NC School Safety Bill Would Arm Volunteer Teachers

While the airwaves and social media have had plenty of teachers saying that they sure don’t want to be armed, they don’t speak for all teachers. Not by a long shot. They’re trying to do just that, mind you, but they don’t.

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You see, there are plenty of teachers who would gladly carry a firearm so they could defend not just their own lives, but the lives of their students.

North Carolina is considering a bill that will allow them to do just that.

Republican lawmakers have a new plan to address school safety in North Carolina.

The School Security Act of 2018 would allow teachers to apply to become undercover School Resource Officers.

Participants would be required to undergo basic police training and would be sworn officers with guns in the classroom.

The position would also come with a 5 percent pay increase.

“The two problems that the bill tries to address is, one, we really don’t have enough money to put enough School Resource Officers into schools if we just pay them for a separate position,” said Senator Warren Daniel (R-46). “And two, even if you had the funding, we wouldn’t have enough applicants to fill those positions. It would provide a cost effective way to get School Resource Officers into the school.”

Senator Warren Daniel is one of the bill’s sponsors, along with Senator Ralph Hise and Senator Dan Bishop.

“Hopefully their skills and services would never be needed as a resource officer and they would be able to focus on their teaching 99.99 percent of the time. But there’s just that small fraction of a possibility that something tragic could happen and that they would be ready,” Senator Daniel explained.

Of course, not all teachers are onboard. In particular, one is quoted prattling on like anyone is considering making this mandatory, which is typical for anti-gun zealots.

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You see, in almost every aspect of life, those who oppose guns also tend to believe that anything not forbidden should be mandatory. With that mindset, they see a bill like this and automatically jump into the idea that this is somehow going to require teachers to be armed, which it isn’t. They don’t want the facts. More importantly, though, they don’t want the voters of North Carolina to have the facts.

Instead, they want to pretend that the apocalypse is upon us because a handful of teachers who want to will be armed.

I’m not crazy about requiring specialized training since a concealed carry permit should be all that is needed, but that’s a compromise I’m willing to make so that there will be more responsible adults armed in our schools.

With this law in place, don’t expect to see another Parkland or Santa Fe happen in North Carolina.

And to those teachers who think the idea of carrying a gun is a disaster, all I can say is, “Then don’t.” No one will make you carry a firearm. Frankly, if you’re stupid enough to think a bill that will allow someone to carry will require someone to carry, then I don’t want you to have a gun anyway.

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