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Two more Tennessee students have died by gunfire at school in a state that has invested hundreds of millions of dollars to fortify campuses — and done little to restrict gun access.
Police said a 16-year-old female student at Nashville’s Antioch High School died after being shot Wednesday in the cafeteria by a 17-year-old male student with a handgun, who then shot himself in the head and died. A third student was grazed in the arm during the shooting.
The shooting comes less than two years after a mass shooting at a private Christian school in Nashville prompted the state’s Republican supermajority to invest in more school-based safety officers, security upgrades, and allowing some public school teachers to carry guns.
This year’s legislative agenda, headlined by a special session called by Republican Gov. Bill Lee, is dominated by private school vouchers and enforcement of President Donald Trump’s immigration policies.
While some Democrats on Wednesday signaled a desire to take up school safety and gun reforms, it was unclear from the initial reaction whether Republicans who have firm control of state government will respond.
The latest shooting happened at approximately 11:09 a.m., prompting a lockdown at the 2,100-student public school in the southeast Nashville neighborhood of Antioch. Students later were transported by bus to a nearby hospital to reunite with their families.
“It is impossibly difficult to be here, once again, dealing with the devastation of gun violence in one of our school communities,” Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell said at a news conference outside the school campus.
Tennessee has invested heavily in school security
Lee’s administration mostly sought to fortify school campuses in response to the 2023 shooting by a former student that killed three children and three adults at Nashville’s Covenant School.
The GOP-controlled legislature has rejected efforts by Democrats to tighten the state’s lax gun laws.
In 2023, lawmakers added $144 million annually to the state budget to pay for at least one school-based officer for every public school. Tens of millions of more dollars were invested to help public and private schools make security upgrades and bolster collaboration between schools and state homeland security agents.
Lawmakers in 2024 approved new school fire alarm protocols to take into account active-shooter situations; a pilot program to give teachers wearable alarms; and increased safety training for school bus drivers, among other things.
Their most contentious debate was over a bill to let some public school teachers and staff carry guns under certain circumstances. Ultimately, the measure passed easily despite dramatic protests at the state Capitol by citizens wanting fewer guns in schools, not more. So far, few Tennessee school systems, if any, have sought to pursue that option.
Meanwhile, another 2024 law — to severely punish threats of mass school violence — has resulted in children being kicked out of school and arrested on felony charges, sometimes because of rumors and misunderstandings. The law is being challenged in court by several families who have filed lawsuits questioning its use.
This year, the governor has called the legislature into a special session beginning Jan. 27 to take up “public safety” measures aimed at curbing illegal immigration, a statewide private school voucher proposal, and emergency aid for flood-damaged parts of northeast Tennessee.
But Democrats said Wednesday that immigration and vouchers are distractions from the toll of gun violence on Tennesseans, especially its youngest citizens.
In 2022, firearms were the leading cause of death among the state’s children and teens ages 1-17.
“While we do not yet know all the circumstances of the shooting, we do know that a minor somehow accessed a handgun, walked into his school with that handgun and committed an unspeakable act of violence, ending his own life and the life of an innocent child,” said Rep. John Ray Clemmons, of Nashville, who chairs the House Democratic Caucus.
Antioch is the same neighborhood where Shaundelle Brooks’ son Akilah was killed during a 2018 shooting at a Waffle House restaurant. Brooks, who has become an outspoken advocate for gun control, was elected last fall to represent the area in the state House of Representatives. She was sworn in last week as the legislature convened a new two-year session.
“We are only one week into the start of our legislative session and already our state has been ravaged by another school shooting,” Brooks said Wednesday. “We must do better.”
The governor said on social media that he had been briefed about the shooting and was joining Tennesseans “in praying for the victims, their families & the school community.” Several GOP leaders in the legislature said they were waiting for more details from law enforcement.
States look for ways to protect America’s schools
Other states have taken a variety of approaches to respond to school shootings, often colored by which political party is in power.
Last month in Michigan, lawmakers approved a package of bills aimed at preventing violence in schools in the wake of the 2021 Oxford school shooting that killed four students.
Some of the legislation had bipartisan support, including bills putting more mental health support in place for students and creating standardized terminology for first responders and school staff to use during school emergencies. Others, such as a bill requiring districts to send home information about safe firearm storage, were pushed through by Democrats.
In Georgia, legislators are floating ideas to protect students in response to a mass shooting at high school last September, including revisiting a tax credit for gun safety devices that stalled last year. Other measures are expected to address student mental health and, as in Michigan, better communication between school districts and other government agencies.
The Georgia shooting, in Apalachee, raised major questions about how school systems and law enforcement share information, as well as the poor state of mental health safety nets. The alleged shooter had been investigated previously on suspicion of making online threats. His mother reportedly called the school warning of an “extreme emergency” that morning, but school officials were not able to find the student before the shooting started.
Lawmakers in Texas, another Republican-controlled state, mandated armed guards at every public school, panic buttons in classrooms, more staff training, and additional mental health support for students after the 2022 Uvalde shooting.
Recent school shootings also have focused more attention on how shooters obtain their weapons — studies find that most of them get them at home. Parents faced charges after shootings in Oxford, Michigan, and Apalachee, Georgia.
Nearly all public schools control access to their doors when kids are in the building with measures like locks and monitoring. Many now use a single point of entry. Around 60% of public schools also control access to their grounds when school is in session with barriers like a locked gate.
Around 45% of public schools had an armed police officer or other sworn law enforcement officer present at least once a week during the 2021-22 school year, the most recent federal data shows.
Two armed school resource officers were patrolling Antioch High School in Nashville when Wednesday’s shooting occurred, authorities said. Police said that by the time the two officers arrived at the cafeteria, the shooting was over and the shooter was dead.
The school will be closed for the rest of the week as Metro Nashville Public Schools arranges for grief counseling and other support for students and staff.
Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.
