Bill Clinton: “Well, I hope so. You know, it's interesting; all of these instances of school violence, even though they occurred in…”

“Well, I hope so. You know, it's interesting; all of these instances of school violence, even though they occurred in schools which some had a lot of racial diversity, some had not much racial diversity, but they all occurred away from inner-city areas with very high unemployment and high general crime rates. They tended to occur more in small towns and rural areas or suburbs, where you normally would not think that society itself falling apart around you would happen. Now, part of that could be the absence of the kind of warning and alert systems that you often have in the big city schools. I mean, a lot of big city schools, for example, all routinely have metal detectors and things like that because they know they've got to protect their kids. But I think what it means is that whatever is out there in our culture, whether it is the failure of parents to teach their kids, whether it is that plus then the extra exposure to violent experiences when you're young, kind of one step removed through media or video games or whatever--whatever it is--what it shows is that the people in rural America and in suburban America, in low-crime America and upper income America are just as vulnerable to having alienated young people in gangs or in isolation take violent action. I think that's what it shows. And it should destroy any of our racial or economic stereotypes about this. This is something that can happen anywhere. That's the point you made, and I think that's right. [A student noted that T.C. Williams also had social workers and psychologists in addition to the hotline and peer mediators, and asked how many other schools in the country had these alternatives.]”