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Virginia Tech Victims, the most deadly attack to date
credit: jokohok

All articles in this series may be found by entering “School Attacks 2022” in the SMM home page search bar.  This updated article continues with answers to additional issues raised in Part 4.  But first, here’s the status quo circa September, 2022, the beginning of the 2022-2023 school year:

Senate Democrats on Wednesday blocked two bills from Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas) that would have used COVID-19 stimulus funds to bolster school security and mental health resources for students.

What could possibly be so objectionable to Senate D/S/Cs?  This:

The Securing Our Schools Act, which was cosponsored by Sen. John Barrasso (R., Wyo.), would double the number of police officers in public, charter, and private schools, strengthen physical security measures like alarms and locks, and put thousands of mental health professionals in public schools. The Protect Our Children’s Schools Act ​​would fund that effort, appropriating billions of dollars in unspent education-related COVID funding. Sen. Chris Murphy (D., Conn.) objected on the Senate floor to both, killing the legislation after Cruz sought unanimous consent.

As I’m sure you recall from the first four articles in this 2022 series, President Biden is against any school security measures, because he thinks gun control will solve that, and pretty much every other, problem.  Of course, he can’t tell the difference between his wife and sister, so… On to the issues:

QUESTIONS, ANSWERS AND SOLUTIONS, PART I (continued):

Q: WHAT ABOUT SCHOOL RESOURCE/LIAISON OFFICERS?

Some schools have armed police officers on their campuses during school hours, more have part time officers, but most have none.  School liaison officers are expensive; they are of little use to a day-to-day patrol force, yet their salaries must come, in part or whole, out of a police budget.  Even if a school has an assigned liaison officer—and this is true primarily for large high schools–-the odds that the officer will be on campus when an attack occurs, or will be in the part of the building necessary to take immediate and effective action are small.  And as I’ve previously mentioned, some school districts, primarily in Democrat-ruled urban areas—are doing away with any police presence in their schools.   This is tragically ironic in that one of the primary anti-liberty/gun arguments against arming school staff has always been the occasional presence of a police officer.

A case in point regarding the less than perfect effectiveness of on-campus police is the Parkland Attack, where a school liaison officer, Deputy Scott Peterson, was present, but due to confusion and cowardice, did not enter the building where the shooting was occurring. No officer entered the building until about eleven minutes after the first shots were fired, some five minutes after the suspect abandoned his weapon and escaped.  This was due in part to Peterson’s radio order that other officers not approach the building.  Obviously, a part of the problem in that incident is the high school campus has at least 12 separate buildings, radio communications were hampered due to long-known and unaddressed equipment issues, available security video was on a 20 minute delay (unknown to first responders) and the usual fog of war confusion.

At Uvalde, there was no assigned resource officer, though several were tasked to visit the various schools from time to time for “15-45 minutes.”  None was present when the attack began.  More than 300 officers from a variety of local, state and federal agencies would eventually arrive, but would do nothing to stop the attacker, who continued to kill for some 77 minutes.

The duties of these officers do not include continuously monitoring entryways, and it wouldn’t matter if they did; schools have far too many to cover, even if a school is housed in only a single building.  Uvalde had  multiple separate buildings, as did Parkland.  In addition, officers can’t be at most extra-curricular activities, which usually occur after school hours.  After eight hours a day, they’re on overtime, and have to make choices about when and where they’ll be present.

Many schools have the populations of small towns with multiple buildings.  Modern schools are like mazes to those that don’t work in them daily.  Those most likely to know who doesn’t belong on a campus and what is happening on a moment-by-moment basis are those that work there: teachers.  They are also present at each and every activity of a school, during the normally scheduled school day or at extra-curricular activities.

I noted in an article about the NRA’s 2012 proposal to put police officers in every school, while it would be better than nothing, it’s simply not possible, and it has not, circa 2022—and no thanks to Joe Biden–come to pass.  There are too many schools (more than 100,000), too few police officers, and for the brokest nation in the history of the world, irrational to consider.  There are, by most estimates, some 800,000 actively serving police officers in America, but that includes federal officers, and even that number is too small to adequately do their jobs. Sending any of them, full time, to schools means the public is even more vulnerable. To hire enough officers to adequately protect every American school–it would require a least 300,000–is impractical, unnecessary, and simply unaffordable, so the Biden Meat Puppet Administration has hired 87,000 IRS agents instead.  Worst of all, it would not address every threat, particularly that of multiple attackers, as I noted in this bit of 2014 fiction. 

