So, how many school shootings are there in a year? The government says 240. NPR, of all organizations, says the number is *slightly* lower: 11.

The School Shootings That Weren’t

Even that 11 doesn’t mean “mass murders,” or even “one murder,” but just a “shooting at a school. And of course there’s this problem:

The government’s definition included any discharge of a weapon at school-sponsored events or on school buses.

That is *incredibly* vague. Did a rabid Dire Wolf break into the school and start eating the kids and a school guard shot it? School shooting. Did the school have a sanctioned target shooting exercise? School shooting. Did the cops have a running gunbattle with gangbangers through a school parking lot? School shooting. Described in the piece is a Wisconsin school that was confused about whether or not to report students engaged in a paintball battle as an “attack with a weapon” or a “possession of a firearm.”

We are forever being told that “this sort of thing happens in America all the time.” And yet, a school shooting where kids are actually shot makes the news, far and wide. Stuff that happens all the time is, by definition, not newsworthy. If it’s newsworthy, it’s rare.