The shootings that left 10 dead at an Oregon college last week are focusing attention on security measures on campuses and whether firearms should be allowed there for protection, says the Wall Street Journal. Federal officials said six guns had been recovered from Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Or., along with a steel-enhanced flak jacket and five magazines of ammunition. Seven more guns were found at the gunman's nearby apartment. Colleges have implemented measures to identify potentially violent students and respond more effectively to mass shootings after the 2007 rampage at Virginia Tech that killed 33 people. Colleges have focused broadly on improving emergency notifications to people on campus and responding quickly and forcefully to crises, said S. Daniel Carter of a campus-safety initiative at VTV Family Outreach Foundation that was formed as a result of the Virginia incident. “The campus-security landscape has changed profoundly since the 2007 shootings,” he said.
The number of campus attacks grew to 83 in the 2000s—including data through 2008—from 79 in the 1990s and 40 in the 1980s. Data compiled by Everytown for Gun Safety, which advocates for stricter gun controls, show that shootings at colleges increased to 31 in 2014 from 14 in 2013. The FBI identified 160 shootings from 2000 through 2013 as “active shooter” events, or an “individual actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a confined and populated area.” There were an average of 16.4 active-shooter incidents a year between 2007 and 2013, up from an average of 6.4 a year from 2000 to 2006. A total of 486 people were killed and 557 wounded in the incidents.