A number of violent incidents at Southern Nevada schools has several in the community concerned.

This week on Nevada Week, we examine the problem and what the Clark County School District is doing to keep students and teachers safe.

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Welcome to Nevada Week; I'm Amber Renee Dixon.

A shooting involving school police at Western High School, a mother reportedly admitting she tried to hit two girls at Basic High School with her SUV, and shocking video of a student attacking a teacher at Cheyenne High School.

These are just some examples of the violence that has grabbed headlines not only here in Southern Nevada but nationwide this school year.

Here to talk about violence and behavioral issues present at some Clark County School District schools are Mike Barton, chief student achievement officer at CCSD; Henry Blackeye, chief of the Clark County School District Police; Rebecca Garcia, president of the Nevada PTA; Dell Schilleci, program director for Turning Point Nevada, and Janet Nordine, a marriage and family therapist, also a registered play therapist.

Thank you all for joining us.

Chief Blackeye, I want to start with you.

How serious from your perspective is this issue?

(Henry Blackeye) Well, it's definitely got a lot of headlines.

I think it's important to compare it to our last school year before the pandemic.

So in 2019-2020, we've been looking at the numbers, and we follow from a year-to-date type of statistical review, and we just did one in March.

And looking at our numbers compared to 2019-2020, it does appear that the violence in schools that has been reported is a little high in some areas, not in all, but with our fights, I would say that's a little bit higher than it was in 2019-2020.

However, the rest of our calls for service are not as high.

Actually, that year it was a pretty busy year prior to the pandemic.

You know, we closed the schools on March 15, 2020 and if we continued, that would have been our busiest year ever as a police department.

So when we started the school year this year in 2021 in August, it kind of-- I think that year off, that year and a half off, and just the kids coming back and the excitement and just the things that we were dealing with, I think that year off kind of just-- everyone forgot about what school was like here in this school district.

You know, we were busy.

We were busy in 2019-2020, and it didn't stop when we started the school year this year.

When talking to the kids during that first two months, it was consistent.

Most of the incidents that started right off the bat were social media related.

Throughout that pandemic time, there was a lot of taunting, a lot of bullying and things like that, and when students returned to school, they saw those rivals on social media and then the fight was on.

So we were dealing a lot with fights, and that was untraditional for us.

Typically when school starts in August, it's not an environment where fights are happening, you know, in the first month and a half or so.

You know, typically the kids have a "get to know you" period where they interact differently, you know, and they just don't go right off the bat and try to settle their scores.

But that's what happened this year, and it kind of continued until even right now.

-A serious enough issue for you to hold a press conference last week to talk about it, and at that press conference, it was reiterated that there is an uptick in violence, but what most concerns you is the level of violence, the type of violence.

What are you seeing, Mike Barton?

(Dr. Mike Barton) Well, we took a strong stance at that press conference you referenced.

You know, certain infractions we won't tolerate as a district.

The ones we highlighted in the press conference were battery on staff or students that leads to a criminal citation, distribution of a controlled substance, and sexual assault.

So those types of infractions and, again, fighting, we also made strategic changes in realtime around fighting, that if they lead to a campus disruption, that can lead to a recommended expulsion.

So those types of infractions we're taking a serious look at, but we always have to come back to the fact that these infractions, those serious infractions or even other ones on campus, we need to deal with our mental health issues involving our students, because the pandemic did not help.

We had a mental health crisis before the pandemic, let's be honest, as a community.

The reality is that pandemic or school closures put a magnifying glass on those mental health issues that have been existing for years and haven't been dealt with through services.

So as a district, the way we're dealing with those issues, those serious infractions and those less severe infractions, is trying to get to the root cause of the behavior.

So we're doing that through teletherapy on campuses, where now we have teletherapy on our campuses.

We have partnerships with the DA's office and the Harbor.

We really need to take a stance that root causes of these issues need to be addressed at an early stage.

You know, if you don't get to a mental health issue in fourth grade and help treat a child and support a family, that will just exacerbate over time and become more of an issue at the secondary schools.

So that's really our approach, dealing with this in a serious manner right now in realtime with those infractions we will not tolerate, but at the same time doubling down, tripling down on the resources we need for mental health support for our students.

-Rebecca Garcia at Nevada PTA, what did you think about what the school district came out with as far as disciplinary measures?

(Rebecca Garcia) Well, I think it was helpful to provide some clarity around how things are going to be responded to now.

I think a lot of parents felt it came too late, that these have been capturing headlines for months, and I think there's still questions related to how quickly things turn over.

For example if a student is involved in a fight, there have been multiple reports that they're back on campus the next day, or challenges like that that lead to safety.

