The idea comes from lessons learned last year from the shootings at Columbine High School in suburban Denver. Fourteen students and a teacher died at the hands of two seniors, who then killed themselves. Sheriff's deputies were criticized at the time for not stopping the shooting faster. With Columbine as hindsight, regional SWAT teams in Northern Kentucky and Hamilton County have recently started developing QUAD programs they hope will be copied throughout the region and elsewhere. The Cincinnati Police Division just started training all its 1,000 officers to use the QUAD plan.
Educators welcome the help.
Fred Bassett, superintendent of Beechwood schools in Fort Mitchell, has given blanket approval for law-enforcement officials to use his school for practice anytime. QUAD started last year in Columbus, where SWAT Lt. David Wood looked at the Columbine criticism and decided to develop a new method. Because it takes time for the specially trained SWAT officers to mobilize, his plan trains any officer who could end up being among the first on a school-shooting scene. Most of Columbus' more than 1,700 officers already have completed the training. Some of them used the plan recently when a shooter ran into a hotel.