David Riedman
Assistant Professor
Office: Emergency Services Department, ISU Meridian
David Riedman is an assistant professor in the Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Services at Idaho State University and the founder of the K-12 School Shooting Database, an open-source research project documenting gun violence at schools in the United States dating back to the 1960s. He is a Ph.D. student, earned a master’s degree in National Security Affairs from the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School, and has authored multiple peer-reviewed articles on homeland security policy, critical infrastructure protection, and emergency management. He has keynoted the largest conferences for public safety, public health, and campus security to share his research on school shootings. Formerly, he served as a firefighter and emergency medical technician in Maryland for 18 years, when he reached the rank of Captain.
The database started in 2018 after the Parkland High School Shooting as a school project. Riedman and his classmate hoped to develop a threat assessment tool to prevent future incidents by documenting school shootings. Since then, he has continued to develop the database into the most comprehensive and inclusive public source of information on gun violence at schools, with more than 2,700 incidents dating back to 1966. He is recognized as one of the foremost experts in understanding gun violence at schools.
