Under a bill approved by Texas lawmakers last year, every public school district in the state must have armed personnel in place. Districts don't have to allow for armed school staff, but if they don't want to put school resource officers on campus, or can't afford the cost, allowing trained and vetted employees who've volunteered to serve as a first line of defense against a targeted attack on campus is an option. 

There are already hundreds of school districts in the state that have adopted the state's Guardian or Defender programs, which both offer pathways to put armed school staff in place. Now a west Texas district is joining their ranks, though at least one district official doesn't sound too happy about the decision. 

“We are unable to put a school resource officer on every campus. Even though our law enforcement entities have tried for us, but they just don’t have the staff right now to do that. In place of a school resource officer, we have had to go the guardian route or defender route, whichever you wish to call it, and that arms staff members on campus,” said Robyn Cranmer, deputy superintendent, Canyon ISD. 

... “It’s still hard to believe that we are at the the point that we’re arming staff, you know. School teachers sign up to teach kids, they don’t typically sign up to carry weapons on campus. This has been a mindset shift and we’ve kind of had to work through that and what that feels like and what that looks like,” said Cranmer.

We've heard these complaints before, but the folks responsible for training armed school staff in states like Colorado and Ohio have said their biggest problem is finding enough space for staffers who have volunteered, not a lack of volunteers themselves. Even with the extensive training that's involved, Laura Carno, who runs FASTER Colorado's training program, has told Bearing Arms that only one school district in the state has ever reached out to her about providing training only to come back later and say there wasn't enough interest among district employees to move forward. 

It might be a slightly different situation in Texas, where an armed presence is now required on campus, and it's still unclear what happens if a district can't afford to place an SRO at every school and is also unable to find enough staffers willing to volunteer to take part in the Guardian or Defender programs. The Texas law offers districts $15,000 per campus and an additional $10 per student to help offset the cost of adding SROs, but that's not enough to fully fund these positions, which leaves the Defender and Guardian programs as the best option, especially for smaller and more rural school districts. 

Ideally, schools would have both resource officers and armed school staff in place, which research has shown is the fastest way to put a stop to a targeted attack on campus. For districts that can't afford that option, however, having an armed presence that can (theoretically, at least) immediately respond to a threat is far better than having to wait ten, twenty, or even thirty minutes for law enforcement to show up and end the threat to students and staff.