One In Seven L.A. Teens Brings Weapon To High School

Citing the threat of random street violence and the menace of gangs, one in seven Los Angeles high school students admits carrying a weapon to school for protection, according to a new study.

The weapons of choice for most are knives, sharpened screwdrivers, razor blades and the like. But in the survey scheduled for release today, 2.5 percent of the students questioned at 11 high schools said they brought a gun on campus. And 1.4 percent said they bring a weapon every day, making it as much a part of their school routine as a textbook or a calculator.

They clearly have not been deterred by the Los Angeles Unified School District’s policy of making random checks with metal detectors. Nearly half of the high schoolers were unaware their schools had such a policy.

The survey, which covered 1,802 Los Angeles Unified School District high school students, was conducted in 1995 and ‘96 by the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California with the help of researchers from California State University, Los Angeles, and the University of Southern California. The schools represented the geographic diversity of the district.

The issue of school safety has been high on the national agenda since U.S. Senate hearings in the mid-1970s. In 1994, the national Council of the Great City Schools reported that 83 percent of urban superintendents and school board members listed violence and gang activity as their top concern.

About 49 percent of the surveyed students said they could “easily” get a gun and 25 percent said they would have to pay less than $50 for it.

Only 14 percent of those surveyed said weapons are a means of repelling on-campus attacks, while 39 percent said it was fear of gang-related violence that led students to arm themselves. Another 30 percent said a weapon offered protection getting to and from school.

“The students that attend here know nothing but how to be violent,” wrote one respondent from Jordan High School in the heart of South-Central Los Angeles.

A chilling 70 percent of the students at Jordan said they had witnessed a drive-by shooting near campus. More than a third of the respondents in the entire survey had seen a fellow teenager shot in their neighborhood, and 41 percent had witnessed a drive-by shooting.