Guns in Our Schools There has been a lot of debate in the last few years regarding gun laws and schools. Students have become more violent toward one another, and mentally ill individuals seem to be targeting schools and public places. The amount of school shootings continues to rise, and there are no real safety protocols in place that will protect students and teachers. The places that used to be safe for our children, have become one of the scariest places due to violence. Children are dropped off at school each day, with the plan to hide if a shooting were to take place, and I feel that preventative measures have not been taken to keep students safe. Our classrooms would be safer if teachers carried concealed handguns. …show more content…
There are few policies that are aimed to keep students safe from violence. If a student comes to school, and decides to take his/her anger out at school, who knows what could happen. Many other students could be caught in the middle of one person’s outrage. In 1997, an article in USA Today stated that about 10% of students over age 12 now say they have taken a gun to school (Sharp 1997.) Teachers have no way of knowing which children have guns, and which ones don’t. For most teachers their goal is to keep their students as safe as they can while the students learn. Especially in elementary schools where children are very young. No one unarmed teacher can properly protect their students if an armed shooter comes into their …show more content…
The article states, “Teachers and students should hide quietly, lock or barricade doors, and turn off lights and electrical equipment that would attract the shooter’s attention. If possible, they should provide detailed information via 911 contact to guide authorities and, then, remain quiet until a recognized voice advises that it is safe to move.” (Buerger and Bueger, 2010) It is nearly impossible for a teacher to hide 20 or more children in a classroom, quietly until the police arrive to detain the suspect. Bueger also states that, “Unless a situation begins with the shooter confronting a resource officer, the first reaction will come from individuals whose professional orientation is far from armed conflict.” This protocol leaves a lot of time for the shooter to kill. The event of a shooter having his first encounter with a resource officer is very slim. Most schools do not have a resource officer on campus at all. That being said, it is primarily left to the teachers and faculty to handle potential active shootings. After the Sandy Hook school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut back in 2012. A 20 year old shooter carried out a massacre that would took the lives of 20 students and 6 teachers, within 11 minutes at an elementary school (West, 2013.) Teachers across the U.S. have stood up and expressed their want to learn about firearms to
Countless individuals across the world are fighting for: freedom, religious convictions and more commonly for their children future. The devastating attack that had happened in Sandy Brook Elementary School in America that led to few deaths and injuries of youths. Which makes individuals question is educational institutes even a safe place for children. Additionally, there are more shootings in America compared to other nations as Gopink states “ United States has more gun violence than other countries because we have more guns and are willing to sell them to madmen who want to kill people.”(Gopinak, 2007, p. 458 ). This demonstrates that United States is just not inclined to take any action on gun control which is leading to deaths of children and adults. Some individuals believe handguns are not needed in American 's society. Then those who oppose gun control argue guns are a necessity to: hunting in the wild, self-defense, and it is part of the American culture. Furthermore, gun violence is having a vast impact on loved ones; losing a family member can have enormous affect socially, physical and mentally.
Michael Eisinger an eighth grade science teacher says, "If a gunman is going to cause violence in a school, they are going to have the element of surprise," "My guess is that they would still be able to shoot teachers, students or whoever else they wanted before some sort of coherent response materialized. (Huffington Post) Arming teachers isn’t going to solve the problem. We still will end up with deaths in schools. The gunman may decide to take the professors gun as well, which will result in the enemy having another harmful weapon.
One of the biggest debates in education is how to respond to gun violence in schools. According to BBC, “There were 64 school shootings in 2015” (BBC). One response to the rise in gun violence in schools is to arm teachers. Even our President has mentioned “giving a bonus” (Davis 2) to teachers that The fact that the idea of arming teachers is even being discussed is disappointing. Bringing more guns into a school is not the answer to gun violence. Most people that defend the idea that guns will “help” keep schools safe have basically three points: (1) teachers will be trained in gun safety, (2) it helps deter potential school shooters, and (3) it will make the students feel more safe. Even though there is some truth to those points, I think that the cons of arming teachers vastly outweigh the pros of arming teachers.
That is why Rebekah Elliott’s article “The Real School Safety Debate: Why Legislative Responses Should Focus on Schools and Not on Guns” would be valuable to include. Elliot writes that to properly provide safety into schools is to put more funding into higher security and individual school safety programs. Like many writers, she agrees that the Sandy Hook incident shifted America’s views on the second amendment but she believes that having armed teachers could be a safety risk in itself. Her argument is that although it would be more cost efficient to arm teachers than to hire more security, it could increase the liability for negligence if there was a result in injuring a student (2015
Everyone knows that parents’ first worry is the safety of their children. With the increase of violence in schools, parents have started to wonder if their children are really safe in the school setting. Shootings like Sandy Hook and Columbine left parents, administrators, and educators feeling the need to be proactive towards children’s safety. Reacting to situations like these is not good enough when children’s lives are on the line. Administration has started to brainstorm different ways to help insure the protection of their students. The idea of having teachers carry concealed weapons has been on the front burner for quite some time. As a result of this extreme idea, insurance companies have started to increase or even cancel policies with schools that have armed teachers because of the high risk they are putting themselves at. Parents and administrators also worry about the idea of children getting their hands on one of the teachers’ weapons and injuring themselves or other students. Because this idea seems quite extreme, I believe there are other alternatives that are less dramatic and more positively out looked, such as having armed security guards in schools.
