By Cynthia Grau/WJEZ News

School shootings have peppered the news for years, most recently in Kentucky, so is there anything schools can do to keep that from happening?

Aside from response training, Regional Superintendent of Schools of Livingston, McClean, Logan and DeWitt Counties Mark Jontry said they’re looking into mental health training.

“The concerns around mental health are probably the preeminent concern of educators on a daily basis in our schools. We have students at all ages that come to school with more and more challenges on a daily basis, be it difficult home situations or other factors – cyber bullying through social media, et cetera. So, those issues are presenting them at the schoolhouse doors for our educators and they have to deal with it. So, there’s been a concerted effort, not only in Livingston County, but across the region I serve and across the state, to really focus on the mental health of our students, what kind of interventions can we do and what type of strategies can we employ in order to make sure kids are in a good place mentally, and as a result, in a position to learn,” Jontry said.

Jontry was a guest on a recent Community Forum, where he further explains the training. That can be found at WJEZ.com.