Recently actually, Chief Blackeye joined us for a virtual forum that we held around this, and the student comment, his number-one thing was it's also not necessarily physical altercations on campus, but things like slurs and discrimination and verbal bullying that make them feel unsafe on campus, whether it's race or sexual orientation or other issues like that.

So going back to what Dr. Barton said, we're in a situation where right now we're treating the outcomes.

We need to get to a place where we're treating the root causes, and we need to do that earlier in order to make sure kids feel safe every day they show up on campus.

-Janet Nordine, you must be happy hearing about the mental health being addressed here.

What have you seen in your practice, and as a play therapist, you are registered to work with young children who communicate perhaps better through play than verbally.

(Janet Nordine) Yes.

Leading up to today's show, I did a random question to each of my clients: Do you feel safe in school?

And I see clients from all over town, all walks of life from children in foster care to children in affluent families, and maybe 2 out of 50 children I spoke to said they really do feel safe in school.

They don't have concerns, and that can be from do I feel safe in the classroom, does my teacher feel safe to me and my nervous system.

What's happening inside of me when I'm with my teacher and my peers too?

Am I feeling safe in the passing period at school?

So working with younger children, I'm looking at the themes in play, and I often see fighting.

I often see isolation, especially after the pandemic.

So many children were concerned about if mom and dad were going to have money for food, if mom and dad's job was going to last, if mom and dad had to go to work or leave the home and I had to stay home and do school on my own at a preteen/teenage age.

How do I get this technology to work for me?

There was a lot of things happening for kids during the pandemic, and now we've brought them all back together.

And the social media aspect that was already brought up has been a big issue.

Young children, you know, kindergarten and first grade, that are allowed to be on TikTok and see their peers and be exposed to things way too early has really influenced and exposed them to things they're not ready for.

So working with younger children using play, looking at their themes, validating their experiences, making that connection with them has been very important and meaningful for many children.

-Social media has allowed for these fights to be filmed, uploaded and shared so quickly, which I think can also exacerbate the issue or make it seem a lot worse than it really is.

Dell, we've spoken about this.

Everybody has access to a camera now.

You work with teens and their parents.

Describe a little bit of what Turning Point Nevada does, and what have you been hearing from teens about violence in schools?

(Dell Schilleci) Thank you very much.

What Turning Point Nevada does is we meet once a week.

We have a free program for parents that have teenage kids that are having issues with anger, belligerence, school non-attendance, drugs, alcohol, the entire gamut.

And what we do is give our parents first-- well, let me backtrack.

Our parents and our kids meet separately.

I meet with the parents.

The two gentlemen with whom I work meet with the kids.

One of them is a marshal, the other is working on his PhD in psychology.

I was one of those parents.

So when a parent says to me, I'm going to strangle this kid, I know how they feel.

And in the moment, any of you who have kids know what that feels like.

Or when you wake up at night to get a drink or something and you walk by your kid's bedroom and there's nobody there.

It is one of the most sinking feelings on the planet.

You don't know where your kid is.

-What have you heard in regards to school violence from the teens and parents?

-They're all tired of it, even the kids.

They're over it, they want it to stop, and what I hear from the parents, there aren't-- and these are direct quotes-- there aren't enough policies in place that are, for lack of a better way to put it, strict enough or stern enough to send a realtime message to their kids.

-That's a difficult one.

-It's very hard.

-It is, because Mike Barton, we could debate what is a serious enough message that's going to get through to a child or a teen?

What are your thoughts on appropriate disciplinary measures?

-Right.

So I think there's-- you can go two ways here.

I think you have to be very careful, like zero tolerance doesn't work.

You know, we've been there, done that, so the reality is we need to take a strong stance on certain infractions, and what we're doing-- -Can you tell me those certain infractions again.

-Those certain infractions are again, battery to a staff or student leading to a citation, distribution of a controlled substance or sexual assault.

So those infractions, what we're doing that's different from the district's standpoint, those are recommended for expulsion.

But in Nevada in the Clark County School District, I think sometimes people think an expulsion leads to a student being out of school permanently.

We offer academic center programming, Nevada Learning Academy.

There are options for education because we've done research as well.

If students are expelled and they're not having an opportunity to go to any type of school, then what does juvenile crime look like during the daytime?

It goes up.

So the reality is those infractions lead to consequences, a recommendation for expulsion but also reengagement that's going to be ultra-aggressive, that includes potential parenting classes that are required, potential therapy that is required.

If it's substance abuse, completing a course on substance abuse prevention.

So the difference I think in the past is there were consequences, but now we're trying to wrap around services through providers where they need that mental health support to deal with these infractions and not recommit in the future.

