School district has mechanism for staff to carry concealed

[tburnsten]

I didn't feel the actual title of the article was very accurate, since individual teachers and staff members who want to carry will still have to be state-certified concealed carry permit holders as well as get permission from administration first. Not exactly just letting anyone and everyone carry pistols at will. Just read the actual requirements. They are those two plus they must have training in crisis management and hostile situations as well as carry ammunition designed to reduce the hazard of ricochet in the hallways (and I'm guessing overpenetration, they go hand in hand)

I think this is a neat developement, I highly doubt that this policy will ever be tested as good or bad, it will probably be forgotten about soon.


http://www.star-telegram.com/news/story/834022.html

"Small Texas school district lets teachers, staff pack pistols
By MARK [e-mail]
When classes start Aug. 25 in the tiny Harrold school district, there will be one distinct difference from years prior: Some of the teachers may have guns.

To deter and protect against school shootings, trustees have altered district policy to allow employees to carry concealed weapons if they have a state permit and permission from the administration. The 110-student district lies 150 miles northwest of Fort Worth on the eastern end of Wilbarger County, near the Oklahoma border.

More than a dozen state legislatures have considered making it legal to carry guns on college campuses, but experts and officials contacted by the Star-Telegram say the move is unheard of in elementary or secondary schools.

Superintendent David Thweatt said a main concern was that the small community is a 30-minute drive from the sheriff’s office, leaving students and teachers without protection.

'To be prepared’

The district’s lone campus sits 500 feet from heavily trafficked U.S. 287, which could make it a target, Thweatt said.

Other security measures are in place, including one-way access to enter the school, state-of-the-art surveillance cameras and electric locks on doors. But after the Virginia Tech massacre and the Amish school shooting in Pennsylvania, Thweatt felt he had to take further action, he said.

"When the federal government started making schools gun-free zones, that’s when all of these shootings started," Thweatt said. "Why would you put it out there that a group of people can’t defend themselves? That’s like saying 'sic ’em’ to a dog."

Texas law outlaws firearms on school campuses "unless pursuant to the written regulations or written authorization of the institution."

Thweatt did not say how many of the 50 or so teachers and staff members will be armed this fall because he doesn’t want students or potential attackers to know. Wilbarger County Sheriff Larry Lee was out of the office Thursday and did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.

Barbara Williams, a spokeswoman for the Texas Association of School Boards, said her organization is not aware of another district doing something similar. Ken Trump, a Cleveland-based school security expert who advises districts nationwide, including in Texas, said Harrold is the first district he knows of to take such a step.

Trump said he would have advised against allowing teachers to arm themselves, if only because of liability concerns. In the long run, it could have been cheaper and safer to hire security or off-duty police, he said. Texas school districts also have the option of forming their own police force, he noted.

"What are the rules for use of force?" Trump said. "Or how about weapons-retention training? Because they could go in to break up a fight in the cafeteria and lose their gun."

Thweatt said the district did not rush into the decision. Officials researched the policy and weighed other options for about a year before trustees voted on the policy in October.

"The naysayers think won’t happen here," he said. "If something were to happen here, I’d much rather be calling a parent to tell them that their child is OK because we were able to protect them."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The gun policy Teachers and staffers in the Harrold school district can carry firearms beginning this fall if they:

Have a Texas license to carry a concealed handgun.

Are authorized to carry by the district.

Receive training in crisis management and hostile situations.

Use ammunition that is designed to minimize the risk of ricochet in school halls.

Source: Harrold school district

[xchrom]

1. Use ammunition that is designed to minimize the risk of ricochet in school halls.

:eyes:

[tburnsten]

2. Yes, like a good duty-quality jacketed hollow point

The primary use of hollow point bullets is to reduce the risk of a bullet passing straight through a target and flying off into the background, potentially harming a bystander. Also since a full metal jacketed bullet tends to leave wounds resembling icepick stabs with two holes to bleed out of and a JHP bullet expands and stops usually always within its target the JHP causes a more noticable hit, more likely that the violent individual will notice he has been hit and stop his attack, so he doesn't need to be shot any more, and less blood loss means the person shot is less likely to die of there wounds.

[spin]

3. A school located 30 minutes...

from the sheriffs office could indeed be a prime target for a lunatic or a terrorist. Since now there will be trained armed teachers on campus, it should be less of a target then many urban schools.

[liberaldem4ever]

4. OMG-I'm from this area

This tiny town is about 15 miles from where I grew up. I can't believe that they have taken their RW insanity that far. I am so glad that I moved away from that place with my children and moved to a better more sane place to live. We've lived in the Seattle area for 13 years where they don't have gun-toting teachers. God help those people and their poor children in Wilbarger County, Texas. I am so embarrassed to admit I'm from there.