One reason teachers should not be able to carry guns because guns are currently illegal in schools; Guns are illegal because they are dangerous. The Gun Free School Zone Act (GFSZA) is a federal law that was accepted in the United States in 1990. According to the GFSZA, “It shall be unlawful for any individual knowingly to possess a firearm at a place that the individual knows, or has reasonable cause to believe, is a school zone.” In order for teachers to carry guns, we would have to discard this law. Also, the school board would have to create a new policy, allowing teachers to carry guns. Adjusting the rules would be time consuming and confusing. Changing the GFSZA would make students tense and distract children from learning. Citizens from CNN Politics say, “72.4% of educators said they would be unlikely to bring a firearm to school if allowed to do so.” This data shows that the majority of teachers do not even want possession of a gun in the classroom. School officers have the right to carry guns, teachers should just focus on education. Not only does it create a huge responsibility, there would also need to be a large financial investment to supply guns for every school. This money would be hard to come up with, and not everyone is in favor of sacrificing money for firearms.
In “Vulnerable Schools Need Protection: Guns, Training For Teachers may be the answer”, published in a 2008 edition of the Chicago Tribune, David McGrath argues that some teachers should be allowed to carry a concealed weapon for protection. First, McGrath states that if a random psychotic gunman were searching for someplace to attack, his classroom would make an easy target. He feels that if he was trained and armed, his class would not be trapped without a chance of survival because he would be able to defend against the gunman. Sec...
School shootings have the ability to be stopped. They are largely one of the worst repeated tragedies our great nation has endured, and they should be stopped today! No terrorist wants to go out in his/her infamous blaze of “glory” by failing in their attempt. Arming educators has the capability to end school shootings in this decade. “And I haven’t even touched upon the pure deterrent effect of a potential mass murderer having to worry one of his targets might be armed” (Concealed Weapons). This quote presents the very real possibility that just if teachers are armed, future shooters will reconsider and possibly not attempt it at all. Providing this overwhelming deterrent in the foremost thoughts of a would be murderer emphasizes the positive effect concealed weapons operated by teachers could
Allowing concealed weapons in the schools is not a good thing because the teachers are not trained enough to carry a concealed weapon at the schools. Teachers need a lot of training just to hold the weapon and how they should be using it. Teachers also need a lot of nerves to use the gun on somebody else and it’s not about just using it, it’s also about doing the right thing at the right time. A couple of years ago Utah was the first state to legalize to carry a concealed weapon at the schools. According to Desert News, Last year a town named Taylorsville in Utah, a sixth-grade teacher injured herself in the school bathroom when her concealed firearm accidentally went off inside an elementary school bathroom. Luckily she just did not had serious injuries. If we allowed teachers to carry
... result in allowing it. Students could very fall into the wrong hands, teachers could snap and put others in harm, it could ruin the kid by making them feel nervous about it just being there, so on and so forth. There are numerous adversities that the population would have to face just to prevent something that might never happen. Does it seem worth all the heartaches one could experience? Ask yourselves, Is allowing teachers guns in the school the best option for the better of everyone? Maybe there are other safer and easier solutions to the problem. This world is chaotic and needs to have more security in schools. That is true, but the mindset of allowing teachers the ones to carrgo about things. Think about all the situations that could happen in the future or at anytime if we did allow it, and not just about the minor point that schools need to be more safe.
Although most security measures passively make schools safer, it is not nearly enough to prevent an individual who intends on creating mass violence from completing his or her task. State representatives, national organizations, school staff, and parents need to come together to figure out the most reliable ways to prevent an active shooter situation from occurring in their schools. One solution that has been active is many schools have partnered with local law enforcement agencies to provide a police officers to patrol school grounds....
With all of the school shootings that have happened lately I’m sure that most parents would want their child protected at any cost. As of January 2014, there had been an average of one school shooting every other school day. What are the schools doing to protect our kids when they are away from us at school? What more can be done to protect them? We are not able to be with our kids while they are at school, but we surely want to know that if a gunman does try to enter the school, there are measures in place to protect them. Should teachers be allowed to carry a handgun while in class? In my position argument I will discuss reasons that I feel that teachers should be able to carry while in class.
Allowing teachers to carry guns could help lower school shootings. “While some believe tighter gun controls are the answer, others believe the best solution comes in giving more people — like teachers and administrators — more training and more access to firearms that can save lives as well as take them away” (Evensen guns and teachers). “Our organization
In the past years, there have been many school shootings that have happened. People are starting to think that arming teachers will stop school shootings. Others are opposed to arming teachers for many reasons. Armed teachers could stop or create more violence in schools. Due to all the recent school shootings, many people believe school teachers should be allowed to carry weapons, others believe it would lead to more shooting incidents.
Gun violence in schools is a very serious problem in America. More and more shootings are occurring, and no matter what has been done to try to prevent these shootings they still occur. The current methods being utilized to prevent gun violence in schools are not very successful, because school shootings are still occurring. To better prevent gun violence in schools and in general the United States must reinforce gun knowledge, security, and the laws that are already in place.