Stop student violence -- Arm the Teachers.

K

kelsey

New member
Check this out. I say go for it. The students are already armed.



PHOENIX - All options should be considered to prevent rampages like the Minnesota school shooting that took 10 lives — including making guns available to teachers, a top National Rifle Association leader said Friday.

“I’m not saying that that means every teacher should have a gun or not, but what I am saying is we need to look at all the options at what will truly protect the students,” the NRA’s first vice president, Sandra S. Froman, told The Associated Press.

Gun-control restrictions would not have prevented Jeff Weise, 16, from killing nine people and himself Monday at Red Lake High School near Bemidji, Minn., said Froman, an attorney expected next month to be elected president of the NRA, which claims 4 million members.

The presence of an unarmed guard at the school failed to stop the siege, she noted.

“No gun law, no policy that you could implement now or that was already implemented, I think, could possibly prevent someone so intent on destruction,” she said. “I think everything’s on the table as far as looking at what we need to do to make our schools safe for our students.”



Froman said if it is the responsibility of teachers to protect students in a school, “then we as a society, we as a community have to provide a way for the teachers to do that.”

Froman cited the 1997 school shooting incident in Pearl, Miss., where a teacher retrieved a gun from his car when a student opened fire, then held the student at bay until police arrived.

A law prohibiting guns in schools “is not going to stop someone who has evil in their heart and who has the capacity to commit those crimes from doing them,” Froman said
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While I believe that society would be greatly improved if everybody went about armed to the teeth and knowledgable in the defensive use of firearms, I do not advocate for teachers to be armed. I think there should absolutely be a few who are though and that should be kept under super-secret code-word, double-secret handshake secrecy. In fact I don't believe the principal should know which ones are and aren't, and only the responding law enforcement agencies should be privy to that information.

Teachers must get up and move around to teach. That would entail either leaving a gun accessible, locked in a desk, or on their person. Some of these kids are rough, and just like the jail forbade even cops from possessing firearms in the jail, schools should approach the concept with the utmost of respect.

Down here in lots of places and up in Minn, as best as I can tell, there are few people who derive an ego-bump from simply holding a gun. Those people are scary because they view a gun as a tool for getting respect rather than a tool of getting lunch and sometimes for self-defense.

I'm skeptical, but if we could keep it utterly quiet (I mean not even letting other approved and packing teachers know who else does), then by all means, the schools will be safer just being public that there are an "undisclosed" number of teachers with guns at yippity Junior High.
 
Some good ideas KJM. I started a thread on this as well.

At the very least I'm thinking administrators -- principals, etc. -- should have this option. And also some extra training.

Maybe wall safes in those teachers rooms would work with an alarm that goes off in the office when opened?

Just a thought ...
 
Why should it be regulated? If we are emotionaly and mentally qualified to be CCW, why would the adult staff/employees at any school be any different? Are they not entitled to the 2nd just as all of us? Kids are not just at schools, they are in parks, churches, stores, and on the streets also... Just like those of us that CCW are....

The same argument would be, its not the people that follow the law we need to worry about. If the teacher has enough respect for the law to get the CCW they are more likely to be qualified to have it, its the person with no respect for the law that is the problem. They are the ones that are more likely to illegaly carry a concealed weapon at school and use it. My point would be that if they new that there is a possibility of imediate armed resistance from somebody that knows what they are doing it is less likely to happen.
 
I think as long as the gun was mandated to be on the person and concealed, then there would be no reason not to allow them. Of course, it would be voluntary who would choose to carry and who wouldn't. As state employees we may also allowing them access to train with some of our State LEOs. A non-paid deputy of the Sherrif is also another possibility. Give them a badge, gun and pair of handcuffs to use accordingly.
 
I have shot with a lot of people including competitors, recreational shooters, cops, etc. One thing that is obviously clear is that those folks who do not practice enough and practice regularly end up with their skills declining. I am not convinced that arming teachers would necessarily preclude student violence or that if there was violence that the teachers would be well enough prepared to handle the problem. I am also not convinced that I could count on teachers to maintain a properly maintained and secure gun in a place where there are lots of kids like mine. We have already seen how well many of the 'expert' gun handlers manage to screw up things, so why would I think school teachers would do better?

Now, if you start running school teachers through HRT and active shooter training along with team tactics, that would be another story, but that isn't going to happen.
 
I just love the double standard that goes on, among people who supposedly are 2A advocates.

If the person qualifies to hold a CCW, then they qualify to carry concealed whereever they might be. Period. If that means in school, then in school it is. It shouldn't be up to anybody. Nor should there be restrictions.... But no. It's OK for you or me, but if we happen to be a teacher, then there are other considerations? Do you really hear what you are saying?

Here in Idaho, anyone can carry concealed at, on, or in a school or school function, provided you go before the School Board, convince them and obtain permission. I know 4 teachers that carry like this. 2 are in a middle school and 2 are in our local high school. I manage a local retail grocery store. Our local schools all have charge accounts with us. I have a need to go into the school to resolve charge accounts, from time to time. Do you know how easy it was for me to get the Boards permission?

In 5 years time, no one has been injured. No guns have been brandished. No one but the School Board knows how many teachers (or others like myself) carry. Yet, should something untoward occur, we are armed.

