Littleton, Colorado, like every other small town in America, awoke April 20th, 1999 to what seemed to be a normal day with everyone going about their business as they have countless times before. Unlike the other towns in America, however, two high school seniors at Littleton's Columbine High School set out to ensure that this day would go down in history as one of the most devastating and tragic days in American history. They succeeded. As media outlets broadcasted the images of swat vans and police surrounding the once tranquil building of Columbine High School, two teens, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold were busy acting out their fantasy of going on a shooting rampage through their school. They, along with 12 of their classmates and one teacher will be dead in less than one hour but their act will forever be imprinted on the national psyche. The Columbine incident will be the biggest school shooting until the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007 but the attack holds a special place in the minds of Americans. Columbine showed the country that their children may not be safe in the very institution we trust to instill in them the knowledge to be functional members of society. In fact, the educational system's dysfunction may very well have been a central reason for this attack. This dysfunctional system and the social consequences it created combined with the attackers' psychological makeup to produce one of the worst school shootings in history.
The perpetrators of this attack were Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, two senior students who felt that years of mistreatment at the hands of their social "superiors" warranted them going on a vindictive rampage. This perceived social injustice and the desire to avenge the pain unfairly cast on them are considered by many to be the cause of the attack. Columbine High School appeared to be an exceptional public school on the surface.