Virginia Tech Aftermath
credit: washingtonpost

Time is no longer on the side of the good guys.  When an active shooter or shooters enter a school, if they are not immediately engaged and stopped, the only factor determining the eventual death toll will be their good will or lack of marksmanship.  No one possessed of good will would be carrying out a mass murder attack on a school anyway, and when the targets are children and mostly female teachers trapped in small classrooms without cover or concealment, one need not be an Olympic quality marksman to wreak havoc.

Many schools do not have two-way intercom systems, so a teacher seeing an armed attacker in a hallway may have no way–other than their own cell phone, which may or may not work inside the school–to notify the office, warn other teachers, or to call the police, short of running down that same hallway to do it in person. While the police speed toward the building, a process that will take at least five, if not many more, minutes, children and teachers will die. That, at least, is indisputable.

Q:  TEACHERS CARRYING GUNS? 

One significant reason violent crime has uniformly declined in right to carry states is even though only a small fraction of the population carries a concealed weapon, the likelihood is high some honest citizen will be carrying a handgun virtually anywhere at any time.  Knowing this, criminals can never know who will be armed and must assume everyone might be.  Therefore though only a small portion of the honest population carry concealed weapons, they provide a protective, deterrent effect for the general public far out of proportion to their numbers.  Criminals fear the guns of armed citizens far more than those of the police.  The police are predictable and criminals are used to dealing with them, but citizens just might choose to shoot them out of fear, or worse, righteous anger.  It is also indisputable that criminals take pains to avoid armed citizens.

Looting in Ferguson
credit: stlouis.cbs.local

Tragically, cities and states that use every legislative trick in the book to disarm their law-abiding citizens have high crime rates, and higher murder rates. Circa 2022, Baltimore, Chicago, Seattle, Los Angeles, Minneapolis and other usual suspect cities are experiencing record numbers of shootings and murders by gunfire. Cities like Portland, Seattle, Minneapolis and others are not only trying to do away with their police agencies, their feckless response to rampant lawlessness is causing violent and property crime rates to skyrocket. On January 1, 2023, Illinois is essentially decriminalizing crime.  Due to the Ferguson Effect, police officers, to protect themselves, are avoiding criminals.

Circa April, 2022

How many citizens carry concealed weapons?  In 2019, stats indicated nearly 19 million concealed carry permits, but considering the number of new gun owners since, that number has surely greatly increased, and another trend makes any such tally inaccurate. As I noted in Part 4 of this series (enter “school attacks 2022 in the SMM home page search bar to find them all), circa September 2022, 24 states–Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas,  Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia and Wyoming–allow any law abiding citizen not otherwise disqualified by mental illness or past criminal status to carry a concealed handgun with no state testing or licensing. This is known as “constitutional carry.” Many of the residents of those states do obtain a license so they can enjoy reciprocity with neighboring states and all other states with which they share reciprocity (reciprocity is an agreement between states).  Additional states are in some part of the process of introducing or passing constitutional carry, though it’s a near certainty blue states will not.

One can safely believe any number is significantly higher than official records would indicate. Rampant national lawlessness, unchecked illegal immigration and obviously heightened government tyranny has resulted in gun and ammo sales continually breaking records.  Many Americans take the Second Amendment at its word, and refuse to recognize any governmental power to infringe on the right to self-defense (governments have powers; individuals have rights). Such people are unlikely to respond to surveys. Add in the number of people that regularly carry handguns and long guns in their vehicles, and the numbers are surely much, much higher.

S&W Bodyguard .380 ACP pistol. The holster is the size of a common billfold.

What is the value of a teacher’s life?  If they have an unalienable right to self-defense, a right the state can’t confer and may not take away, how is it they lose that right when they cross a school property line?  How can it be a teacher has the right to protect their life, and the lives of their own children, pretty much everywhere but at school?  Do school property boundaries truly determine the value of the lives of teachers and schoolchildren?  At present, in most states, they do.

