# Armed school personnel **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 17, 2012, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301 "2012-12-17T13:57:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![MsRobyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90ced4/32.png) [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/61 "2012-12-18T02:41:18Z")
> [@tomcar](#): > > As someone who works part time in a major city’s school system, I completely agree. > > Let me say this about arming teachers: get ready for more Trayvon Martin/ Zimmerman situations. Teachers have ALOT of things going on. Inner city schools are full of deliquents, and problematic children and young adults. It wouldn’t take much for an amped up teacher to use his/her force. Or for a student to get the gun away from a teacher. > > Turning schools into Liberia or the OK Corral is no answer. I’m in a semi-rural school, and I agree with this. Teenagers are not known for having good judgment as it is, and I’d hate to get in the way of some hothead who wants to kill a classmate because he got jostled in the lunchroom. Or, conversely, some teacher or staff member who doesn’t trust kids gets in the face of one over a perceived threat. Either way, it’s bad juju. In any event, assuming that teachers and staff are to be armed, who is going to pay for the firearm, ammunition, maintenance, other equipment, training, and re-certification? Will these people get paid time off to go to the range to practice? Will they have to undergo psychological evaluation to make sure they’re fit to carry, and if so, will the results of that evaluation be shared with their employer, i.e., the district? Will there be a conscience clause in the employment contract so that teachers and staff who object to being armed won’t have to be? Will the district absorb the increase in health, life, and disability premiums that are sure to happen, or will the staff be expected to pick this up? And what about Naomi? The OP gets an A for effort, but an F for critical thinking. ---
**Author:** ![moldmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ee59a6/32.png) [@moldmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/moldmonkey)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/62 "2012-12-18T02:51:54Z")
In all fairness, the OP stated only volunteers from the beginning: > [@](#): > > I believe that qualified school personnel who volunteer (NOT the strawman of making gun training mandatory for all teachers) to serve as armed security would be the best way to safeguard our schools against gunman incidents. It is a question worthy of debate and it looks like it may get some traction. > **[Sapulpa Lawmaker To Propose Legislation Allowing Teachers, Principals To...](http://www.newson6.com/story/5e3644a02f69d76f6205f436/sapulpa-lawmaker-to-propose-legislation-allowing-teachers-principals-to-carry-guns)** > > In the wake of the mass shooting at a Connecticut elementary school that left 20 children and six adults dead, an Oklahoma lawmaker plans to propose legislation that would allow CLEET-certified teachers and principals to carry firearms to school and... Personally, if a teacher with the right training volunteered I would be okay with that. The “response” teacher wouldn’t necessarily have to make some difficult head shot. If the teacher could pin the shooter down with covering fire, it would prevent the shooter from killing as many. These spree killers don’t seem to like even the idea of being shot back at. Most seem to eat their gun rather than face a response. It’s probably going to take some combination of more restrictions on guns, better identification & help for or locking up of the violently mentally ill, and increased school security to reduce the number of these events. Unfortunately, I don’t think they can be entirely prevented. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/63 "2012-12-18T02:59:39Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > [Act 120 Police Certification.](http://www.lackawanna.edu/police/Training/act120.html) Universities and colleges all over Pennsylvania offer very similar programs. It started 10 or more years ago, but intensified as the economy grew worse, that police departments didn’t want to hire untrained people and then have them getting paid while they were at the academy. Pre-trained only, thank you. Hence, the birth of academies like the one to which I linked. Note that the whole entire program is only 750 hours. Only a small fraction of that is anything to do with guns. What they receive at academy is all the training many cops will ever get. > I’ve said it before in these threads. The public has a habit of grossly overestimating the amount of training cops receive with guns and their general level of competence with same. _snerk_[Note that it takes more training to be a barber or a cosmetologist](http://www.beautyschoolsdirectory.com/faq/license_pa.php) than to be a cop. Of course, it could be that here in PA we are just a bunch of ignorant backasswards country fucks. Better look up the training requirements in your own state and be sure that things are better there. I’ll stipulate that while a few big city forces have more stringent requirements, does all of California meet LAPD training requirements? Is all of New York identical to NYC? ---
