Have you talked with your children's school about classroom security?

[riverrambler]

I understand why you said no, too bad you had to because she was probably sincere. I'm not a teacher but if I was and had the same question put to me I would also say no, however, if the situation came up, I would somehow find a gun. If they fire and blacklist me oh well, that means Im alive.

[Sister]

I think all teachers should carry AK 47’s, AK 48’s, AK 49’s and AR 110’s. they should be equipment with 10 M-67, M-68 & M69 hand grenades a week. Israelis Gas Mask should be supplied to each facility and student with 2 air filters.

Students should be started in kindergarten handgun safety and the basics of the gun parts and safety handling with graduation of full knowledge before second grade.

School uniforms should be strict camo with the exception of Tactical Fridays when all black clothes and sidearm carried will be required for mall trip day.

[Trigus]

Home School your children - problem solved

[Hasaf]

Home School your children - problem solved

This is a Response to a question in another forum. It was based on my short tenure as a CPS investigator (I was later transferred to a separate program for the courts). I know there are homeschooling situations; but they weren't part of the caseload.


The post was in response to this question:

What is your opinion of the rise in popularity of US homeschooling?

Keep in mind, the only kids I saw were kids who for some reason "were on the radar."

My exposure to Home schooling was largely negative. I do realize that there are some great parents that do a great job of homeschooling. However, The bulk of my experience came from being a welfare eligibility worker, then as an investigator in Childrens Services.

If the student is not in school, then the parent will see a reduction in assistance (money). This is a problem in family dynamics because it puts the child in the driving seat. The child can punish her parent by not going to school.

The problem is pretty obvious, as is the solution. The parent “home schools” the child.

This does not mean that the parent sits down with the child and develops’s an individualized education plan. As an investigator I did drop in’s. What I, almost invariably saw was a kid (usually a girl) at home, frequently babysitting a younger sibling. Normally there were friends over (who should have been in school) and they were playing video games, or just watching TV, while smoking.

On the upside for the parent, the payments no longer rely on attendance; so that element of the home power struggle is over. For the girl, she sees it as a win because she doesn’t have to go to school.

Now, there were exceptions. In my caseload of “home schoolers” of about twelve (I had a lot of other stuff in my caseload too) there was one girl that I would meet at the education resource office. This was a place that homeschool students go to get the great services that are available to them. I am not mocking it, there were great resources.

I hate to sound so jaded; but, quite literally, it was one in twelve. The rest were babysitting at home, smoking marijuana and playing video games or staring at the TV.

In many of the homes I visited, the kids were not necessarily safer at home.

[MisterCrabby]

OP, very thought provoking question. We need to make our schools safe for kids, period. I'm all for non-violent aspects of a holistic approach that includes mental health assessments, metal detectors, community/student/staff awareness and training, etc. My view is making schools a gun-free zone shouldn't be the goal exactly. We should make schools casualty-free zones. However a particular school or district chooses to achieve that should be up to them and their community. What works in one rural or suburban or urban school with varying crime levels, risk profiles, economic conditions, politics and other factors won't necessarily work for another. I'm in favor of arming staff if that's what they want to do and there is a clear policy and program for them to do so that covers them for liability. However, that needs to part of an overall casualty-free strategy, involving law enforcement and other preventive systems. It can't be a way for the school to get by on the cheap!

Hasaf, thanks for your post. It's refreshing to see a thoughtful explanation such as yours. Also, thanks for teaching.

Your last entry was very interesting. I had a similar question at work, and answered the same way.

I added that if the company wants to discuss a situation /policy where we have internal responders, like some churches and schools now do, i will be interested in discussing it. My company, like schools and other institutions cannot be half in on this question. There is no room for gray or error in questions of life and death.

Why wife is observing that the news coverage and popular interest for school violence is waning as they unfortunately keep happening. Here's to a 100% casualty fee school year!!

[Sister]

Children and guns go together like peanut butter and jelly

All children should learn basic handgun training before the first grade. Firearm safety drills should start in first grade until the third grade.

Every American child should have guns, this is the American dream!

[RedneckRuffian]

Some, yes. The school actually triggered it by doing a drill. Supposedly they will be going thru different responses, but the first is pretty much just lock, hide, & be quiet; at some point they're supposed to do some sort of run-away drill, and they did at least talk about fighting back -- although that seemed to consist of telling 6 year olds to throw books. Better than going quiet, but I'd rather they all get out the back door and practice getting over the fences, especially at the young ages. Their chances are almost certainly better in the neighborhood and crossing streets than huddled up waiting. Out there I'd trust more to brakes & random acts of kindness than I would to the certainty of the bad guy/gal pulling a trigger. I also accept that it's not easy to herd elementary school kids in *any* high pressure situation. Frankly, as a nation we're better off figuring out ways to help people in a healthy fashion rather than giving up or squishing freedoms.

