Oct 21, 2009 6:57 pm US/Eastern
Program Seeks School Violence Tips From Students
Reporting
Cindy Hsu
NEW YORK (CBS) ―
Too often students don't come forward when they hear about threats of violence. This is National Safe Schools Week, and a program to get kids to speak up is about to kick-off in New York City schools.
Kids love their cell phones and they're texting non-stop. Dan Gross started a program called Speak Up that gives kids a phone hotline and text message address to anonymously report threats of weapons violence in school.
"In 4 out of 5 school shootings, kids knew about it beforehand. In 81 percent of school shootings, the attackers told someone else. So that points to a real opportunity to prevent these things from turning into tragedy if kids would speak up and talk about what they know," said Gross, co-founder of PAX.
Public service announcements aimed at teenagers are airing across the country. Gross started the anti-gun violence group PAX right after his younger brother was critically wounded in a shooting on the observation deck of the Empire State Building back in 1997.
"We've gotten over 30,000 calls to the Speak Up hotline in seven years," he said. "We can tell you there have been hundreds of tragedies that have been averted as a result of kids calling."
Local teenagers said it's a good way to report, without being labeled a rat. "People don't feel safe going to adults because they feel it might make the situation worse, so I think being able to say anonymously whatever is happening it will help, because then you don't get blamed for anything," said Nora Allison-Weiser, a high school sophomore.
Speak Up is running in about 20 communities nationwide, including Yonkers. Police Commissioner Edmund Hartnett said it's a win-win situation for everyone and they start investigating the minute they get the call. "We'll start doing background checks, we'll start doing address checks," he said. "If it's something involving bringing an explosive into school we'd have to handle that differently than someone bringing a pocket knife into school."
Speak Up will start in 10 New York City middle and high schools by the end of the year, and the goal is to eventually expand the program citywide.
(© MMX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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