Those already licensed for concealed carry provide a ready pool for schools.  Many people assume the police are all expert shots.  Not so.  Many police officers are required to qualify with their firearms only once a year.  The courses of fire are commonly easy–a trend government mandates to ensure “diversity” in police forces has made necessary–and passing scores laughably generous.  Even so, officers can shoot the course as often as necessary to earn a barely passing score.  Many officers fire their weapons only once yearly (and clean them less often, if at all).

Shooting skills can be learned by virtually anyone, and a great many citizens exceed the police in shooting skill.  Non-police, private shooting academies have far higher standards than most police forces.  This is not to denigrate the police in any way–-they do a difficult job well–-but putting on a police uniform does not endow the wearer with magical shooting powers beyond the reach of teachers.

Most teachers are women, and firearm teachers know women often make the best students, commonly lacking the preconceptions and ingrained bad habits present in many men.  They also tend to inherently respect the power of firearms.  I suspect many people around the nation might be surprised to discover how many teachers–-male and female–-are quite competent with firearms, and how many routinely carry concealed weapons (depending on one’s state of residence, personal experience may vary).

Publicizing that teachers are allowed to carry, confirming they are carrying, but taking pains to ensure no one knows who or how many are armed in any given school, will confer upon all teachers, students and schools in that school district the benefit of making every school a harder target.  This is so even if no one is carrying, but no rational person should ever rely on bluffing where lives are at risk. This kind of information will tend to be leaked, and someone will always call that kind of bluff.

Anti-liberty/gun cracktivists commonly argue armed staff policies will force every teacher to carry guns.  Nonsense.  No policy should be required to carry a firearm; it must be voluntary. The last thing anyone needs is someone incompetent—physically or emotionally–with firearms carrying, and yes, some teachers shouldn’t be anywhere near children or firearms.  Even if one school in a district has no one on campus carrying a concealed weapon, as long as the public doesn’t know that, but reasonably believes all are, that school retains the deterrent effect of appearing to be a harder target.

Schools need all the deterrence they can get.

Anyone planning a school attack, knowing the Smallville School District allows concealed carry, even encourages it and posts signs proclaiming that distinction, but the Pleasantville School district next door does not, would surely attack the easier target.  Terrorists and school shooters are deterred only when they believe their mission might be thwarted, which tends to cause them to shift to a softer target.  Currently, all but a small portion of American elementary and secondary school are soft targets.

Q:  THE POLICE ARE HIGHLY TRAINED.  TEACHERS CAN’T HAVE THAT SAME LEVEL OF TRAINING.  WON’T THEY DO WORSE THAN POLICE OFFICERS?

After everyone was wounded or killed at Virginia Tech…
credit: christiansciencemonitor

In virtually every school shooting, the police have had no active role in stopping shooters, who usually commit suicide, or rarely, escape, before police are in a position to see, let alone stop, them.  It may be reasonably argued the police at Uvalde had no effective role, or at the very least, by their own incompetence, a very limited role.  Police officers are indeed extensively trained, but only because their jobs require a wide range of knowledge and skills.  The skills they need to stop a school attacker are few, specific, and do not require years of study and lengthy on-the-job experience to learn and master.  Teachers need only a fraction of the comprehensive training of police officers to be prepared to save lives.

Teachers are no different than anyone else lawfully carrying a concealed weapon. In virtually every state, they must learn the law relating to the use of deadly force—these issues are virtually the same for police officers–and demonstrate basic proficiency with their handgun.  This would be a good starting point for schools, as long as the bureaucratic tendency to over-regulate–demanding everyone carry the same gun, holster, and requiring unrealistic and unnecessarily lengthy training, etc.–is suppressed.   It would be wise for school districts to underwrite tactical training, but this is not absolutely necessary, nor is it difficult or expensive to do or to learn.

Some argue teachers must solely focus on teaching—anything else is an unconscionable distraction and dereliction of their fundamental duty—thus cannot possibly be aware of their surroundings or effectively protect themselves or others.  This is dangerous nonsense on stilts.  Circa 2022, we are, more and more, discovering how very many teachers are engaging in sexual and political indoctrination–and hiding that fact from parents and the public–rather than teaching their ostensible disciplines.

