LAS VEGAS -- After a tragedy touches a school or a campus is threatened, the Clark County School District's Crisis Response Team steps in to help students and faculty.
Between the deaths of students and faculty members and students threats, the team handles between 300 and 400 cases a year. The most recent crisis was the horrific double murder and suicide in Boulder City Monday.
Five-year-old Max Walters was shot and killed in his home Monday morning. The team went to his school to talk with students and teachers even before it was announced that the boy had died.
"The protocol was to be available to the principal to start planning, orchestrating what needs to happen if and when the coroner called the death," coordinator for the team Rosemary Virtuoso said.
Each case is different and needs the attention of trained experts, Virtuoso said. Her nine member team has to be flexible in their response.
"Little ones, early elementary kids, they have a very difficult time. They do not understand the concept, the finality of death, and tend to move on. Although, we might see regressive behaviors once their parents talk to them," Virtuoso said.
In cases involving young children, the team actually focuses on the adults in their lives, teaching them the signs of emotional stress.
"Kids might have nightmares, or be clingy because they are not sure what is going on. They see something happening and don't understand it," the coordinator said.
The team was created the day after the deadly shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado in 1999. Members have received training from the Secret Service.
While the tragic situations like the one in Boulder City might get the most attention, the crisis team says the majority of its work is evaluating threats, especially ones involving a student who is thinking of harming himself.
"Suicide ideation level is very high right now in the school district and it is the second highest in the entire nation," crisis response school psychologist Kelly Demos said.
In those cases, school psychologists are sent to assess the level of threat the student poses, deciding if follow-up counseling or hospitalization is needed.
While the team is there after something awful has happened, Demos says the most important thing the team does is prevent tragedies.
Shooting scene from double murder and suicide in Boulder City
