When NPR Says School Shootings Are Overblown

8/27/18 NPR:

How many times per year does a gun go off in an American school?

We should know. But we don't.

This spring the U.S. Education Department reported that in the 2015-2016 school year, "nearly 240 schools ... reported at least 1 incident involving a school-related shooting." The number is far higher than most other estimates.

But NPR reached out to every one of those schools repeatedly over the course of three months and found that more than two-thirds of these reported incidents never happened. Child Trends, a nonpartisan nonprofit research organization, assisted NPR in analyzing data from the government's Civil Rights Data Collection.

 And especially interesting:

The Civil Rights Data Collection dates to 1968. The Education Department's Office for Civil Rights administers the survey every two years. Every public school is required by law to complete it. These findings often drive public conversations.

For example, the CRDC was the source of recent reports that black students were suspended from school at rates much higher than whites — information that inspired changes in discipline policy across the country.

Untrustworthy data from one office should make you wonder about their other data.