Back in 2021, the parents of Ethan Crumbely were charged for their child’s actions in the Oxford school shooting. This made it the first time parents have been charged for their child’s school shootings. However, over the past few years, school shootings have continued to happen more and more at an alarming rate. As a result, this has brought light to the reality of the situation and has triggered discussion across the country on how to deter these school shootings.
The answer is to hold parents responsible for their children’s actions, just like how the parents of Ethan Crumbely were held responsible.
No matter what, parents will always have a significant influence on their children’s views and behavior, thus ultimately impacting the decisions and actions they make. Holding parents responsible for their child’s school shootings would prevent future tragedies from occurring and students will start to feel more safe at school.
Furthermore, becoming a parent comes with responsibility. Major responsibilities of parents include noticing strange changes in their child, such as behavior changes, mood changes and more. With that, parents have the responsibility to notice signs and signals from their child that could be alarming and show a threat.
“Often times when a student has experienced a high level of trauma in their lifetime, that can be a marker for potentially like a mental health challenge. And oftentimes you can see that if a student is isolating themselves, they’re reserved, maybe they’re acting out in other ways, potentially facing bullying behavior,” Assistant Principal Matt Kraft said.
Overall, children spend a lot of time with their parents. From doing various activities together to just that simply children live with their parents. Because children spend most of their time with their parents, they influence them. From their behavior, actions and more. So in the end children reflect their parents.
“If you live with your parents and they have a certain view or do certain things, it will definitely rub off on you,” junior Mathew Harvey said.
School resource officer Dave Wynia agreed that in most cases children definitely reflect their parents. But also said that this is not always the case. He also said that how parents raise their children will affect how they behave in public and with their peers.
In addition, parents who leave guns, ammo and other dangerous weapons out should be held accountable and be charged. Even parents who do not give their children proper gun safety training or do not teach their children about the safety of their dangerous weapons should be charged as it is obvious neglect from the parent.
Wynia said that if parents have guns and ammo not legally stored such as without locks on them then they bear responsibility and accountability.
Parents can be held responsible and go to court for their children’s school absences and tardies. In that sense, parents should be held accountable for their children’s school shootings.
Harvey said that holding parents responsible for their children’s academic attendance but not school shootings “is foolish and doesn’t make any sense” when it could prevent more school shootings from happening.
Additionally, charging parents helps keep them accountable. Furthermore, it can also put pressure on parents to be more responsible and aware. It will also send a strong message to parents across the country.
“Parents should be held accountable and they should be prosecuted under whatever law is available to prove the point that as a parent or guardian, you need to have the supports and constraints in place to make sure your child and other people are safe,” Kraft said.
