A Horrible Idea

Frank Lasee, a Wisconsin state representative from Green Bay, is advocating allowing teachers to carry guns at school in light of recent school shootings. Before commenting on the utterly lunacy of this proposal, it should be noted that, according to this interview with forensic psychologist Dr. Helen Smith, "we haven’t had that many particular school shootings. I mean, they’re definitely not accelerating." So we're not dealing with something new this year or looking at an increase in numbers. But even if we were, I cannot imagine an American classroom with an armed teacher. Can you imagine reading Shakespeare aloud in high school English while your teacher has a .45 strapped to her hip? I think it might be a bit of a distraction. How could we feel safe going to school or sending our kids to school if our schools are places where teachers need to carry guns? According to the above mentioned article, Pete Pochouski, Director of School safety, Milwaukee Public School said, "statistically, schools are the safest place for children." If that's true then Lasee's recommendation is even more ludacris. Perhaps even more important is the fact that teachers carrying guns, in my opinion, will be largely ineffective and probably more likely to cause harm than good. Can you imagine a teacher shooting at a student? Probably not likely. So maybe its not for stopping crazy students (the cause of most of school shootings) its just for stopping outsiders who come in like in the recent shootings in Bailey and Nickle Mines. I suppose its possible, but if a shooter grabs a student and uses that student as a shield do you think there are many teachers bold enough to take a shot at the aggressor? Most police officers wouldn't take the risk of hitting the student accidentaly, I can't imagine that it would be a good thing if a teacher did. Finally, adding that many firearms to a school environment in the hands of people whose primary concern is not the firearms is a very bad idea. We have had many cases in the past of police officers being shot with their own weapons. If a police officer can have his weapon stolen then I find it highly likely that the same could happen even to the most diligent teacher. So now you are introducing the possibility of arming an aggressor who might otherwise not have access to a firearm. Brilliant. This type of security at schools should be handled the same way it is everywhere else -- by police officers. If we don't have enough police officers to put enough in every school then we need to raise the pay of police officers so that more qualified people will want the job. If there isn't money to pay the police officers then we need to take some from the glut that is being given to mostly useless school bureaucracy. If there still isn't enough money then we need to raise taxes for it. It should be a priority. The safety of our children is one of the most important things for this or any nation. If the solution is having more guns on campuses then we need to do whatever it takes to provide that protection in the form of police officers.