Report: 2 shot at Calif. high school; shooter detained

[Corcaigh]

Studies show that a homicide of a family member or loved one is more likely in a home with a gun than a home w/o a gun.

Why do you expect it to be different for schools?

This is the point that often seems to be ignored where people are arguing for proliferation rather than control.

It's about evaluating risks. There is a risk that a crazy violent person will create an elaborate plan for mass slaughter and chose to target your place of work or your school. There is also a risk that someone, who is otherwise non-violent, will make a terrible decision in the heat of the moment. A few dozen people die each year in spree killings. Many thousands more die in shootings and suicides.

While it's possible that an armed teacher might help reduce the carnage of a spree killing, trained armed security on site didn't stop Columbine. There are close to 100,000 public schools in the USA. If you introduce weapons to that many situations, do you really think the risk of tragedy goes down?

Again, Adam Lanza's mother had multiple weapons. It didn't afford her any protection. In fact it led directly to her death and that of many others.

[PeterMP]

thats why i say pepper spray. It can stop 90% of any attack and wont kill classrooms.
Like alternative energy, if you support alternative weapons, they will get better every year and take over firearms.

PLUS

Anyone here have children that go to school that doesn't have a guard within 1mile?
The Elementary school doesn't but the middle school around the corner has a regular cop in there all day. (i do kiss&ride so i see him all the time).
So does the High school about 1 mile the other way down Franconia.

PLUS

between the two above and NEVER saying the offenders name, wiping it from the earth and i think we would be good.

side note: 2 dif female cops do the crosswalk at the highschool and middle school in the morning/afternoon also.
*so they are around* for portions of the day.

My wife and I were talking. Our local park has a police "command' center (essentially its a trailer) with a some police presence a lot of the time.

I'd support building schools in clusters and then doing something like that with the schools. The police wouldn't be "in" the school per say, but would be very close by.

I also don't have an issue with pepper spray.

[twa]

Why not?

I would agree that an armed security guard (who carries a weapon as a direct part of his job and is constantly aware of it) is a very different situation from a gun at home.

But an armed teacher (who is a professional teacher not a professional security officer) seems very similar to a gun at home, where the carrier's primary role is unrelated to the gun and it is only there for a rare emergency situation.

what if I told you the teachers would be better (or equal to) trained and screened than most armed security guards?
why the fear?

Nothing stops a teacher from shooting kids now,but a armed teacher IS in the best position to defend against a shooter.

add

corcaigh
where was the armed security guard?....outside the school,far away from the scene and at that time restricted in use of force(naturally they adjusted that afterwards)

[PeterMP]

what if I told you the teachers would be better (or equal to) trained and screened than most armed security guards?
why the fear?

Nothing stops a teacher from shooting kids now,but a armed teacher IS in the best position to defend against a shooter.

What affect would that have on the educational system?

How is that going to affect your pool of teachers?

How are you going to do that when they are teaching?

Are you going to have gun training in service days?

In this latest case (in this thread), it appears that nobody will die.

What are the chances that changes if the teachers present have guns?

[MattFancy]

what if I told you the teachers would be better (or equal to) trained and screened than most armed security guards?
why the fear?

Nothing stops a teacher from shooting kids now,but a armed teacher IS in the best position to defend against a shooter.

add

corcaigh
where was the armed security guard?....outside the school,far away from the scene and at that time restricted in use of force(naturally they adjusted that afterwards)

What if most teachers are older or younger women?

This is from 2011, but I'm sure nothing much has changed: http://www.edweek.org/media/pot2011final-blog.pdf

[Mad Mike]

Thinking about the teachers being allowed guns let me ask this...what if a teacher wanted to shoot students? Then there's a class full of students the teacher can kill so it can go both ways. What needs to happen is every school needs metal detectors by every door and security guards standing so if it goes off they get searched. After class starts, there needs to be one entrance into the school. Have a security guard by every door I case one tries to break in.

What if it rained cows instead of water? Because both things have happened the same amount of times in the past.

Look, I'm against arming teachers. Their job is to teach. But in schools where it is not feasible to hire armed guards, some administrator could be tasked to take a few firearms courses and be licensed for concealed carry as the designated security person of last resort.

Locking down entrances and funneling anyone entering the building through a security station with metal detectors is fine if you can enforce it. Metal detectors are useless without an armed guard.

And Thiebear, pepper spray vs a gun is a sure way to die. If you are close enough to spray someone, they are close enough to shoot you without aiming. Tazers might be a little more effective but still lack range and anyone with a bulky coat is pretty well defended against them. I'm not saying they shouldn't be available. They could be a "better than nothing" option for teachers we don't want to arm with guns, but if someone with a gun is determined to kill a lot of people, the best option to stop them is another person with a gun.

[twa]

What affect would that have on the educational system?

How is that going to affect your pool of teachers?

How are you going to do that when they are teaching?

Are you going to have gun training in service days?

In this latest case (in this thread), it appears that nobody will die.

What are the chances that changes if the teachers present have guns?

