I’ll never forget the first horrifying moments of covering The Covenant School shooting in Nashville.
It was March 27, 2023 — the day I officially moved off the breaking news team at my newspaper, The Tennessean, to take over as the children’s reporter. My new role included covering the health, welfare and education of children. I was driving across town when the flurry of text messages and phone calls began.
Information was spotty at first. All I knew to do was to point my car in the direction of the school’s neighborhood until I learned more.
As I sat in gridlocked traffic while emergency vehicles blared past, I got news of what I feared most: Children had been shot. Possibly others.
I began to report to my editor what I saw: People running up the hill toward the school. Dozens of emergency vehicles. Helicopters circling overhead. Children and staff members standing in a parking lot across the street from the school. Empty school buses rolling by to pick them up.
While I waited for a news briefing from public officials, I spoke to police officers. I called the spokesperson for the nearby children’s hospital. I asked worried neighbors what was on their minds. Eventually we learned that three children and three staffers had died at the private Christian school.
The days and weeks that followed brought an influx of national media outlets and a flurry of other events, including a visit from then-First Lady Jill Biden and then-Vice President Kamala Harris. Then there was also the chaos of protests at the Tennessee Capitol over gun laws. The political fallout of the shooting made international news.
But at some point, it all went strangely quiet.
Less than two years later, our community was swallowed in grief once again. A student opened fire at Antioch High School in Nashville, killing a 16-year-old student, wounding another and then fatally shooting himself.
But this time, as horrible as it is, we had a sense of what to do.
I’ve thought a lot about that grim reality: Knowing what to do as a reporter in the midst of unthinkable tragedy. When the Education Writers Association approached me to assemble this reporting guide, I began to gather what I wished I knew in 2023 that I know now. I also took a look back at how we got to this point in U.S. history, where gun violence, mass shootings and school shootings seem nonstop.
After conversations with fellow reporters and even a journalist-turned-therapist, here are some guidelines that I hope will help those tasked with the difficult job of covering a school shooting and gun violence.
Navigating the Aftermath of a School Shooting
The immediacy of covering a school shooting can be overwhelming. There are a lot of places you and your colleagues will need to be: the school, the family reunification location, news briefings with officials, nearby hospitals, and so on.
If you’re sent out into the field, start reporting what you see, hear and observe, even if official information is sparse.
Here are some other tips to follow:
- Be careful not to report on rumors or conspiracy theories.
- Work together with your colleagues and officials to verify information.
- Start a voice memo or dictate updates to a colleague via phone if you can’t write things down.
- Talk to bystanders.
- Ask police officers for updates.
- Find out if there is a designated media staging area.
- Jot down questions you may want to ask in a news briefing later.
Also, the hours covering a school shooting can get long. Don’t forget to eat something and stay hydrated, even if you don’t feel hungry or thirsty. Check on others around you and make sure they do the same.
Examining the Ongoing Debate and Research on Guns
School shootings typically reignite heated debates over guns — an issue that deeply divides Americans to this day.
This resource on Americans and their views on guns from Pew Research Center is a great place to get a sense of public opinion. You can also read up on the landmark 2022 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that widened the Second Amendment.
I also recommend catching up on the powerful organizations that have shaped the gun debate over the years, such as the National Rifle Association and Everytown for Gun Safety.
Founded in 1871, the NRA began as a recreational group and has since grown into a political force in the U.S. It is known to lobby against gun control and defend the right to bear arms outlined in the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. This article from the BBC is a helpful explainer on the NRA and the enormous influence it exerts.
In the wake of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, families banded together to form Sandy Hook Promise, an organization that focuses on preventing gun violence in America. Billionaire and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg founded Everytown for Gun Safety in 2013 with the goal of ending gun violence. This guide from USA TODAY has more details on the key gun control advocates leading the debate in recent years.
You’ll find there is a lot of data on school shootings and gun violence out there. It can get confusing. The K-12 School Shooting Database is a helpful resource, with data that goes back to the 1970s.
The Washington Post’s interactive school shootings database is also a great resource, with data that goes back to the 1999 Columbine High School shooting in Colorado.
Here are a few key facts from The Washington Post’s database as of August 2025:
- There have been 428 school shootings in the U.S. since the Columbine High School shooting.
- More than 394,000 children have been exposed to gun violence in school since the Columbine shooting.
- In 2022, we saw the highest number of school shootings in a year since 1999, topping out at 46. Dozens more school shootings have unfolded in the years since.
- Children of color — and especially Black children — are disproportionately affected by gun violence at school.
Here’s additional context journalists should keep in mind: Not every reporter will cover a school shooting. Youth are more likely to experience gun violence at home or in their communities.
Additionally, the gun death rate among children and teenagers has increased 106% since 2013, according to a 2022 report from the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions.
Interviewing Children Who Have Experienced Trauma
Approaching traumatized subjects in the wake of a school shooting requires an extra degree of care, especially when it comes to kids. As a starting point, I find this guide on trauma-informed reporting to be greatly helpful. (The latter is from the Global Center for Journalism and Trauma, formerly the Dart Center.)
John Woodrow Cox, a reporter with The Washington Post who has extensively covered school shootings and the effects of gun violence, offered some words of advice when I approached him.
While some of these depend on when (and where) you interview a child, here are some of Cox’s methods for interviewing children who have experienced gun violence. Many of these also apply to interviewing adults.
- Interview everyone around the child before sitting down with them. If time allows, learn the child’s story from the perspectives of those close to them before your interview. Work to understand what may trigger their trauma. Go into the conversation with as much knowledge and understanding about the child as possible, and use that to inform your approach and your questions.