[lepus]

5. I'm not sure but here goes.

I personally would be very comfortable with the majority of the teachers in my son's school carrying. We already have a deputy there that open carries as part of his duties.

I would much rather the school be a hardened target vice a soft target. As I recall, in columbine, the police did not enter the school for a few hours after the incident.

[liberaldem4ever]

6. Not me

I can't even imagine going to a school with teachers with guns. There is such an atmosphere of fear in Texas schools anyway. When I went to school there, teachers at any moment for any reason could grab you up, hit you with a board as hard as they pleased in front of the whole class. I managed to not be hit but barely. It was traumatizing to be sitting and reading in class and suddenly hear screaming in the hall on a daily basis, at least it was for me. I am an extremely sensitive person and have been my whole life. I was so terrified of the teachers just for them doing that, that I can't even imagine them being able to beat you AND shoot you too. There were lots of bad kids in school but I was never as scared of them as I was of the teachers.

Oh, I couldn't take it anymore and I dropped out of school in the 11th grade with a straight A grade average. It was just a relief.

[Hangingon]

7. I grew up in Texas and never experienced the fear ...

of teacher mistreatment or an "atmosphere of fear in Texas". No one in my family has had that experience. We received good educations - whether in urban or rural schools. Not one of us had or saw "teachers at any moment for any reason could grab you up, hit you with a board as hard as they pleased in front of the whole class". I am curious where this kind of treatment happened?

[liberaldem4ever]

8. It was in Childress, Texas between 1970 and 1978

Childress is in North Central Texas on Hwy 287(?) on the way to Amarillo. I think there were about six thousand people living there when we did, to tell you the truth I don't remember exactly. I don't know where you attended school in Texas, but I assume that bigger cities in Texas weren't as strict as schools in small, rural farming towns. I pray to God that things have changed for the better there since I went to school there.

Junior High School was the worst and it was exactly how I said it was. There was even a teacher/coach I had in 8th grade that made you follow along in the book as others read out loud and if he called on you and you couldn't start reading in the right place when he randomly called on you, he made you carry his paddle out into the hall and he hit you as hard as he could. I was terrified of him and I used a ruler to keep up exactly where I was supposed to be in the book. He is only one example. I could tell you a lot more.

I never attended more than half a year of school in Childress because I got so sick with nerves I stayed home and did makeup work. I had my first stomach ulcer when I was 10 years old and was in the hospital for it. I am a 46 year old woman now and I can hardly type this because my hands are shaking so bad. Please don't think I'm lying-I sure wouldn't make this up. It's really hard to talk about even so many years later. I have never dealt with it with therapy but I've always needed to.

[tburnsten]

9. I don't think any school

is as harsh now as they were 30-40 years ago. Lawsuits are too common and easily won for that.

Anyway Many schools (including the one I went to) have an officer open carrying a pistol every single day, the big difference is that this school is too far from LEO presence and too small a community to be able to afford hiring an officer full time. In a school that has 110 K-12 students, a full time cop is a huge expense. That means they would have to cut either staff or classes, and I'm willing to put money down that they already have a precious small set of programs. This is a cheap and convenient way to address the unlikely but horrible event of a school shooting. The districts policy is not to allow teachers to shoot students over distractions in class, get real that is a ridiculous assumption. Also, in every single mass shooting that has been successfully stopped (I mean the shooter was interdicted and stopped before they completed their attack) it was someone on scene who responded, not a police officer responding to 911 calls. Armed teachers are an excellent idea, provided that the teachers who carry are people who already shoot and are already certified to carry in their states.

[liberaldem4ever]

10. I don't know what the right answer is

But I have known too many unstable, highly regarded teachers who would have scared me if those people could have been armed in the classes I was in. I don't think that teachers would ever shoot students, but I worry that the students could get access to the guns. Or that teachers would use the guns as intimidation against students.

I'm not so presumptuous to think that I have all the answers. I know I don't. I guess I just wish that our country would actively address the problems that leads to student violence in schools, like bullying, poverty, and child abuse instead of just resorting to being more violent with more guns and fear.

But I really think that will never happen.

[tburnsten]

The new policy isn't addressing student violence

And it isn't intended to address mental health or violence problems at all. Life insurance doesn't prevent you from dying, what it does is make the aftermath the best it can be. Likewise, this policy is intended to equip the school with first responders who can react to the horribly unlikely event of an attack on the school, not because they are afraid of the students. And it isn't a fearful tactic, it is a prepared one. I have life insurance, despite the fact that I turned 22 last saturday, does the description of paranoid or fearful fit me, or am I prepared? I don't want to leave my expecting wife out in the cold if something should happen to me, that is why I am insured. This school district has no other option for a reasonably effective response in the event that some wacko decides he is going to kill him some kids before committing suicide and knows that this school is far from any help. The school isn't permitting tgeachers to carry because they are afraid of the students, they are allowing them to carry to better protect their students should the unthinkable happen.