What were the chances at the other shootings?....as I asked....how many are you willing to sacrifice?
Hoping to talk down a shooter is a real risk and can be done as well when armed...but it is nice you assume they are more capable of negotiation than handling a weapon

Guns do not seem to drag down education where allowed/required now....do you have any examples??

training can easily be done in off time to the level of armed security guard level

[PeterMP]

What were the chances at the other shootings?....as I asked....how many are you willing to sacrifice?
Hoping to talk down a shooter is a real risk and can be done as well when armed...but it is nice you assume they are more capable of negotiation than handling a weapon

Guns do not seem to drag down education where allowed/required now....do you have any examples??

training can easily be done in off time to the level of armed security guard level

I want to "sacrafice" the minimal number of people. I know in some settings guns actually seem to increase the number of deaths (i.e. more people are "sacrafice"). What evidence do you have that isn't the case in schools (now, I do think we'd have to break this down some. I'd be more willing to have guns in a high school than an elementary school because I think it is more likely that people that interact with the school are possible of obtaining a gun on their own and using it to kill people in a high school than an elementary school (essentially the students in a high school are more likely to shot each other than an elementary school))?

If you don't, then isn't possible your approach will actually lead to an increase in people being "sacraficed"?

I know of no case where guns are required of the teachers AND there is a robust effort to train the teachers to use them.

Do you?

[twa]

What if most teachers are older or younger women?

This is from 2011, but I'm sure nothing much has changed: http://www.edweek.org/media/pot2011final-blog.pdf

Women are perfectly capable ....believe me
asking one to physically subdue would be different....with a gun they can be the equal of any man

[Mad Mike]

Why not?

I would agree that an armed security guard (who carries a weapon as a direct part of his job and is constantly aware of it) is a very different situation from a gun at home.

But an armed teacher (who is a professional teacher not a professional security officer) seems very similar to a gun at home, where the carrier's primary role is unrelated to the gun and it is only there for a rare emergency situation.

When you show me some statistics that indicate armed professionals are likely to shoot the people they are assigned to protect we can continue this. I'm not going to try to debate wild theories that have no basis in fact.

[PeterMP]

When you show me some statistics that indicate armed professionals are likely to shoot the people they are assigned to protect we can continue this. I'm not going to try to debate wild theories that have no basis in fact.

How likely is it that an elementary student is going to be killed with a gun in a manner that would have been prevented with an arm guard in an elementary school?

[twa]

If you don't, then isn't possible your approach will actually lead to an increase in people being "sacraficed"?

I know of no case where guns are required of the teachers AND there is a robust effort to train the teachers to use them.

Do you?

there are two countries where teachers are armed, one school district here in Texas does as well
there are also other ones in the US that have allowed teachers to be armed on a case by case basis(naturally that is kept quiet)

despite all these armed teachers I know of none shooting a student....do you?

texas
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/29/us...anted=all&_r=0

Utah
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/n...oting/1793773/

Utah has allowed teachers to carry concealed weapons on K-12 campuses for 12 years now and, said Aposhian, "We have never had any accidental or intentional shootings." He serves on the state board where any violation of concealed weapon laws would be reported.

"Teachers are professionals. They will take appropriate measures to maintain a gun discreetly and safely," said Aposhian, a tactical firearm instructor.

[Mad Mike]

Again, Adam Lanza's mother had multiple weapons. It didn't afford her any protection. In fact it led directly to her death and that of many others.

And yet a gun *did* protect this woman and her children...

http://amarillo.com/news/latest-news...truder-5-times

And again, *this* is ignored....

http://www.justfacts.com/guncontrol.asp

* A 1993 nationwide survey of 4,977 households found that over the previous five years, at least 0.5% of households had members who had used a gun for defense during a situation in which they thought someone "almost certainly would have been killed" if they "had not used a gun for protection." Applied to the U.S. population, this amounts to 162,000 such incidents per year. This figure excludes all "military service, police work, or work as a security guard."[12]

And for the sake of argument, I'm going to assume these figures are wrong. Let's cut that figure in half just to be sure there is no exaggeration.
Thats 81 THOUSAND times a year someone justifiably used a gun in self defense, be it by showing the gun, or firing it.

[MattFancy]

Women are perfectly capable ....believe me
asking one to physically subdue would be different....with a gun they can be the equal of any man

You really think a 50+ y/o is going to be chasing down someone with a gun?

And don't you think that teachers may object to this? We don't pay them enough as it is now, and then you want to add security guard to their duties?

[Son of Gadsden]

Condolences to the victims.

However, this is just another media manipulation story.

Two people shot by violent lunatic.

Statistics show guns are used for self defense twice as often as crime. Just by doing a rough google search, I got the numbers approximately 2.3 times more often.

So, yeah. The media reported two shot.

Five people had their lives saved by guns that weren't reported.

So like I said, condolences, no one ever likes to see this and something should be done. But also don't let it fool you, this is the media telling half the story as usual, and it just bothers me.