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Upon what do you base this conjecture?</p>
<p>In my kid’s prior school, the officer wandered around in front of the doors at arrival and dismissal time. His presence was a very good thing for many reasons.</p>
<p>My D’s high school had a massive gang problem. The thought of having students and other teachers locked in the building with them and no protection makes my blood run cold.</p>
<p>"I guess I’m confused. The suggestion is that don’t have anyone armed in the school trying to take out the shooter because there might be casualties from “friendly fire?”</p>
<p>Imo, there are other things that can be done to prevent mass shootings than arming teachers or having armed guards in the school, but I cannot get political, so.</p>
<p>I’m sure you’re right Emily and there is much to discuss on that topic, but the fact that in many places there are already armed guards in the schools. Places like high crime schools (in which magnet programs are often placed), as well as wealthy schools. Many expensive privates quietly have armed security.</p>
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<p>That’s the point I was trying to make as well, just couldn’t find the right words.</p>
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<p>I have heard this often. There is a big difference between a battle ready shoot to kill whatever moves trained millitary and police trained personnel. And I would worry about school hired personnel regardless of their backround. </p>
<p>IMO, should belong to the police department, the PD should be responsible for vetting, training, monitoring, and keeping up the skills of anyone that carries a weapon around our kids. Especially if we are looking for people to respond to emergencies.</p>
<p>I don’t think it will ever be possible to fully prevent mass shootings. The question is how to minimize the loss of life. I think the NYPD does a pretty good job here. I’m a fan.</p>
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<p>she was a private citizen in her own house. That is not what we are talking about. However, she unloaded 6 shots into the man, from a revolver, and he still walked out of the house to look for help. </p>
<p>I have no problem with the mom that defended her children and home, so do not mistake that. </p>
<p>But in a school setting, I want a better shot.</p>
<p>I think that the use of armed security is very prevelant throughout our lives</p>
<p>[Guards</a> carry guns, shoppers pay for bags at new Atlantic City supermarket Save-A-Lot - pressofAtlanticCity.com: Atlantic City News](<a href=“http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/news/press/atlantic_city/guards-carry-guns-shoppers-pay-for-bags-at-new-atlantic/article_fe7cb4b2-a04e-11e1-adfc-001a4bcf887a.html]Guards”>Guards carry guns, shoppers pay for bags at new Atlantic City supermarket Save-A-Lot)</p>
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<p>That is very, very true. I recall that there were police present at our public high school Friday night football games back in the mid-1960s.</p>
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That is what I am talking about and you don’t get to dictate. I am talking about lawfully armed citizens saving lives.</p>
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Amuses the heck out of me in my real life that many peace-loving folks here never knew that their Special Snowflakes are protected by the very weapons they want to ban from the schools teeming with gang violence.</p>
<p>The problem, once again, is that we are trying to prevent the specific incident that already happened, without thinking about what might happen in the future. The suggestion to put skilled marksmen in every school in the country so that when the deranged young man with an AR-15 shoots his way in the front door of the elementary school…</p>
<p>One of the many problems I see, is maybe the next deranged person doesn’t have a loaded AR-15, but gets shot and killed by the armed guard. There are just so many bad possibilities with bad outcomes once you introduce an additional many million guns into the schools.</p>
<p>1) I don’t think having an armed, trained guard at a school is a bad thing. However, when there are far less expensive and (arguably) more effective methods of shooting prevention available, I think it is unnecessary.</p>
<p>2) Someone mentioned that the Columbine guard arguably saved many lives. Yet, the fact remains that Columbine was one of the worst high school shootings ever. Wouldn’t it have been better if the perpetrators never acquired guns in the first place?</p>
<p>3) Virginia Tech had many officers on its campus when the horrendous shooting took place there. I believe more than 30 people were killed. </p>
<p>IMO, fighting firepower with firepower isn’t the solution. Regulating and restricting gun access is.</p>
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<p>ZM, the title of this thread is about solution to school shooters. You brought up 2 things. </p>
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<li><p>The off duty officer that was carrying a gun that saved lives. I love that instance. But she WAS NOT a joe schmoo off the street citizen. </p></li>
<li><p>A mom that shot an intruder in her home. </p></li>
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<p>Neither of those instances are a school shooter, and neither of them help make decisions about school safety. </p>
<p>I do conceed that schools may benefit from armed personnel. But they need to be the right people, with the right training, with the right experience, with the right supervision, with the right ongoing educational and medical requirements. Otherwise, we could be setting ourselves up for more problems. </p>
<p>Taking a few teachers out to a firing range and putting them through “training” is not an answer in my opinion. In fact, I would put money on it causing more problems.</p>
<p>If the schools my children attended had to have armed guards in order to feel or be safe, I would move. There is absolutely no way to tell where the next mass murderer armed with a semi automatic weapon will strike and the only way to be ready would be to have heavily armed people everywhere ready to defend. I don’t want to live like that.</p>
<p>As vlines says, there is a huge difference between regular civilians who are armed, vs trained police officers with guns, even taking into account the fact that the police themselves shot 9 bystanders outside the Empire State building a couple of months ago. I support more police, anywhere they need to be. But civilians, not so much. Including teachers.</p>
<p>In theory, having a bunch of civilians (i.e., no uniforms) with guns would keep us / our students safer if they could rush in and stop an unbalanced shooter like those at Newton or Virginia Tech. However, practically speaking, let’s say 3 civilians all converge on the site of a shooting. How do they know who the concerned citizens are, and who the crazed shooter is? It just sounds like a recipe for disaster to me.</p>
<p>3bm103, I wish you could meet the resource officers in our schools. They are the best. And they are not actually there to prevent school shootings. They are there for so many other things. Including much of what I think NJres alluded to in post 31. They are there to keep their ear to the ground, prevent/intervene with gang issues, educate, and identify trends or problematic behavior. They do a lot of on the spot traffic education in our HS’s too. </p>
<p>They are awesome. </p>
<p>But if you asked anyone if they were there to prevent mass school shootings at the time of the incident, I don’t think a single parent would say that was their job. Nor could it be. The schools are huge, and even though their offices are at the front of the school, and they are always present at the front during arrival and dismissal, it is really unlikely that they would prevent a mass shooting from starting. Like at Colombine, they may, or may not prevent some loss of life. Or they could be the first victim. Or not in that part of the building and not engage at all.</p>
<p>These resource officers are in full PD uniform. Easily identifiable as “the good guy”, and easily identified as armed.</p>
<p>Newton school shoter had handguns.</p>
<p>Vlines threads and conversations evolve.</p>
<p>Texas wants its teachers to stop teaching critical thinking and to start carrying guns. Hard for me to take anything the state’s “experts” say seriously.</p>
<p>The Newton shooter had handguns, but principally used the bushmaster, which is not a handgun, for the actual shooting.</p>
<p>I’m for it. Not all teachers will carry. But we have some teachers who are very well trained and are good shots with years of experience. </p>
<p>Will there be friendly fire…perhaps, but there also will not be 20 dead. First round that goes off will get a response. It will end much more quickly.</p>
<p>I’m not afraid of my kids being around a teacher with a CHL, who has undergone a background check and training and is carrying.</p>
<p>I’d be happy for the teacher to carry and I’d thank God that my kids had an extra layer of protection.</p>
<p>But that’s just me. I’m a Texan. I know it’s not a popular viewpoint in all places. But the truth is that these no-carry zones are the soft target that crazy people like to hit. They don’t as often hit places where they know there may be a high volume of law-abiding citizens that shoot back.</p>
<p>Yes, it’s a shame that we live in a time where these horrible things happen and people are afraid. But we do.</p>