Laura Carno, brilliant author of Government Ruins Nearly Everything, ardent Second Amendment protector, political dynamo, and my dear friend, penned an insightful article recently on how to ensure public safety in our nation’s public schools.

Carno, who believes citizens are adults who shouldn’t be told how to live and instead need to tell the government to back down when they get too big for their britches, identifies what she views the government’s role should be in protecting children in school districts from coast to coast.

Her article, featured on The Hill, outlines exactly why public schools have a civic duty to boost firearm training:

Most Americans, regardless of which side of the political aisle they are on, agree that one of the primary roles of a government is to ensure public safety. From national defense to protection of our civil rights, there lies a proper role for the government.

What then, is the government’s role in protecting children in the school system?

What about those schools that have armed staff as their only means to protect their students? An increasing number of schools are arming staff so that someone can respond to a violent threat, such as an active shooter, right there on the school premises. David Kopel and Joseph Greenlee, in a previous column here, detail why students are safer when we “get more guns in the right hands.”

In schools that can’t afford an SRO, or in rural schools that are far from law enforcement backup, many have teachers and administrators who are concealed carry holders on campus. They have volunteered under Colorado law, and are now armed first responders in their schools. This responsibility comes along with a significant need for training. Part of having a gun in the right hands means making sure that person is professionally trained to stop a threat. And that means advanced training.

In Colorado, we recently offered our first FASTER class to train these school staff members to stop an armed attacker, administer emergency medical care, and a host of other skills meant to save lives. FASTER stands for Faculty / Administrator Safety Training and Emergency Response, and has been successfully offered in Ohio for more than 5 years.

We have a Colorado training team made up of highly decorated, active-duty law enforcement officers that includes SWAT team members, a Police Officer Academy Curriculum Chairman, and full-time law-enforcement trainers. Two of the trainers have responded to active killer events in Colorado.

Those of us who carry firearms do so because we understand that we are responsible for our own self-defense. We understand that despite their best intentions, law enforcement cannot be everywhere at every moment. We know that the faster an armed threat in a school is stopped, the faster medical care is delivered, the fewer people are injured or killed.

Providing life-saving medical and firearms training to those on the front line in our schools, those who have volunteered to protect our school children, is the next logical step for industry executives to take. We should give our school children the same opportunity to survive an attack that we so willingly give ourselves.

Great points. Who deserves armed protection more than our own children? Why would anyone have a problem with allowing armed professionals in any school, primary to college, when it’s done so as a preventative measure?

Laura’s right: regardless of political affiliation, everyone should support those who choose to prepare to be at the front line of defending our nation’s children.

What say you?