Utah - H.B. 264 - This is a good one!

C

Caeca Invidia Es

Staff Alumnus
I like this one, and I really hope it passes. You can read the full text at http://www.le.state.ut.us/~2001/bills/hbillint/HB0264.htm

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HB 264 provides for mandatory firearms safety education in grades K through 4, and in grade 12. Younger students will be taught that if they find a gun they should leave the area, not touch the gun, tell an adult about the location of the gun, as well as how to share this information with other children.

Older students will be taught about the Constitutional right to keep and bear arms, risks and benefits of firearms ownership, state and federal laws, and proper firearms safety measures. They will also have the option of actual hands-on firearms experience under the supervision of a certified firearms instructor or law enforcement officer.

Firearms safety education will be taught by teachers and/or certified volunteers and will be value-neutral, neither pro-gun nor anti-gun.
 
If done in the proper way this could be VERY good!

I think a GOOD time to start teaching youngster about actual marksmanship / Firearms saftey should begin around 10-12years of age. (Maybe sooner depending on how mature they are, or later) You just have to REALLY keep an eye on them. Always stress saftey first when teaching kids. :) That is something I have come to live by.
 
Whoa, there big fella! Are you SURE that the law reads that the instruction MUST be gun-neutral? I'm a Hunter Education instructor for Utah, and the head of the hunter Ed. dept. had serious concerns about the wording of the original bill. Is the link for the original, or a revised version? Much as I agree with the intent and concept (which I sincerely do - hey, I'm already an instructor, right?) this one must be VERY carefully worded so as not to allow "back-door" inclusion of "guns are evil" stuff in the program.

If it's a good one I'll back it 150%, because I believe that EDUCATION WILL save kids' lives. What I don't want is to back a wolf in sheepskin. I'll even volunteer to be one of the instructors or help develop the curriculum if it'd fair and it passes. I'll check the above link, then revise my comments above accordingly. Thanks for the link and heads-up!!

Doug444
 
20 (c) The volunteers or school district teachers instructing the firearm safety education class
21 shall select materials and teach the class on a neutral basis showing a bias neither in favor of nor
22 against firearms.
Click to expand...

An alternate as been suggested by the standing committee, this section is intact in both.
 
I printed out the link and read through it pretty carefully. Here are the watchouts as I see them:

1) My guess is that if the school district has a teacher who wants to teach this course (for whatever reason) they would have first crack at it. And there is no prerequisite for the teacher to have any prior firearms knowledge, though all of the volunteers must be firearms certified in some way. I think that EVERYONE who teaches the course should have first hand firearms safety knowledge. Dispite the caveat that the class shall be taught on a neutral basis, accurate knowledge must be passed on, and that requires accurate knowledg on the part of the instructor.

2) The stuff for K-6 sounds a lot like the NRA (gasp!) Eddie Eagle program - which is good. But you can only go so far with that program, and those in grades 4-6 will need more thatn that to keep their curiosity from getting the best (or worst?) of them.

3) The instruction for 12th graders seems to be pretty comprehensive (though I don't particularly like the term "gun violence" in sec. 3 (b)(i)(C) ), though I heard that one of the objections voiced was to the inclusion of discussion of the Second Amendment and the Constitution. THAT's scary.

4) What about the kids in grades 7-11? I guess that after 7 years of being told to just "leave 'em alone" then we should expect them to do just that, eh? Yeah, right. Anyone read the papers lately? It's the 12-15 year olds that are accidentally shooting their friends beacause "I didn't know it was loaded". Sounds to me like THEY need it more than the 12th graders do!

5) Just exactly how is the school district going to judge the effectivness of the program if they don't keep track of who went through it and who didn't? Remember, a student doesn't have to take the course - just the school has to teach it. If the government needs to track all of us evil CCW holders, they should also track all of the kids who've been firearm safety trained. Are they afraid that the numbers and names will actually prove that it works? Without names, you'll never be able to know if the kid involved in the accident, etc., went through the course (bad for the program) or not (good for the program - if you can call any accident "good").

I'll be sending this in a letter to my state representative and senator to see if they can improve on this good idea before it gets destroyed by riders and "commpromise".

Doug444
 
You might want to contact Sarah Thompson as well. She is the director of Utah Gun Owners Association. From my understanding they helped in writing the bill. You can reach her at Director@utgoa.org.

The lessons for the younger kids is based on the Eddie Eagle program :D
 
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