US Army response to school shootings: Violent video games

By Chris Burns/Jan. 5, 2018 12:30 pm EST

The US Army just converted a war training video game to better suit future trainees with school shootings. A tactical FPS video game was made to train troops in the US Army. That game was converted by the army to instead assist teachers and faculty to fight back against attacks in public schools.

Violence that was once said to be caused by video games is now being fought with video games. This particular video game is part of a $5.6 million program called Enhanced Dynamic Geo-Social Environment, or EDGE. This system is located online at CESI EDGE Training dot com, and the School Shooting version is coming this year.

"With teachers, they did not self-select into a role where they expect to have bullets flying near them. Unfortunately, it's becoming a reality," said Tamara Griffith, chief engineer for the project, speaking with AP. "We want to teach teachers how to respond as first responders."

One video about this project was published by Gizmodo, containing interviews with the Army Research Laboratory's Griffith, and others.

"I hope that people will sort of see this simulation as a really cool and engaging way to think about school safety," said Amanda Klinger, director of operations for nonprofit Educators School Safety Network.

This video game was first promoted by the US Army to several news outlets right around the turn of the new year. Meanwhile there was no significant news this week or last week or any week recently about any sort of new gun regulation in the United States.

A related set of events that happened happened recently took place at the White House. On the anniversary of the massacre at Sandy Hook, the Trump administration hosted a Christmas Party. One of the invited attendees was National Rifle Association leader Wayne LaPierre.

Some misinformation about this situation was spread not long after, but the fact remains that a party on the night of the 5th anniversary of the Sandy Hook shootings did take place, and the NRA was represented. See Snopes for more details.