As they sat in Hodge Hall 2075, graduate students were faced with the jarring thought of what would happen if an active shooter, somebody who wants to kill as many people as possible, entered the room. Where is the nearest exit? What could be used as a weapon? Who would survive and who wouldn’t?
All these questions lingered in students’ minds as they listened to emergency management coordinator John Summerlot’s active shooter presentation at Friday’s Graduate and Professional Student Government meeting.
Before beginning, Summerlot told assembly members his presentation was not intended to scare them.
“The idea is to keep you mentally prepared and aware in situations that you’re going into and how best to get out of those,” he said.
Summerlot taught GPSG members about how to react in an active shooter situation using the method “Run, Hide, Fight.”
At the first sounds of gunfire, students who are not near the shooter should run. Whether it’s under a desk or in a barricaded room, students who are near the shooter but have not yet been seen should hide. If the shooter begins to approach, students should fight with anything available, including desks, chairs or laptops.
“The idea behind ‘Run, Hide, Fight’ is to keep you safe and keep them moving on, looking for that next available soft target,” Summerlot said.
Although this method is useful in deciding what to do, Summerlot added that each situation is different, and where the shooter is and where each person is changes it.
“You can’t universally say ‘Oh, you should always do this or you should always do that,’” Summerlot added.
The average active shooter incident lasts for less than four minutes, and the average response time of the IU Police Department is about two and a half minutes. This method is to keep people safe during the short duration of the incident, Summerlot said.
As part of this method, it is important for people to think about different exits in the rooms they are often in or what could be used as a weapon in their office or classroom.
Summerlot said part of his job is to get people to think differently about the rooms and spaces they are in.
“Think about the spaces you’re in on a regular basis and how they might look a little bit different or what you could do in an emergency to make those better spaces,” he said.
As the emergency management coordinator, Summerlot’s looks after all IU campuses and deal with all emergencies including floods, fires or overseas travel emergencies.
“My job is to make sure students, staff and faculty are prepared to respond to the emergencies they may run across on a daily basis,” Summerlot said.
After the presentation, there was a short time for assembly members to ask questions. Some questions were about concealed carry on campus and when each part of the “Run, Hide, Fight” method applies. In terms of where the state of Indiana is on concealed carry on campus, Summerlot said each year a bill is proposed but has never gone past committee.
Although the ideas and feelings from the presentation may have been jarring, GPSG President Ben Verdi said it is important to know this type of information.
“I think it’s important for us to understand that there are a myriad of different situations that we might find ourselves in,” Verdi said. “We’re going to be potentially people who really need to know this kind of stuff.”