**Author:** ![artemis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/91b2a8/32.png) [@artemis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/artemis)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/64 "2012-12-18T03:05:22Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > Is all of New York identical to NYC? Given that the NYPD is using Glocks modified to have an extra-heavy 12 pound trigger pull (because they were having such a problem with NDs), I hope not! ---
**Author:** ![rooostra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d07c76/32.png) [@rooostra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rooostra)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/65 "2012-12-18T03:14:07Z")
For those seriously considering the arm the teachers approach, the question I have is about liability. If there is an incident at a school involving an armed teacher, say a student gets hold of a weapon or the teacher hurts someone thry shouldnt with a firearm, who is liable? I am guessing that in addition to the teacher with the gun, the school district is as well. That means increased insurance costs. One bad incident could bankrupt a school district. It seems to be that much of this argument boils down to “it would be too expensive to pay for police or security presence, so let’s rely on a volunteer.”. If I’m a teacher making 50k a year, I may be a bit irritated that I am being asked to do something normally done by folks making a lot more money than that. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/66 "2012-12-18T03:20:22Z")
> [@rooostra](#): > > For those seriously considering the arm the teachers approach, the question I have is about liability. If there is an incident at a school involving an armed teacher, say a student gets hold of a weapon or the teacher hurts someone thry shouldnt with a firearm, who is liable? I am guessing that in addition to the teacher with the gun, the school district is as well. That means increased insurance costs. One bad incident could bankrupt a school district. > > It seems to be that much of this argument boils down to “it would be too expensive to pay for police or security presence, so let’s rely on a volunteer.”. If I’m a teacher making 50k a year, I may be a bit irritated that I am being asked to do something normally done by folks making a lot more money than that. Once again, I’ll speak only for PA. Generally, teachers here are equal to or better than cops in pay. In the town where I teach, for example, starting pay for a teacher is $34k. For a cop, it is $20k. PA state cops make a decent living, and I’d guess that officers in Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, and Philadelphia probably do too. The rest get shitty pay, shitty benefits, and fight for overtime. Many municipalities get by with part-time officers who need other jobs just in order to make ends meet. Highly trained and well-paid aren’t terms that apply to your average cop. ---
**Author:** ![rooostra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d07c76/32.png) [@rooostra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rooostra)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/67 "2012-12-18T03:23:32Z")
Oops, saw that Ms. Robynalready addressed liability. What about when the police arrive at the scene of a shooting and turn to corner to see a teacher holding a gun who is still looking for the school shooter? What if the cops see the teacher shooting at the shooter? How likely is it that they get shot by cops? Read about the Giffords shooting to see how close the person who subdued the shooter and retrieved the gun was to being shot by another citizen responding with his own gun. Multiple armed people who are not in communication with each other at a shooting scene can massively complicate the response. ---
**Author:** ![rooostra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d07c76/32.png) [@rooostra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rooostra)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/68 "2012-12-18T03:24:43Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > Once again, I’ll speak only for PA. Generally, teachers here are equal to or better than cops in pay. In the town where I teach, for example, starting pay for a teacher is $34k. For a cop, it is $20k. PA state cops make a decent living, and I’d guess that officers in Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, and Philadelphia probably do too. The rest get shitty pay, shitty benefits, and fight for overtime. Many municipalities get by with part-time officers who need other jobs just in order to make ends meet. > > Highly trained and well-paid aren’t terms that apply to your average cop. In Oakland, CA, cops make six figures, well more than teachers. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/69 "2012-12-18T03:53:57Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > Note that the whole entire program is only 750 hours. Only a small fraction of that is anything to do with guns. What they receive at academy is all the training many cops will ever get. Well, I’d be thrilled if even 75 hours of training was required before a regular citizen was allowed to possess a handgun. Are you saying that “only” 750 hours of training would be essentially no different than simply issuing pistols to teachers and telling them “protect the school”? ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/70 "2012-12-18T04:01:23Z")
They don’t get 750 hours or even 75. They get 40 hours, same as the security guard watching a parking lot. Those same colleges and universities offer act 220 training and run things concurrently. FTR, I’m not in favor of arming teachers, but I find the whole idea of cops as our paradigm of trained shooters to be hilariously ignorant. ---