So there are hard consequences, but also we need to think about that reengagement or eventual reengagement that will happen with an education setting and making sure that we're providing those services to the student and family.

-Rebecca.

-I think one thing that we haven't talked about yet is the fact that we don't have enough adults on campus to really monitor and respond, and at the beginning provide support and build relationships with students.

If you have a counselor that has 400, 600 or 800 kids on their caseload, how are they getting to know those children independently and know what their needs are?

If you have teachers that have 45 kids in a class, which is a reality in the Clark County School District, or it's being taught by a long-term sub or a series of short-term subs, how are we really making sure that kids are getting what they need?

So all the different discussions, we can't forget that one of the most important things about school safety is children having a trusting relationship with an adult.

When you're talking about the nervous system, that was kind of what clicked in my head.

It's so important that kids at school feel like they have connections to adults, and when all the adults are overwhelmed when there's not enough of them, that's hard.

So that costs money.

We have pipeline issues in mental health and in education, so there's a lot of challenges to deal with.

But we have to get to the point where we recognize that we need more adults who are trained and capable on campus.

-And there is a teacher shortage across the country -And there's a mental health shortage.

-And that.

And this issue we're talking about is not just here in Southern Nevada, it's across the country, the teacher shortage and violence in schools.

What is the consequence for bringing a firearm on campus?

I wanted to reference you reported 25 firearms confiscated so far this year, or this school year dating back to August?

-We do that count from the start of the school year, so that's the first day of school until the current date.

So right now I know I reported 25; that's actually 28 or 27 I believe as of today.

-How does that compare to previous years?

-If we compare it to the 2019-2020 school year that ended in March, we're right on pace to match that or be a little bit under that.

You know, we have the random search program that Dr. Jara created in response to our high number of firearm confiscations, I believe that was three years ago, and that has helped in knocking down that number.

You know, the random search program, it's randomly selected schools, typically a high school.

They do a search at the start of the school day.

Every student entering the school will be searched-- or not every student, every certain number of students that come in through the door, also a classroom search, and we have canine dogs.

We have five firearm detection dogs that go around, and they hit four high schools each school day, and they select a classroom to do a classroom sniff.

The students exit the room and they sniff the room for firearms.

No firearms are detected, but I think those measures are preventative enough to knock those numbers down.

Yes, I would like to see zero firearms confiscated in our schools, but the reality is that's not reality.

That's not possible, you know, but we're doing what we can to ensure that all those incidents are responded to in a timely manner.

They're investigated, and anyone who brings a weapon such as a firearm to a campus, they're arrested.

And I'd like to say it's just confined-- this issue is confined to our students, it's not.

You know, I talked about at the press conference that an element to the school violence this year has been parents.

You know, we've had a number of parents arrested for violent acts on students, on staff, on each other on our campuses, and in the years past, that hasn't been an issue.

It is this year, and daily we have calls to elementary schools, middle schools and high schools for parents that are solving their problems through physical violence to staff and students and, you know, they're arrested as well.

So I also reported we had a thousand combined citations and arrests since January this year.

That's 1,300 now, so it's a lot of work.

There's a lot of work going on and, you know, I think these types of forums help to get the message out to at least parents out there that you need to check your student's backpack before they leave because these firearms are getting to the school from the home typically, the majority of them.

So they need to check that backpack before they leave.

They also need to check their social media accounts of their students.

Turn off the phone at night, you know.

Look and see what they're doing.

You know, a student has their student life, the life they have with their parents, and they have this other life on social media, and I think a parent needs to know all those three things with their child to be effective.

-Before I forget, bringing a firearm to campus, what is the consequence for that?

-The consequence is a mandatory expulsion, and we've also reenacted our Expulsion Review Board where any kind of disciplinary infraction, parents and students are entitled to due process rights.

But with reenacting the Expulsion Review Board, it will be automatically any firearms-- and it's just not firearms, anything deemed a dangerous weapon per Nevada Revised Statute-- will be a recommendation for expulsion and going to that Expulsion Review Board.

So we're taking a serious stance on this.

And if I could also piggyback on a comment by Ms. Garcia, connectedness has been a thing we're hearing from students, like we've done focus groups as we've been involved in these latest incidents of violence, and we're hearing from students that they're saying-- and the power of student voice-- that they're feeling like the connectedness has fallen since the pandemic.

So we are definitely at a stage of building back those structures that promote students reporting something to an adult or to another student.

But Ms. Garcia is so right that our ratios for counselors and mental health professionals on our campuses and teachers are some of the highest in the country.

So moving beyond that, not making excuses for it, how do we build structures back for students to feel safe in reporting, back to your firearm question, if there's a firearm on campus, if you have that sense of connectivity, you want them to feel safe to report it to an adult or someone who will act on that immediately.

