would it be to hyperlink the original study. Unless they are blatantly obscuring that there is no causation in whatever correlation they are grasping at.

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Most people get their news online, however hard would it be to hyperlink the original study. Unless they are blatantly obscuring that there is no causation in whatever correlation they are grasping at.

 

Every time the media publishes studies and surveys, I try to find that original study, most of the time they intentionally try to hide it because they have twisted the study results and/or the studies methodology was absurd.

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I have no love for Rahm. Accuracy is, however, our friend.

 

The other item, highlighted in red above... for years I have asked folks on this forum to refrain from seemingly clever yet ignorant name calling references which were plentiful from conservatives during the Obama Administration, and persist to this day as evidenced in multiple threads. Liberals are guilty as well.

I was not a fan of Bush nor am I a fan of Trump...

I'd love to have Bush back in the White House in place of Trump.

 

We all, must treat all, with respect... whether we agree with them or not.

If we don't, we all lose.

 

Well stated, especially when the context is supplied.

 

And for additional background, the original author of that quote (or at least the meaning of the quote) was M.F. Weiner in 1976.

 

M. F. Weiner wrote an article in the journal Medical Economics entitled “Don’t Waste a Crisis — Your Patient’s or Your Own.”

 

Basically, take advantage of a crisis to exact change that would not normally happen. You might love Five Guys burgers and beer...but if you survive a heart attack at 50, you may be compelled to become a fan of salad, sparkling water and exercise.

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