**Author:** ![IceQube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/dfb087/32.png) [@IceQube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IceQube)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/71 "2012-12-18T04:11:31Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Who were, ironically, not armed in accordance with base regulations. Trained soldiers on a base full of weapons and they were helpless. Base regulations? It is protocol **not** to carry weapons on Fort Hood. Cite: > [@Lt. Gen. Cone](#): > > As a matter of practice, we do not carry weapons on Fort Hood. This is our home. [http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=56558](http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=56558) ---
**Author:** ![IceQube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/dfb087/32.png) [@IceQube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IceQube)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/72 "2012-12-18T04:18:16Z")
Anyway, I agree with beefed-up point-of-entry security. I work at a school, and point-of-entry security is out-of-this-world lax. Gates to all three parking lots: wide open, from the mornings to 8 PM at night when the school finally shuts down and the janitors go home. Only one gate is “guarded” by an completely unarmed school official (unless you count a walkie talkie as a weapon). Other “security” staff merely wander about the hallways, looking for students late to class or skipping class in the bathrooms. Completely unacceptable. Hell, I could easily see a random person off the street walk straight through the gate with a gun in his/her waistband, walk right through the front doors (which are always unlocked) and start shooting away at the secretary in the front office. I don’t know if it’s like this in other school districts, but it is in my school district, and my school district is fairly conscientious of security (at least from the top-down). All schools are equipped with a police officer, usually one with lots of previous experience (of the two police officers we’ve gone through over the years, one was in the Army, and both were on the SWAT team). Each police officer also has a brand-new vehicle (purchased last year) fully equipped with laptop and other electronics. Unfortunately, the police officers are content to patrol the hallways for dawdling students. Get the hell out there to the parking lots and at least shut the gates for goodness sake. Then lock all the doors to the school and buzz people in, but not before a visual inspection - do they appear nervous? Do they have ID? What is their purpose (picking up child, etc.?) Are they wearing a bulletproof vest? Bulge in pants? * * * Apparently Lanza shot his way through the locked front door of Sandy Hook Elementary School. Well, kudos, at least you got your doors locked. Had it been my school he could have let himself in. Still, where’s that police officer? Should have taken him down at the door. It appears that the school did not have a police officer since the Wiki article said that it took 40 minutes (!!) for the police to respond. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/73 "2012-12-18T04:24:59Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > They don’t get 750 hours or even 75. They get 40 hours, same as the security guard watching a parking lot. Those same colleges and universities offer act 220 training and run things concurrently. > FTR, I’m not in favor of arming teachers, but I find the whole idea of cops as our paradigm of trained shooters to be hilariously ignorant. Fair enough. Basically, the police are under-trained and most every other gun owner is minimally or non-trained. Great. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 5:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/74 "2012-12-18T05:27:10Z")
The minimal training of police officers is not in and of itself an argument against having them for this purpose. How many situations are there where the police made things worse by reacting to a guard? And how often do these psychopaths target a school specifically because they know most of its inhabitants will be easy targets who won’t fight back? The question is not whether you can prevent all other school shootings, but whether or not you can make them less likely. ---
**Author:** ![Sleeping\_Synapse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ab992/32.png) [@Sleeping\_Synapse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sleeping_Synapse)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/75 "2012-12-18T07:37:07Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Armed school personnel I’m sure that would instil a real _esprit de corps_ in American kids; teachers with M16s slung over their shoulders, pacing up and down between rows of desks during exams. Kids who aren’t exactly at Finish levels of pupil achievement already… The ‘fight fire with fire’ mentality in the US really is bemusing to an outsider. It’s like watching an insane person bang their heads against a cell wall, over and over, with each drop of blood causing them to hit their heads even harder! The kicker is, it’s like the majority of Americans seem to have a mindset conducive to this kind of counter-intuitive thinking: super-sized soft drink bans to try combat obesity epidemic - cry one’s liberties are being eroded; economy flushed down the