What went right at New Bedford High. (News connection: up-to-date and usable education information from schools, government, business, research and professional organizations).

Educators and administrators learned much from the tragedy at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo. The importance of establishing good communication between students and adults tops the list.

In the end, it was open and confidential communication that prevented a similar incident at New Bedford High School in Massachusetts in late November. Three teens were thwarted in a plot to blow up the school and act out a Columbine-like student and faculty shooting and suicide.

"There is a lot that went right in that situation," says Julie Lewis, staff attorney for the National School Boards Association. "There was communication taking place between the right people: the police, school officials and faculty members." In October, a student told a faculty member that she had overheard two boys planning an attack. That teacher then told other officials, says Lewis.

The school's two resource officers--who had just started working at New Bedford this fall--also played a significant role, she adds. Their placement there had grown out of a city-wide community policing initiative. It was one of these officers, a former student of the school and a confidant of many on the faculty and numerous students, who headed off trouble. By following up on the threat, the police uncovered a box containing a partially completed bomb in a nearby apartment building. At that point the police could not make an arrest, although they did interview suspects. Weeks later, when a school janitor found a letter in the trash outlining the plot's details, police were able to make arrests.

All involved took the matter seriously, notes Lewis. This relates to a key finding that came from the U.S. Secret Service's study of the Columbine incident: Teenage assailants almost always talk to other students about their plans. "We are living in a time when this has to be taken quite seriously," says Lewis.

Judy Wurtzel, executive director of the Learning First Alliance, says there are other lessons that can be learned from the incident in New Bedford High School. Each student in the school should have at least one adult that knows him or her well. "Without opening a file, at least one adult should know the kid's name, how he or she is doing in class, and who that kid is hanging around with," she says. In the recently-issued report by the Learning First Alliance titled, Every Child Learning: Safe and Supportive Schools, Wurtzel stresses the importance of school activities for all students, not just the athletes who often receive praise, or for the students who gravitate to student government. She advocates expanding school activities for students--not just the gifted or elite.