Hoax Threats Can Create 'An Environment Of Anxiety' For Schools

While fake threats like the one that happened at Nathan Hale don't always harm people physically, they can have lasting effects on student's emotional health.

Even just the threat of violence at a school can send students, teachers, and parents into distress. And it doesn't easily fade away when the chaos ends.

"It creates an environment of anxiety, like higher anxiety that is already there," says Rebekah Taylor.

She is the executive director of Daybreak Family Services. The organization provides counseling to school districts like Sand Springs and Broken Arrow. Taylor says school threats like shootings or bombings can live in the minds of students, even if they don't experience them firsthand.

"You have the anxiety of just being a kid in the world and then you put all of that on top of it that's definitely going to disrupt learning," says Taylor.

To help prevent those disruptions, Rudy Perez with the National Association of School Resource Officers says a strong relationship between law enforcement and school districts is necessary.

"The schools are an ecosystem and it's not a law enforcement answer only it's a complicated problem with complicated answers," says Perez.

He says schools need to take threats seriously every time.

"Because it's happened so many times, people are not taking it seriously and I think you can't get lax in these situations," says Perez.

Whether or not a threat turns into something real or not, Perez and Taylor agree that a parent's relationship with their child can help in more ways than one.

"Make sure your kid knows you're there to listen to them their feelings are important, their feelings are valid, if they have fears those are valid," says Taylor.

When creating a plan to deal with threats, the National Association of School Resource Officers says schools should focus on getting accurate information to parents as quickly as possible to prevent rumors.