This Is A Dangerous Place

It was a tough couple of days for little girls. Savannah Hardin died after being forced to run for three hours as punishment for having lied to her grandmother about eating candy bars. Savannah's stepmother was also implicated in the death, brought on by seizures caused by severe dehydration. She won't be eating any more candy bars.
Savannah died in Alabama. Meanwhile, across the country in Washington, an eight year old girl was accidentally shot by a third grade classmate. No stolen candy in this one. Just happened to be in the wrong place when the purloined handgun went off. Their school went into lockdown immediately after the shooting, where first responders found Amina Kocer-Bowman and her clueless assailant safely ensconced.
Just down the coast and up the street from the school where I work, another elementary school was put on lockdown because there was a man roaming the neighborhood with a shotgun. In this case, no little girls or little boys were harmed. Physically. The bad guy was taken into custody.
It made me think about the first thing I was taught in teacher school, about how the primary need for kids to learn is safety. I wonder how much learning will take place up the street over the next week, now that the potential for lone gunman exists in that neighborhood. I wonder how the test scores of that school in Washington will be affected. I know how Savannah's report card will look. I know that we live in a scary world for boys and girls of all ages, but it does make me pine for the times when a kid could get in trouble for bringing Mad magazine to school. Nobody wanted to get paddled or spanked, but they didn't expect to die.
I know that everyone's going to get an extra water break after we run our laps this week in PE.