Guns In Schools - My Experience & The Impact On Our Youth
This is written in response to questions asked by others who have requested some insight about guns and school safety due to the tragic news from Uvalde, Texas.
I will start by stating that this is a difficult topic for me (as I know it is for many educators). I have been in some intense situations as an educator. However, I am thankful for those experiences.
Because of those fierce and traumatic experiences, I have been able to reflect upon them. Through that process, I have used those experiences as a guide to promote safety, teach awareness, and, most importantly, design and educate others about prevention techniques that schools can use to keep students, staff, and even school visitors safe.
My Experiences
Today, I want to talk about two of my experiences so that you understand more about what students and teachers endure.
My First Experience As A Student
This journey started in 1980, before the tragedy of Columbine.
I can reflect upon being a student in a school where we had daily fights, and many conflicts included students with knives.
At that time, I was quiet, petite, and kept my head down. So, to stay out of the way when these fights occurred, I either went from class to class using a route that I knew would circumvent the fights, or I would wait until the hallways cleared after the tardy bell rang and would run to class.
Taking these precautions was especially important on my way to science class because the science hallway was at the back of the school, where most fights occurred.
I have to pause and give credit to an excellent teacher that understood and was kind enough to help me. Every time I passed by him, he would have an excused tardy slip ready for me so that I wouldn’t be marked as arriving late to my next class.
Every single day! He did this to ensure my safety and likely for many other students.
This extraordinary teacher showed me that you must show up for your students, no matter what else happens in the school.
This brings me to my first experience with guns in schools.
One day while at school, one of my friends came to me because one of her friends had brought a gun to school. He had a fight scheduled during lunch and had decided a gun was the answer. She said she needed to tell a teacher, and we went to that same excellent teacher, our band director, to explain the situation. I practiced my instrument and helped other students while she gave him the details.
The situation was dealt with immediately. All students were removed from our school, and there was no incident or media coverage. How this teacher and administration quickly and quietly dealt with the situation was another lesson I would draw upon in the future.
Two things really stood out to me from this situation. One was how these educators kept my friend’s anonymity, so no one knew she had reported the gun. And the second act I witnessed was how humanely they treated the young man with the gun. They did not make him feel like a criminal or treat him as a lesser human. What I witnessed in this situation has definitely made me a better leader as an adult. But as a student, I became acutely aware of how easily a gun could enter my school.
My Experience As An Educator
Let’s fast forward to the beginning of my career as an educator. You see, I started at a high-poverty school. Well over 85% of the students were in poverty.
One thing I knew when I started my career was that it was essential to establish positive relationships with my students and their families. So every year, I made a continual effort to make positive phone calls to my students’ homes, visit the neighborhoods, and attend any sports games I could. Making this extra effort paid off greatly for me time and time again.
But one particular year, I know it saved lives.
But before I get to that year, let’s talk about lockdowns and more.
Lockdowns became more frequent over the years. So much so that we had code words and training on what to do in that situation. I even attended a meeting where a student walked around the room for quite some time before the school officer brought him to the front and demonstrated that the student had successfully concealed 25 weapons under his clothes, including a shotgun!
This moment stands out to me in my career because that training led to a few teachers retiring and led another teacher to start bringing a gun to school for protection.
As a new teacher, both of these responses unnerved me.
Yet, lockdowns continued, and finding places to hide inside a classroom became a constant challenge from year to year.
I continued teaching where there was high poverty because I saw I was making a difference in the lives of children and families. That motivated me to continue working in this particular community.
One year we had some extreme gang violence that crossed into the school. Fights increased until a massive fight led to drive-by shootings and consistent daily lockdowns. During this time, no students were allowed to be alone without an adult. We also had 16 of the largest male substitutes I had ever seen (or ever saw again, for that matter).
On one Tuesday afternoon, I had picked up my next group of students and was escorting them in a line to my classroom when I noticed a student in the hallway alone and approaching us.
Thank God for relationships! You see, I had developed a bond with this student and had discovered he could not read. (Yes, he made it into adolescence without anyone noticing.) By this point, he had developed a defense mechanism to get in trouble whenever he was expected to read.
One day I was able to talk with him privately and made arrangements to get him assistance so none of the other students would know. I would check up from time to time on him and his progress. He was shocked that I genuinely cared.
Because of this relationship and the trust I built with him, he confided in me that he was part of a gang. So when the whole school was in lockdown due to gang violence, and he was in a gang, but he was approaching my class unescorted, I knew it wasn’t a good thing. Later, I would discover how much of a “not a good thing” it was.
So I did the only thing I knew to do, care about him. I slid my keys to the student in the front of the line and motioned them to go in (by the way, this is where teaching expectations from day one is important because not one student questioned me in this situation, and I only used hand gestures). As I was motioning to my class, I called out to the student and asked if he was okay, and I walked toward him to greet him.
By doing this, I could pause his forward motion. I told him I was worried about him because we were in lockdown, and I did not want him to get in trouble. I offered to walk him to his next class as I noted that my students were safely in the locked classroom. We walked and talked together, and I saw some of his tension melt away as we joked, and I asked about his family and so on.
He was apprehended, and they found a gun on him. He had planned to shoot another student in my class.
None of the other students were ever aware of the true seriousness of the situation, and my colleagues were also unaware.
I remember that lesson from so long ago when my principal and the excellent teacher showed me that all humans must be treated respectfully.
Little did I know, and little did they know, that being such role models would save lives in the future.
The Impact Of Guns In Schools
For almost my entire career, we have dealt with lockdowns. And for any student, parent, teacher, or administrator that has had to participate in a real lockdown, it can be very traumatic.
Yes, we do the practice drills, which are traumatic all on their own, but you can never quite prepare mentally or emotionally for the real thing.
As educators, we take on every child’s responsibility in our immediate environment during a lockdown. We blindly plan how to keep them safe while wondering if a student or outsider poses a threat, not knowing who to trust. You hear noises, and you hope that it is the Police coming to your aid. You wait, and you wait, sometimes for hours, just to hear the principal give the all-clear and to breathe again.
For students, guns in schools are incredibly traumatizing. They feel unsafe coming to school where their only focus should be learning and developing social skills.
This can not continue to be the norm as it is for so many in our society.
At this stage of the game, I implore every one of us to
dig deep for solutions;
put forth our efforts into prevention;
work on mental health;
and help our youth and everyone understand what collaboration and unity genuinely are.