Anyone can—and should–learn to be more aware of their surroundings, to develop “situational awareness.”  And if a teacher carrying a concealed weapon never uses it, as will be the case for all but a few across the nation, their attention to their normal duties is unchallenged.  If they must use it to repel a school attack, their attention will be distracted from teaching for only a few minutes, a distraction for which I suspect most teachers, students and parents will be eternally grateful.  After an attack is stopped, it’s a safe bet everyone will have a few days off.  If it’s not stopped, there will be far more days off, and as at Sandy Hook Elementary, the school will be demolished.  It appears Robb Elementary in Uvalde will also be destroyed.

Some educators, politicians and deluded citizens argue the mere presence of a gun on campus, even carried by police officers, somehow sullies a mystically pristine educational atmosphere.  That they would rather allow people to die to maintain their delusions is all one need know about their lack of character.

Police officers, because of the very nature of their jobs, make mistakes in shooting far more often than citizens.  They are required to rush into ambiguous situations and often aren’t sure who is innocent and who is a threat.  An initially non-threatening person might turn on them in a split second.  A beaten and bloody, petite woman might viciously attack the police when they arrest her abusing husband.  People on the scene–teachers–know precisely who the bad guy is and what needs to be done.  The police virtually never have to make such decisions in school shootings as the killer has commonly killed as many as he pleased, and himself, before they can lay gun sights on him. Their role tends to be helping the wounded and dying, protecting an enormous crime scene, and traffic control.

Sandy Hook entrance
credit: NYPost

At Newtown the killer—who would want his name mentioned here—was confronted by a locked, remotely controlled main entrance door.  He simply shot his way, within seconds, through the floor-to-ceiling plate glass window next to the door.  In that situation, there would have been no confusion among school staff about what was happening.  There would have been no question the killer had deadly intent and anyone near him was in imminent danger of serious bodily injury or death.  Who could doubt what he intended to do if he got into the school?  Armed staff could have shot him while he was still trying to break into the school—it would take mere seconds–and no one need have been injured.  No highly advanced and technical skills would be required, only the ability to shoot straight, and at that point in the attack, when no students or other innocents were in danger, it would matter little if staff members firing on the shooter missed a few rounds.  Even those rounds might have caused the shooter to turn tail and run. As it was, he was able to kill for ten minutes, and could have taken an additional five–perhaps more–before the first officer entered the building.

Keep in mind an officer entering a building where an attack is reported has to orient, move to where the attacker is, even if they’re continually moving, find/see/positively identify the attacker–bad guys can shoot with abandon; the police and honest citizens can’t–and only then do they have the chance to stop the attack.  How many lives are being lost during this process?

The demolition of Sandy Hook Elementary School.

By all means, take this link and learn the unmistakable lessons of Newtown.

Remember too that in elementary schools, most teachers, principals and support staff are female.  They tend to lack size, strength, training and the necessary aggressiveness to incapacitate an attacker hand to hand.  Even if a principal is a world-class martial artist, this is meaningless unless they can get close enough to an armed attacker without being shot, and even then, their chances aren’t good.  In such circumstances, time and distance are the determining factors, and schools are full of long, open hallways with no cover, or even concealment, for the unarmed defender.

But even a slight woman, capable with a handgun, is fully as dangerous to a murderer as a strapping man at the distances found in school attacks.  When Mrs. Manor and I were last required to qualify with our handguns for a state concealed carry permit, I fired a perfect score, and she, using the same make and model of handgun–Glock 26–fired only a single point less, outshooting–with ease–every other man present by a substantial margin.

In school attacks, firearms are truly equalizers and lifesavers, particularly for female teachers, just as they are for women outside school property boundaries.

Of course, shooting stationary paper targets is different than shooting at human beings intent on taking one’s life.  However, the same dynamics apply to attacker and those being attacked.  Arguing against the means of protecting lives because of logistical issues is missing the point in a rather large, obvious and deadly way.

Are we truly prepared to say when an armed madman breaks into a school and begins shooting, women shouldn’t have the means to protect their lives because they have chosen education as a profession?  Because they’re women, and saving themselves and their students would somehow be a betrayal of feminism?  Because their use of violence to save lives would somehow spoil a pristine educational environment?  That’s the very real and deadly effect of current policy.

Walther P22, a common 10-round .22LR pistol like that used at Virginia Tech

Next Tuesday I’ll post the sixth article in this series, which continues to address the issues involved in actually saving lives, rather than merely feeling safe, being smugly morally superior, virtue signaling or “sending messages” about what some want the public to believe, regardless of reality.