gurgler by an avaricious Wall Street and the banks - tax the middle class and poor; introduce health care for those who cannot afford it - sound the ‘Pinko alarms’; get fed a government 9-11 line more nonsensically conspiratory than ‘Mossad did it’ - quaff it like it’s the antidote; children gunned down in their [once] sacrosanct place of learning - prostrate to effigies of a Second Amendment tablet- toting President Heston… :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/76 "2012-12-18T13:53:12Z")
> [@Sleeping\_Synapse](#): > > I’m sure that would instil a real _esprit de corps_ in American kids; teachers with M16s slung over their shoulders, pacing up and down between rows of desks during exams. Kids who aren’t exactly at Finish levels of pupil achievement already… No one is proposing anything like this and you know it. Sarcastic hyperbole. > [@](#): > > The kicker is, it’s like the majority of Americans seem to have a mindset conducive to this kind of counter-intuitive thinking: super-sized soft drink bans to try combat obesity epidemic - cry one’s liberties are being eroded; economy flushed down the gurgler by an avaricious Wall Street and the banks - tax the middle class and poor; introduce health care for those who cannot afford it - sound the ‘Pinko alarms’; get fed a government 9-11 line more nonsensically conspiratory than ‘Mossad did it’ - quaff it like it’s the antidote; children gunned down in their [once] sacrosanct place of learning - prostrate to effigies of a Second Amendment tablet- toting President Heston… :smack: Maybe because Americans tried the obvious, straightforward thing once- to eliminate alcoholism, ban alcohol- and it was a dismal failure. As for our once sacrosanct places of learning, we once had safe schools without banning guns; we’d like to go back to those days. I would say the difference between then and now is cultural. Maybe when we stop giving maladjusted narcissists the importance in death they never had in life, going out in a blaze of glory won’t be as attractive anymore. As might the prospect of being summarily shot like a mad dog before the body count gets into the double digits. ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/77 "2012-12-18T14:03:36Z")
Yes, the prohibition of one thing is just exactly like the prohibition of anything else. That’s why there are speakeasies where people get together to mutilate female genitalia. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/78 "2012-12-18T14:42:38Z")
To address the whole subject of “we have laws against X, why not guns too?” I see a distinction: Most laws directly ban a behavior- it’s against the law to murder people, to commit rape, to drive drunk, etc. But “prohibition” laws (and yes I see a direct analogy between banning alcohol and banning guns) attempt to prevent a behavior by banning something which enables that behavior, even if it’s innocuous in itself. People are obese? Ban soda! Prohibitions of this kind punish those who don’t abuse the banned object and are usually little obstacle to those who do. btw: given the occasional news reports of people being arrested for arranging the “circumcision” of their daughters, apparently there _is_ an underground of female genital mutilators. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/79 "2012-12-18T15:35:01Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > But “prohibition” laws (and yes I see a direct analogy between banning alcohol and banning guns) attempt to prevent a behavior by banning something which enables that behavior, even if it’s innocuous in itself. People are obese? Ban soda! Prohibitions of this kind punish those who don’t abuse the banned object and are usually little obstacle to those who do. You’d have a point if anyone was talking about banning guns in their entirety. But they are not so you don’t. In Canada (land of the commie pinko socialist gun-grabbers), I can legally own an AR-15. Even they are not “banned”. However, it is classified as a restricted gun, which means there are certain requirements I must fulfill before owning one., such as obtaining a Possession and Acquisition License, and shooting it only at a range. This sort of thing though (getting a license for a military grade weapon) is seen as much too intrusive in the US. I think most people are actually talking about keeping military-grade weapons out of the hands of loonies, rather than banning them. Any talk of the dangers or impossibility of “banning guns” is simply a straw man argument. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2012, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301/80 "2012-12-18T15:50:08Z")
> [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#): > > You’d have a point if anyone was talking about banning guns in their entirety. But they are not so you don’t. But they are, at least on this board. If you’re talking about lawmakers, point conceded. It’s just that most gun control proposals amount to saying that owning a firearm is a privilege that the government may deign to grant you on its terms. That’s the part that rankles. And registration/certification, while not a restriction in and of itself, really would be step one to making gun confiscation possible- it happened in Britain. Most pro-gun people would be fine with registration _ **IF** _ they could be absolutely, 101% sure that it would never, ever be used to enable confiscation. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/armed-school-personnel/644301.md?page=5)