[liberaldem4ever]

13. I respect your opinion, but I disagree

I can't equate life insurance with being armed with a loaded gun. You are right in the same way that you can believe that having a gun in your house is worth having to protect you and your family from criminals and will insure you from harm. Personally, I have never had a gun in my life and never will. I have seen many more little kids getting the guns in their house and hurting themselves than I see people shooting home invaders.

Still, it is every American's right to have a gun in their home if they want it, but it is also their responsibility to make sure it is kept safely. I never figured out how it is helpful to have a gun in your house if it is kept locked up. How do you get to it fast enough in an emergency? What if the criminal gets it first or from you? It seems that most people have them under the bed or in the closet, even with children in the house unsupervised. To me, that is scarier than a burglar. I'm not putting down anybody who has guns-I just don't understand it.

Anyway, if a school district decides that teachers having guns is worth it and the parents agree to it, and it is lawful to do, fine. But I have raised four sons from 27 to 17 and I would never send them to a school with armed teachers. I've never felt they were in that much danger in school for that to be worth it.

[benEzra]

15. Thoughts on gun storage...

Still, it is every American's right to have a gun in their home if they want it, but it is also their responsibility to make sure it is kept safely. I never figured out how it is helpful to have a gun in your house if it is kept locked up. How do you get to it fast enough in an emergency? What if the criminal gets it first or from you? It seems that most people have them under the bed or in the closet, even with children in the house unsupervised. To me, that is scarier than a burglar. I'm not putting down anybody who has guns-I just don't understand it.

Thoughts on gun storage here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=2415415&mesg_id=2425155

It is entirely possible to have guns safe from child access and at the same time be able to access them quickly, IMO.

Back to the point in the OP, I suspect the school officials are worried about something like this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amish_school_shooting

In that case, the police arrived there only six minutes after the 911 call. What if that twisted individual had had free reign for another 24 minutes? Or if it had been an EDP intending to kill as many people as possible until somebody with a gun showed up? The school discussed in the OP at the moment has zero armed security with the nearest police response 30 minutes away.

[liberaldem4ever]

16. I'm glad you are a conscientious gun owner

It is good to know that accidental gun deaths are declining. I haven't heard about that. You sound like you really know how to be safe with guns around your kids. That is really great, I wish every gun owner would be as responsible as you and your wife.

[benEzra]

17. Thank you. (n/t)

[one-eyed fat man]

18. cops and school shootings

In case you didn't notice, the response of the police when called to a shooting is to cordon off the premises and not allow anyone to interfere with the shooter(s) until the SWAT team finally shows up.

Generally, by this time even the pyschopaths are so tired of waiting for the "blaze of glory", they just kill themselves.

In the meantime, the school is full of victims bleeding to death while the cops are busy shooing people away that are already outside. (Watch the cell phone video footage from Virginia Tech, for example.)

The only interventions against school shooters that were successful occurred when someone already there, like the assistant principal in Mississippi or the students at the Appalachian School of Law, intervened with their own guns.

Recall that the Jewish day-care shooter, Buford Furrow Jr., an avowed white supremacist, had originally planned to shoot up a synagogue, but was deterred by the sight of armed security. By altering his target to a government certified "gun-free zone" the ex-convict on probation in Washington state was free from the distraction of return fire.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0vyxgJLJVA

[tburnsten]

11. The new policy isn't addressing student violence

And it isn't intended to address mental health or violence problems at all. Life insurance doesn't prevent you from dying, what it does is make the aftermath the best it can be. Likewise, this policy is intended to equip the school with first responders who can react to the horribly unlikely event of an attack on the school, not because they are afraid of the students. And it isn't a fearful tactic, it is a prepared one. I have life insurance, despite the fact that I turned 22 last saturday, does the description of paranoid or fearful fit me, or am I prepared? I don't want to leave my expecting wife out in the cold if something should happen to me, that is why I am insured. This school district has no other option for a reasonably effective response in the event that some wacko decides he is going to kill him some kids before committing suicide and knows that this school is far from any help. The school isn't permitting tgeachers to carry because they are afraid of the students, they are allowing them to carry to better protect their students should the unthinkable happen.

