“We are in lockdown.  This is not a drill.  Repeat.  We are in lockdown.  This is not a drill.” 

Such dire-sounding words piped over the P.A. system sound like something one would hear in the military or in prison.  Instead, the discomforting announcement is made at the high school where I work.

When I became a teacher over 21 years ago, I never thought in my wildest imagination my life could be in jeopardy while on the job.  Due to the Columbine and Virginia Tech shootings, today’s teachers and students face new threats going to school.  It’s not enough having fire and earthquake drills.

If you’ve never experienced a lockdown, feel lucky.  I’ve been through two and they are frightening.  Yet much of the horror stems from the procedures of a lockdown more than the suspected sniper lurking about.

Teachers are told to lock the door, turn off all lights, and get kids on the floor under tables and desks.

Since everyone knows this, what prevents a person with a gun on a school campus from shooting the lock off the door and killing 35 kids who are sitting ducks? 

For the teacher, there is no worse feeling than having no communication with the administrators.  Besides the P.A. announcement of a lockdown, no further messages are aired.  No e-mails are sent to teacher computers.  Cell phones aren’t even utilized.

“It was only fifteen minutes,” an outside observer may comment.  But let me tell you, when you are crouched down under a table, hearing muffled cries and whispers from students, unsure how to comfort them, unable to calm your rapidly beating heart, peering up through the slits of vertical blinds hoping not to get a glimpse of a gunman, it seems like an eternity.

School officials need to figure out a better way of protecting children during future lockdown episodes.