“Pre-reporting is really important with kids who have been through trauma,” Cox said.
- Explain what you do. Show the child your work before interviewing them. Pull up your news outlet’s website, photos, videos and whatever else you think will help them understand what you do.
- Make sure the interview setup is comfortable. Ask kids where they prefer to talk. For younger children, plan to have a parent or trusted adult present for the conversation. Make sure the adult understands they don’t have to speak for the child, but they can also intervene if they worry the child is having a trauma response or becoming upset. Sit with the child in a way that has their line of sight either equal to or above your own. If that means sitting on the floor, give it a try.
“That gives a physical sense (that) they’re in charge, too,” Cox said.
- Give them as much agency as possible. Make sure the child knows they’re in control of the conversation, not you. Also remind them that just because you’re an adult, they don’t have to talk or answer your questions if they don’t want to.
“I constantly give them permission to say no and walk away,” he said.
- Record everything. You never know what little thing a child will say that will become relevant later.
“Kids speak in such specific ways, and I think so much of the power of what they say is in the specificity of their language,” Cox said.
- Help them out of the “dark places.” When you ask a child to retell a traumatic experience, find a way to bring them back into a calmer, more balanced state of mind. Jot down a few notes and questions that would give them something to smile about or get them talking about something that brings them joy.
“We take them into very dark places … We’re asking them to relive some of the worst moments of their lives, and we have a responsibility to bring them out of those moments,” he said.
Taking Advice From a Therapist
Melissa Stanger is a journalist-turned-therapist who specializes in treating trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder, among other things. She said it’s hard to pin down a “right” way to cover traumatic events and the people they affect.
However, she did offer a few helpful pieces of advice.
Here’s what I took away from our conversation:
- Connect on a human level. When you approach someone who has experienced trauma, remember that you’re a human first and a reporter second. “Imagine how you would feel and how you would want to be approached if it was you in that situation,” Stanger said.
- Avoid harmful stereotypes. Be mindful of what details you include about the community and people affected by gun violence. Harmful stereotypes can emerge around race, poverty levels, crime rates and other factors. Carefully examine every detail in your coverage. Even in the heat of the moment while news is breaking, be sure to talk things out with an editor or a colleague. If you’re digging into long-term coverage, fold in the voices of experts, advocates and trusted local leaders.The same things apply when you’re talking about mental illness, Stanger said. She also recommends including links to resources for those who may be struggling with mental health, where relevant.
- Guard against sensationalizing. By definition, sensationalizing something means you present it in a way that provokes interest or excitement at the expense of accuracy. While school shootings and gun violence will draw great interest from your audience, Stanger said to guard against writing things for the sake of engagement.
- Keep an open mind. It can be easy to go into an interview with an angle or a narrative in mind, Stanger said. She encourages reporters to instead let people tell the story in their own words.
“If we let the story unfold and then find the lens through that, it becomes more of a person-centered story and not a tragedy-centered story,” she said.
Caring for Yourself While Covering Traumatic Events
The fallout of covering traumatic events can take a heavy toll on journalists. I know firsthand how true that is. Here are some things I’ve found helpful over the years, along with a few more pieces of advice from Stanger.
- Talk about it. Find someone you trust and talk about what you’re feeling, seeing and experiencing. Seek out a friend, family member, colleague or loved one to talk to. Don’t bottle things up.
- Give therapy a try. I’ve been deeply thankful for the counselors who have helped me along the way as a journalist. Many companies offer free counseling sessions through what’s known as an “employee assistance program,” or EAP. See if those benefits are available to you. A lot of health insurance providers also cover counseling. Some counselors even offer “sliding scale” payments based on income.
- Know the warning signs. Even if you didn’t directly witness something traumatic, there is such a thing as vicarious trauma and secondary trauma. Stanger said this can drive post-traumatic stress disorder and other issues in journalists. Sometimes PTSD can look like other things, Stanger said, including disruptions in sleep, mood, personal relationships and appetite, along with irritability, nightmares and hypervigilance. The American Press Institute put together an excellent resource on mental health for journalists. The Global Center for Journalism and Trauma also created the Journalist Trauma Support Network.
Research on the Effects of Gun Violence Exposure on Kids
Additional Reporting Resources
- Gun Violence Archive
- Gun Violence in the United States 2022: Examining the Burden Among Children and Teens, Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions
- How the Supreme Court Broadened the Second Amendment, The Trace
- How to Have Better Conversations with Survivors of Gun Violence, The Trace
- It’s Time to Rethink Coverage of School Shootings, Columbia Journalism Review
- Language, Please Style Guide, Vox Media
- Local Newsrooms Want to Stop Sensationalizing Crime, but It’s Hard, Poynter Institute
- Key Facts About Americans and Guns, BBC
- K-12 School Shooting Database
- Responsible Coverage of School Shootings, Education Writers Association
- School Shootings Database, The Washington Post
- Style Guide for Trauma-Informed Journalism, Global Center for Journalism and Trauma
- Journalists and Mental Health: An API resource guide, American Press Institute
- Journalist Trauma Support Network, Global Center for Journalism and Trauma
Thanks to EWA board member Joy Resmovits of The Trace for compiling and sharing the sources in the section, “Research on the Effects of Gun Violence Exposure on Kids.”
Rachel Wegner is the children’s reporter for The Tennessean, a newspaper in Nashville that is part of the USA TODAY Network. Her work focuses on the health, welfare and education of children. Before her time on the children’s beat, she covered breaking and trending news for The Tennessean.