[SteveM]

12. 30 mins. from LEO. Who ya gonna call while some sociopath shoots & reloads?(nt)

[benEzra]

14. That describes Massachusetts schools when my father-in-law attended...

that wasn't a Texas thing, it was a period thing, I think. There was a strong authoritarian streak in U.S. education there for a while.

[JonQ]

22. I call BS on this one

any teacher that so much as lays a finger on a kid today is going to lose his/her job, probably face jail time and there will most definitely be a lawsuit involved.

It's not like they're giving teachers carte blanche to just up and shoot any student that back talks.

EDIT:

And yes, I did go to a public school in Texas.

[AtheistCrusader]

23. Done properly

You will never know these teachers are carrying, unless the worst happens and they have to draw a gun to protect human life. Most schools have police officers that patrol, we had 3 liason officers at mine. All three wore guns on their hips on school property. They wear them for the same reason these teachers will, only the teachers will remain anonymous, and the students unaware of their firearms.

I will grant, any sort of screwup like a negligent discharge, brandishing, 'printing' of the weapon through the teacher's clothes panicking a student, any of that will be highly publicized, and very very negative press.

Hopefully it will never be an issue either way, no accidents, and no more need to ever use one for it's intended purpose.

[SteveM]

19. School gun policy getting more attention than this story:

DALLAS -- A body found in a remote area has been identified as that of a clerk whose abduction from a small North Texas town store was recorded by security cameras, authorities said Sunday.
Mindy Daffern, 46, had been missing since Friday from the store her family owns in the city of Scotland, 130 miles northwest of Dallas. Surveillance footage last showed her being confronted at gunpoint by an unmasked man who walked her outside the store....
In the video, the gunman shows no apparent concern about appearing on camera...

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/local/08/18/0818clerk.html

Suspect convicted of burglary, aggravated sexual assault, and failed to register as sex offender -- and still free at the time.

Not in a school, and not in Wilbarger County, but in the town of Scotland (pop. 438) some twenty miles away from the Harrold School District. But if some psychopath out for juice wants to visit in these thinly-populated areas, who you gonna call?

[Hangingon]

20. Training offered for teachers and staff

LAS VEGAS, NV, Aug 18, 2008 (MARKET WIRE via COMTEX) -- Dr. Ignatius Piazza -- founder and director of Front Sight Firearms Training Institute near Las Vegas, NV is referred to as the Millionaire Patriot by the hundreds of thousands of students who have attended Front Sight Firearms Training courses because he has given away tens of millions of dollars in training so law abiding Americans can enjoy what he refers to as the "Comfort of Skill at Arms."
Dr. Piazza has offered to provide a $2,000 Four Day Defensive Handgun course to every school teacher in the entire Harrold Independent School District to thank Harrold School District administrators for their progressive and rational decision to allow school teachers to carry concealed handguns to protect students against violent attack.

(snip)

From the hundreds of testimonials from law enforcement officers who have attended Front Sight Firearms Training Institute near Las Vegas, claiming it is the best firearms training they have ever received, it appears Ignatius Piazza and Front Sight can in fact train Harrold School District personnel to be better with a gun than your average police officer

http://www.marketwatch.com:80/news/story/millionaire-patriot-offers-train-every/story.aspx?guid=%7B3549A967-6759-4135-A429-D5A84AE2B11B%7D&dist=hppr

[one-eyed fat man]

21. teachers' Union prez deserves dunce cap..............

Gayle Fallon, the president of a teachers union in Houston, TX, claims teachers do not, 'Don't Have it in Them' to Shoot Columbine-like Killers.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/mark-finkelstein/2008/08/19/union-prez-wouldnt-want-teachers-shoot-colombine-killers

She sure as heck didn't know my high school teachers! Virtually to a man, they had proven beyond all doubt they could have, and would if needed. Most all of them were WW2 or Korean War veterans. (Although, it was alleged that one of the math teachers had been with Teddy at San Juan Hill.)

Come to think of it, at VA Tech, the teacher that tried to stop the nutjob there was 80 year old unarmed holocaust survivor, . Perhaps that generation is just more disposed to doing what HAS BE DONE. From her lofty position, she discounts any number of current combat veteran teachers of both sexes that would have the courage to do what needs to be done if the unthinkable were forced upon them! Especially, if the tools for defence were allowed them.

Gayle appears to be typical of too many of the current crop; satisfied with bleating while waiting their turn to be killed.

[AtheistCrusader]

24. My 10th grade poetry teacher

was a co-pilot in a B-17 that lost about half of his hearing when part of the cockpit windscreen and walls got shot off by Germans.

Pretty blanket statement for any Teacher's Union, since Teachers come from all walks of life, all kinds of experiences.