Quote:
Originally Posted by August
And just as important if not more they should be hardening school physical security. There are too many unlocked doors and easily shattered large glass panels. Keeping a mad killer outside even for a few minutes might well give law enforcement enough time to neutralize them before they can get at the kids or staff.
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Well, schools aren't prisons, and they aren't designed as such for a reason: to make the children not feel like a prisoner. OK, who cares about children's feelings, anyway?
More importantly: all the easily available entryways you want to seal of are at the same time easily available exits. Your idea of creating chokepoints to make it difficult to get into the building also make it difficult to get out of the building, like during a fire.
And most importantly: in most cases of mass shootings the perpetrators know their targets very well, and they have found ways to get in despite hardened security.
Armed teachers? American teachers are already not paid enough and treated like ****, now you want to burden them with the role of SWAT as well? Also this idea would also INCREASE the number of guns in schools.
First of this would make it easier for a perpetrator to get a gun (it's down to mugging 5'1" Mrs. Smith, basically). Secondly teachers are normal people with normal problems, so arming them might have unintended consequences as well (mass shootings HAVE been commited by teachers as well).
Even with training the teachers don't become marines or SWAT members. They only become people in street clothes running around armed. If there really was a mass shooting: would a real SWAT team ask before shooting someone running around with a gun whether he/she was the perpetrator? I highly doubt that.
"Arming teachers" is like the typical American answer to guns: "More guns". That has never worked before.
And with all of this you are only fighting the symptoms, of course, but not the underlying problems, which -I admit- are much more complex to identify, let alone addressing them.