The 4 teachers that I know about, I know because we all shoot together. Frequently... But then, this is Idaho.
 
I guess Idaho and the 4 teachers Antipitas knows is proof that arming teachers works...as a microcosm sample.

I am sorry, but I missed the statistic. Just what percentage of Idaho teachers carry while teaching? How many have responded to active shooter situations and been credited with saving X number of children's lives?

Where I live in North Texas, we actually have at least one full time cop in each high school and apparently some form of LEO presence in middle schools. The officers involved receive considerable training in active shooter situations. Compared to other officers on the force, their training is second only to SWAT officers in the numbers of hours they spend getting training and running drills for active shooters.

The active shooter training basically means that the officer is supposed to search out and stop an active shooter on campus. It is a position I don't admire because it means putting his life at risk in order to stop the threat. The officer does not stop to render aid to downed students and faculty. The officer does not wait outside and direct in officers to set up a perimeter. In other words, the officer does a lot of what the officers first on scene did not do at shooting situations like Columbine. It is not a condemnation of the officers who responded at Columbine, but using that and other school situations as a learning guide to what needs to be done to stop further risk and loss of life. The argument is basically that backup and medical help is enroute. Dragging out downed students won't stop the violence and those students aren't going to be getting help significantly faster than if left for the back up officers and EMTs.
 
I guess because I am married to a teacher and I get to hang out with other teachers, I have doubts that they might be able to exercise their rights better than the criminal element in schools can exercise it for them. You do have a second amendment right to go about armed, so why is it that cops aren't allowed to carry a sidearm in the jail for interrogations?

Could it be that many of the suspects are better able to take the gun away from them and use it to good effect than the cops might be?

Because my wife teaches a remedial class, and some of her students have already proven to be quite violent, and because they live in a rougher neighborhood than my wife can imagine, I would be worried that carrying a gun for her would be more dangerous than not when around those kids.

And what about the emotional bond that teachers grow with even bad students? One of her kids didn't show up to class and after 3 days, she called his house to find out why he was gone only to find out he robbed a liquor store AT FIFTEEN YEARS OLD! With a gun mind you.

Nope, If my wife is packing, I don't want anybody to make her out as their first target. I'd rather let a few carry concealed and privately.

Don't confuse a right to do something with prudent to do something. I am not arguing that a teacher has a right to be armed. Every human has that basic right. I am arguing the prudence of the exercise in that circumstance. Just like I have a right to tell my boss anything I feel about him, but prudence dictates that I keep it professional.
 
Double Naught Spy attempted sarcasm by writing:
I guess Idaho and the 4 teachers Antipitas knows is proof that arming teachers works...as a microcosm sample.

I am sorry, but I missed the statistic. Just what percentage of Idaho teachers carry while teaching? How many have responded to active shooter situations and been credited with saving X number of children's lives?
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We haven't had any school shootings. Is it because no one knows how many teachers are armed, or because we breed better students? :D
 
When I first posted this, I was hoping for a good response. A little insight into me. Both of my parents are teachers although my father has retired to the farm. He is a veteran, a former member of the Army national rifle team, and has more than enough ability and experience to defend himselft with a firearm. My mother beleives in the 2nd ammendment, but does not possess the love for firearms that the rest of us do.

That beings said, I think the choice should be up to the individual teachers. If they are deemed competent by the state to possess a CWP, then I feel there is no reason they should not be allowed to carry it everywhere. I feel same about all legally licensed CWP holders. No place should be allowed to ban them simply because they have made the choice and taken the effort to be allowed to carry a firearm.

I would agree having a full time LEO in each school would be an ideal start, but in the small towns where I grew up it is not financially possible.

In some cases the town mayor doubled as the chief of police and then moonlighted as the Fire Chief of the Volunteer Brigade.
 
I think it a good idea for the qualifying teachers to carry, perhaps, designated, if volunteering. With some guidelines and qualifications of course. I don't believe they need to be "SWAT" capable, ..who wouldn't if that's all you did at taxpayer expense....I could probably launch a manned orbital vehicle if that were the case. I've known far better shooters (and combat experienced) that are civilans than the mystical "SWAT" guys in uniform. If economics allowed, a good, armed, security officer would suffice. That would be his sole purpose, to respond to such threats. Not uniformed. On another thought, I never thought armed pilots are necessary. Their sole business is to fly the plane, that's it. Armor the cockpit door and let it go where it will go. If some pilot wants to shoot bad guys..he should quit and join the LAPD.
 
The answer is going to be just as simple as adding "With exception of employees or others holding jobs within state buildings or on state property" to the part of the CCW/CHL laws that apply to no CCW in schools.
 
We haven't had any school shootings. Is it because no one knows how many teachers are armed, or because we breed better students?
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I know there was kind of a joke in there but a very serious answer is simply, it is because a broken person has not walked in and started shooting.

These are things that can happen anywhere, to anybody, at any time. We are talking mostly about people that are mentally ill and often undiagnosed. No regulation whether pro or anti 2nd is going to change whether that can or can not happen.

What a pro 2nd stance can possibly do is reduce the number of casualties and possibly reduce the likelyhood of the occurance.
 
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