The Columbine tragedy led to an evolution in school construction, he said, with most new classrooms designed to provide locking from inside via a key or thumb turn. “Locking from inside the classroom may not have been a popular option out of concern that students could lock the teacher out,” he said. Ferking is a design leader for DLR Group, an architecture firm that specializes in school design.
Many schools designed in the 20th century featured classroom doors that locked from the outside, allowing the teacher or administrator to lock up as they left for the day, Todd Ferking explained in an email. “To me,” Stephens said, “there’s just a whole cascade of apparent failures that took place in this particular situation.”