So we're hearing from students they're not feeling as connected to their individual campuses as before the pandemic.

-I want to go back to talking about the parent involvement in a negative way.

Janet, you also counsel parents as well in addition to children and teens.

What does that indicate to you that parents are now getting involved in violence at schools and adults in general?

-They are also as dysregulated as their children.

You know, where does the dysregulation come from?

My stance as a therapist is looking at not just the behavior, but what happened to you.

What's happening in that home?

Can we support those parents in the home?

Can we do a deeper dive?

What's really happening?

If they're this violent at school, how are they with their children at home behind a closed door?

I would have those concerns as well.

Can we get involved in the family's life to help support them in a way that maybe they're not getting support?

Can we refer them to community resources?

Consequences are absolutely necessary in these kinds of situations, but can we provide community support to families that may be lacking?

We've all been through this pandemic and many people have suffered greatly, differently than myself or some of us at this table, and can we offer them some ways of figuring out life in a different way instead of resorting to these escalations of tempers and the fight or flight response, and where are we coming from and what's happening?

-Dell, what is your take on the impact COVID has had on behavior?

-It has-- as everybody here has said, it has isolated people, and we're communal beings.

We don't do well in isolation, and consequently we have an uptick in social media, as everybody here has said and knows, and with our kids especially.

It was, and remains, their out.

That's where they go to-- for lack of a better way to put it-- hook up with their friends, hide, have an alternate being where they can be somebody they really want to be but really aren't, and we see quite a bit of that.

-One thing I heard from you at a recent meeting, Ms. Garcia, was that teachers are coming up to you asking what do I do if there is violence happening in front of me?

And I wonder either for you, Chief Blackeye or for you, Mr. Barton, what can a teacher do?

What are they legally allowed to do if something happens in their presence?

-So I'm happy to take that question.

First of all, teachers have to maintain and monitor their own safety.

So that's reality.

We have a negotiated agreement with the teachers union, Article 12, that really describes that at the beginning of the school year, principals and administration have protocols as far as if there's something happening in the classroom, hitting the call button, getting an adult to come and help with that situation.

But ultimately we want to also protect teacher safety.

So they get involved, they do break up fights; however, if it's an extreme fight, there definitely is that call button, School Police gets involved, but we don't want people getting hurt, and that's the reality.

So to have a mandate that teachers have to get involved, it's a case-by-case situation as far as how involved they should get, because we don't want their safety to be compromised as well.

-And what would you recommend to a student who witnesses some violence?

And there has been at least one instance of pepper spray being used, and surrounding students who had nothing to do with it getting impacted as a result.

-Right.

We've had-- I think the number is around a little over 50-some incidents of pepper spray usage so far this school year, and considering the amount of fights, that's a very low number.

And yes, those reports have come up about students who were innocent, bypassing a fight.

If you've seen these fights, a situation like Desert Oasis there, that was social media that was all out there, and that was-- look at that.

It was a brawl.

People were going in there kicking and things like that.

You really think there's an innocent bystander standing around that?

You know, someone's going to come in and deal with this issue and bring calm to that violent situation by using pepper spray.

The officers announced they're using pepper spray.

You know what, and just the culture and the way the school is run throughout the year, you know, most kids know, all of them do unless they just got there that day, that if there's a fight, if you don't want to get injured by someone in that fight, you stay away from it.

But what we have is we have kids with their phones out filming it.

So they want to post that content on social media to show that they were there and that's all you see, and that's why we have so many videos of all of these fights from these children surrounding these fights, and a lot of them do get injured not from the pepper spray but from the combatants in the fight, those that want to join in.

So yes, put your phone down, contact an adult to help stop that fight.

And in those videos, you see the adults.

The principal was in that Desert Oasis one trying to stop the people fighting, and I have to commend the students as well.

There's some students in there that come and help try to stop these other kids from fighting and hurting others.

Some of these fights have caused serious injuries, you know, so it's important to know and to let your children know that if there is a fight on campus, go contact an adult to respond to that and don't be one of those that gets your phone out and then films it.

You know, the video of the student being struck in the classroom, think of it.

The student was just sitting right next to it, filming it very calmly, and just watched it happen.

You know, that's-- we need to stop that type of behavior and actually, you know, contact an adult to respond to that type of issue.

-It's certainly alarming.

Thank you so much for your time, all of you.

Next week on Nevada Week, we're going to explore some of the other issues impacting our valley's youth and introduce you to some of the local nonprofits available to help.

Thanks so much for joining us on Nevada Week.

Any of the resources we discussed here can be found at vegaspbs.org/nevadaweek.

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