Giving Compass' Take: 

• The Heritage Foundation list three common factors that school shooters have in common: Mental illness, coming from a broken home, and economic insecurity. 

• What resources are available to students with mental illness? How can we expand them? 

• Here's what it's like to go back to school after a shooting. 

What do school attackers have in common? Several things.

In addition to often exhibiting signs of increasingly violent and dysfunctional behavior, they are significantly more likely than the average population to suffer from undiagnosed or untreated mental illness; they often come from broken homes; and their shootings may be related to economic insecurity.

Let’s take a closer look at these factors.

  1. Mental Illness. Even when serious mental illness is not present, school attackers almost always exhibit common traits of extreme resentfulness, anger, and a desire for revenge because of perceived social alienation.
  2. Broken Homes. Familial dynamics may also play a role in the early detection of students on the verge of committing catastrophic acts of violence.
  3. Economic Insecurity. Socioeconomic trends may provide clues to identify further risk factors related to school violence.

Read more about each of these common traits by John Malcolm and Amy Swearer at The Heritage Foundation.