Reducing violence in workplaces and schools

In my Viewpoint, Another Day, Another Lone Gunman, published in the November issue of Consulting-Specifying Engineer, I couldn’t find a silver lining or ray of optimism in the recent shootings at Ft. Hood or the Orlando RS&H engineering firm, so closed with, “So it seems that more incidents involving lone gunmen lie ahead, no matter how much we secure our buildings. Consequently, I’ve posted on my blog links to programs aiming to reduce violence at workplaces and schools, and how to respond to events that do occur.”

Here, then, are the promised links. I’ve separated them as best I could into categories that would support your own research and reporting, with the aim of increasing safety and awareness in schools and workplaces.

Best wishes to you all.

Institutional Resources and Government Websites

OSHA home page for workplace violence:
“Homicide, is the fourth-leading cause of fatal occupational injury in
the United States.”  This is a great place to start looking for
relevant OSHA standards, training, statistics,  and more.tween the research community and the practitioners and policy makers.

University of Colorado at Boulder’s Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence (CSPV): : In an effort to establish more complete and valuable information to impact violence-related policies, programs, and practices, CSPV works from a multidisciplinary platform on the subject of violence and facilitates the building of bridges be

• In particular, the CSPV designed and launched a national violence prevention initiative to identify violence prevention programs that are effective. The project, called Blueprints for Violence Prevention, has identified 11 prevention and intervention programs that meet a strict scientific standard of program effectiveness. Here’s a link to the Blueprints website: www.colorado.edu/cspv/blueprints/

FEMA Lessons Learned Information Sharing website: LLIS.gov is the national network of Lessons Learned and Best Practices for emergency response providers and homeland security officials. LLIS.gov’s secure, restricted-access information is designed to facilitate efforts to prevent, prepare for and respond to acts of terrorism and other incidents across all disciplines and communities throughout the US.

IMPACT Safety: A non-profit organization in central Ohio that  teaches practical skills to enhance personal safety and confidence for adults, youth, individuals with special needs, organizations and corporations in Central Ohio and around the state. Women, teens, children, and men can learn these effective strategies that prevent violence. Organizations can help their employees enhance their sense of safety and confidence in the face of risk through safety awareness courses and workshops. They have a good white paper worth reading, with hyperlinks to supporting data.

Journalism Center on Children and Families: A webpage containing annotated hyperlinks of Sources for Covering School-Based Shootings. The Center’s list of experts was last updated July 2009.

Research Reports

National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH):  Initiative on Occupational Violence and Homicide: The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI) reported 11,613 workplace homicide victims between 1992 and 2006. Averaging just under 800 homicides per year, the largest number of homicides in one year (n=1080) occurred in 1994, while the lowest number (n=540) occurred in 2006. This web page summarizes and links to a wide array of research reports, blogs, and other resources. A few of interest are:

• Search for NIOSH Publications: Generate immediate search results of the NIOSH database on the topic of workplace violence by clicking here

• Violence Against Teachers and School Staff: A single blog post worth reading, but more so are the comments from teachers and other school workers who have been assaulted by students in classrooms.

• Bureau of Labor Statistics: Survey of Workplace Violence Prevention, 2005 (Published October 27, 2006): The Survey of Workplace Violence Prevention looks at the prevalence of security features, the risks facing employees, employer policies and training, and related topics associated with maintaining a safe work environment. Data are available for private industry, State government, and local government by industry and size of establishment, that is, the number of workers employed. Over 128 million workers were employed at the 7.4 million establishments represented by the survey.

Miscellaneous statistics from various sources

Infoplease.com: Time Line of Worldwide School Shootings, Feb. 1996 - March 2009

Wikipedia

• Notable postal shootings
• Notable school shootings in U.S., Canada, and Europe,
• List of school attacks (not just shootings) from 1764 to current
• Mall shootings (search results; not a table or compilation)
• List of events named “massacres” from the Massacre of Thessaloniki, Macedonia in 369 AD to The Ft. Hood Massacre in 2009.

Safety organizations

ASIS International: ASIS International is comprised of more than 36,000 security management professionals worldwide. Many hold senior, security positions with major corporations, and they often have military and/or law enforcement backgrounds including work with the CIA, ATF, and FBI.

MaineSecurity.com’s list of security organizations:  Very comprehensive list of security organizations with alliances and institutions for major types of businesses and professions.