From Presidential Protection to Campus Security: A Brief History of Threat Assessment in North American Schools and Colleges

Abstract

This article provides a brief history of the development of behavioral threat assessment within colleges and universities in the UnitedStates and Canada, from the original Secret Service model used to evaluate threats against the U.S. president, to its adaptations for workplace settings and United States and Canadian secondary schools, to its current configuration in U.S. and Canadian colleges and universities. The article reviews the emerging standard of care for higher education institutions with respect to having a campus threat assessment process and includes recommendations for how college mental health professionals can provide vision and expertise to a campus threat assessment team. KEYWORDS campus threat assessment, campus violence, higher education, school threat assessment, school violence, threat assessment history, violence preventionThe campus shootings at Virginia Tech, on April 16, 2007, marked a critical turning point in U.S. higher education. The scope of the tragedy, and the international media attention it garnered, resulted in an intense focus on the issue of campus security and the question of what could be done to prevent such a tragedy from happening in the future (e.g.

Broadening campus threat assessment beyond mass shootings

“…These reviews of public figure, school, and workplace threats and attacks were mostly media, police, or government agency record examinations that suggested existing crime prevention strategies were not sufficient in addressing targeted violence (Calhoun & Weston, 2003;Fein & Vossekuil, 1999;Randazzo & Cameron, 2012;Reddy et al, 2001;Sulkowski & Lazarus, 2011). Targeted attacks were shown to be infrequent with 43 assassinations or attempted assassinations of prominent individuals in the United States (e.g., politicians, celebrities; Fein & Vossekuil, 1999) between 1949and 1996, 23 attacks on British Royalty between 1778and 1994(Mullen et al, 2008, 3 United States federal judges killings between 1979 and 2001 (Calhoun, 2001), and 37 United States primary/secondary school shootings between 1974 and 2000 (Vossekuil, Fein, Reddy, Borum, & Modzeleski, 2002).…”

“…Campus targeted violence has been seen as more rare and disastrous than general violence (Booth, Van Hasselt, & Vecchi, 2011;Flynn & Heitzmann, 2008;Kiilakoski & Oksanen, 2011;Meloy, 2001;Muschert, 2007;Reddy et al, 2001), and targeted violence prevention has mostly focused on impeding sensationalized large-scale attacks. In fact, the campus threat assessment approach was developed due to consistent findings within investigations of public figure assassinations, threatening contacts to political officials, primary/secondary school shootings, and planned workplace violence (Drysdale et al, 2010;Randazzo & Cameron, 2012). General criminological and crime prevention findings were considered not applicable to these areas of study (Fein et al, 1995;Reddy et al, 2001;Sulkowski & Lazarus, 2011).…”

“…These strategies do not sufficiently address the infrequent, goal-directed behavior of targeted violence Randazzo & Cameron, 2012;Sulkowski & Lazarus, 2011), as these attacks involve various individuals, locations, and weapons (Drysdale, Modzeleski, & Simons, 2010).…”

“…This prevention approach has been termed campus threat assessment and has been widely implemented (Bolante, Aggression and Violent Behavior xxx (2015) xxx-xxx 2014; Deisinger, Randazzo, & Nolan, 2014;Randazzo & Cameron, 2012;Scalora et al, 2010).…”

A Behavioral Intervention Team at a Two-Year College: Responding to a Case of Suicidal Ideation

“…The recent era of mass shootings on college and university campuses has enlightened academic, legislative, and professional leaders about the pressing needs regarding the safety and health of students, faculty, and staff regardless of campus size, focus, or mission (Apodaca, Brighton, Perkins, Jackson, & Steege, 2012;Bendlin, 2013;Eells & Rockland-Miller, 2011;Heiselt & Burrell, 2012;Kennedy, 2010;Kennedy, 2015;Randazza & Cameron, 2012). The college years can correspond to the peak onset of mental health symptoms, especially considering the added pressures and stressors that relate to academic studies (Mitchell, Kader, Haggerty, Bakhai, & Warren, 2013).…”