I certainly would support teacher carry -- on a volunteer basis, with additional training addressing the relatively unique situation they are in. But I don't think teachers should feel pressured to also be security guards -- that's not what most of them signed up for, and not what most needs to be recruited into their ranks. One place our kids were at was a private church based institution, and they got around the ban on firearms on school grounds by allowing teachers/staff to also volunteer to technically be security guards. Their main job was still their main job, they just were also labeled security on paper somewhere, with the dotted i's and t's crossed so they could have legal access to a firearm (which they kept concealed/secured). They drilled for it -- mainly just positioning around campus and that sort of thing -- and at least once quietly armed up due to nearby off-campus goings-on. They didn't advertise it really, but if you asked around about their safety/security policies/procedures they would let parents know. It was one of the draws to the school, IMO; they took it seriously but weren't draconian and it didn't noticeably affect day-to-day activities.

We also need to get past the idea of absolutes, except that it is absolutely impossible to legislate violence completely away. I get why people say things like "we must prevent X!" and "Y can never happen again!" and "we have to do everything to stop Z!", but that's starting with unrealistic goals and leads to draconian measures which only work to alienate additional subsets of society -- encouraging exactly the ends we all want to minimize.

[LongRider]

Some, yes. The school actually triggered it by doing a drill. ...................... We also need to get past the idea of absolutes, except that it is absolutely impossible to legislate violence completely away. I get why people say things like "we must prevent X!" and "Y can never happen again!" and "we have to do everything to stop Z!", but that's starting with unrealistic goals and leads to draconian measures which only work to alienate additional subsets of society -- encouraging exactly the ends we all want to minimize.

Growing up I lived in a suburban area, it was not uncommon to see a rifle in the gun rack of most every truck in the schools student parking lot. Only God knew how many or what the teachers were packing. Mass murders or school shootings were unheard of. If one occurred I think it, I think it may have had to explained to us because it was simply inconceivable. Not the least of which why wasn't the POS drilled with more holes than a spaghetti strainer, because that is what would have happened. From 1949 to 1990 the 41 years before Clinton enacted the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990 there were 112 people killed in mass murders. At the rate of less than 1 mass murder a year

In the 28 years from 1990 to 2018 after Clinton enacted the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990 there here have been 393 people killed in mass murders. With 11 mass murders in 2017 alone. Of the 30 deadliest shootings in the United States dating back to 1949, 18 have occurred in the last 10 years.

So lets look at some absolutes by simply not infringing on Our Constitutional Rights bestowed upon us by God or nature if you prefer and respecting the Constitutional Rights of our fellow citizen whether or not we feel comfortable with that. Instead trust our friends neighbors and fellow citizens to do the right thing as we had for over 200 years. In short do not require Teachers or anyone else to acquire permits, permission, or require combat, tactical, marksmanship, sniper, tango, hula hoop or gun safety certification from anyone. That worked for 214 years I see no reason that it can not work now.

[Snub44]

Very well put...very well. Thank you!!!

[Yogi223]

If I were to try to talk to my grandchildren's school about security, I can almost guarantee I would receive a visit from the PD. This is California; any questioning of the district policies gets YOU investigated. I know this because my wife worked as PD dispatch while I was working in the district. They are licensed loons. I would immediately be relieved of my carry permit just while they investigated.

Is this "California" that you speak of by chance, a district in old Nazi Germany? Surely this isn't in freedom loving America.

[Damien83]

I plan to after what happened at my son's school on Friday. Seems like they were put on lockdown for a bomb threat unbeknownst to parents. Wife thought something was fishy when she went to pick him up and noticed four police cars in the front as opposed to the normal one. While she was sitting there another couple unmarked cars raced up and ran inside. Then they came out and told the parents picking up children they needed to pick up children in the bus pick-up/drop off behind the school. Still no mention of what was going on. Wife found out through parent FB group about threat.

There were two threats written on bathroom wall of a girls bathroom. It's currently under investigation.
https://www.walb.com/2019/08/09/wort...und-bathrooms/

Sad thing about it is our son and his friends are numb to it. Acts like it was no biggie. Wife and I are freaking out about how calm he and his friends are about it. It's damn sad that kids have to be that way these days. Kids are damn resilient!!

[RedneckRuffian]

Most schools have (or certainly should have) a method for informing parents. Our kids' last school sent robocalls with recorded messages. The situation posted above sounds like it was still playing out, so I'm not surprised they provided instructions but not information. FB sometimes works faster than school admins -- but they *should* have gotten to a formal notification fairly soon.

As for the reaction of the kids, I'm also not surprised. It seems to be part of the human condition that kids and parents have opposite reactions to a lot of things -- kids think we overreact and underreact to the wrong things, and vice versa. Heck, in and around 1990 when I was in high school we used to get bomb threats called in all the time and have to file outside while someone searched. It was a running joke. Nobody really felt threatened, and as kids we figured either send everybody home and search the place properly (which would have been more hilarious, as none were supposedly credible threats), or quit bothering sending everyone outside in the rain for 15 minutes while an assistant principal rode a golf cart around looking in a few of the trash cans in a token "search" of a fairly large campus. Everyone knew it was token/CYA and not really thorough. Eh, well, except once I think they brought in a K9, probably as a training exercise.

In this case, a note on a bathroom wall sounds pretty weak, and some kid could end up arrested & expelled for terroristic threats when they probably just need help with fairly typical kid problems, and all we've done is criminalize a kid for being a kid. Can't ignore it, but it's a tough balance.