San Diego State is going on the offensive, combatting possible future threats from campus shootings by hosting a variety of free safety workshops.
On Jan. 7 and 8, SDSU hosted an Active Shooter Response Training Certificate Program that attracted students, faculty and members of the Southern California community, according to SDSU Media Relations Manager Beth Chee.
During the event, participants practiced the Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter and Escape [A.L.I.C.E.] Program when faced with actors who posed as armed gunmen and active shooters, according to Chee.
“The idea is to talk through different situations you may be in and … ways to respond,” Chee said. “[SDSU] held the workshop to certify people for A.L.I.C.E. training.”
According to Chee, survival training will be mandatory for all incoming freshmen, beginning fall 2013.
SDSU Police Captain and A.L.I.C.E. instructor Lamine Secka said that many of the event’s participants had no prior knowledge on how to deal with active-shooter situations.
“We’re not teaching how to go after bad guys,” Secka said. “We’re teaching how to call for help and increase survivability.”
According to Secka, the volunteers re-enacted active shooting scenarios several times.
After each scenario, the volunteers were presented with more vital information, Secka said.
The survival rate increased by the end of training, according to Secka, thanks to students hearing radio announcements and receiving text messages about active shooters on campus.
For some students, like Cal State Long Beach sophomore business major and Resident Assistant Amanda Viselli, the idea of active-shooter response training is well intentioned.
“Being an RA … we learn to deal with situations such as this,” Viselli said. “No matter where you are … being knowledgeable about how to react to this kind of situation could save your life and others’.”
In response to recent active shooting events, CSULB President F. King Alexander said the campus will make resources available so that students can learn more about how to protect themselves from those situations.
“We have identified a six-minute video that we are going to make available to as many individuals [or] groups as possible,” Alexander said via email. “We also are planning for our campus police to do as many informational group visits as possible.”
Alexander sent the video to students via email on Thursday, saying in the email that “it is vitally important that … [students] take a moment to learn what [they] could do to protect [themselves].”
For students like sophomore microbiology major Brittany Daws, watching a video would help students learn about active shooters.
“The odds of [a school shooting] happening, especially at CSULB … is not significant enough … to take such dramatic caution,” Daws said. “I think watching a video would be sufficient enough.”
According to Cal State University Spokesman Erik Fallis, the CSU has campus-based initiatives to help deal with active-shooter situations.
“The CSU requires that [campus] police go through [active-shooter] training annually,” Fallis said.
Fallis added that it is up to each CSU to make active-shooter training mandatory for students and staff.