Steven’s “I’m gonna get you man,” and his demented eyes resurfaced as I walked back to my classroom after meeting with the principal and police officer. I thought he was disturbed enough to follow through on his threat of another student and also knew he was now armed with a handgun and roaming free. In my entire career, I’ve never been more frightened of the possible future and never endured a longer work day, every hour seeming like ten.
I always parked my truck right across the street from the building I worked in, and instead of entering it, I walked to my truck. As I crossed the street I pictured Steven slipping by our police officer who could not guard three different buildings at once. I visualized Steven shooting out the window of the outer door in my building, opening it, and then shattering the glass in my classroom door so that he could have a little target practice. This all could have happened in under a minute. Jack Nicholson’s role in “The Shining” never seemed more real.
I also thought about a .38 Colt revolver I owned that originally belonged to my uncle when he worked as a police officer. It would fit nicely inside a pocket of my laptop computer case, a case I always sat right next to or on my desk. The gun was at home as I never carried it or any weapon in my vehicle on a regular basis, and never when I went to school.
In my irrational and fearful state, I reasoned if I didn’t need the gun, no one would ever know I had one in school, a serious violation of the law and school policy, but one I earnestly considered as I sat behind the wheel of my truck. I had plenty of time to go home, get the gun, and return with time to spare. If I did have to use the gun to protect my students and myself. I figured, probably correctly this time, the average Texas jury was more likely to pin a medal on me than send me to jail, so the legal issue was really minor in my less than rational thinking of the time.
Finally the voice of reason, or God as I often believe, brought me to my senses. A gun? Bring a gun into my classroom? Are you nuts? Well, maybe I am a little, 34 years of teaching teenagers will tilt the mind a bit, one already tilted considerably before I even entered a classroom as a teacher, but still not totally down and out insane enough to ever bring a gun to school, even if I did have good justification.
I got out of my truck, went inside, and moved my desk so that I could see out of my classroom door and the outer door leading to the street. Except for two very quick restroom breaks only 10 feet away, I never moved from my guard tower where time crept by slowly until the evening ended uneventfully. I don’t know what ever happened to Steven.
I’ll always believe I made the right call in resisting the urge to bring a firearm into a classroom and will continue adamant protest against any proposal or program that would have a guy like me toting heat while teaching. The concept, as dangerous and morally wrong as any I’ve ever heard proposed in the realm of school policy, is actually legal in Texas, something I was unaware of until media reports of a Texas school district that permitted armed teachers who were licensed to carry handguns. Since that time, more states and schools jumped on the Quick Draw bandwagon. I am chilled by the reality. Please let this gun collector and avid shooter explain his basic reservations that are not contrary to the Second Amendment.
First of all, carrying a weapon while in contact with children in a school setting is a perversion of my profession, one I freely admit the general public has yet to fully understand, but most dangerously generally believes it does and freely offers policy suggestion in absence of training and knowledge of reality.
A large percentage of my at-risk students were constantly surrounded by violence, drugs and weapons at home and in their neighborhoods. Our school was an oasis, one every staff member actively supported and protected. All of us continuously encouraged students to leave outside issues outside of our school, while continuously counseling our pupils to concentrate on academics and a better future. Our kids, in return, looked at us as family members who would never intentionally hurt them, and not as threatening authority figures they’d grown, for good reason in many cases, to distrust. Our authority stemmed mostly from love and respect, not power. Granted, I worked in a decidedly different environment than the average teacher, but most of this methodology is applicable to any school setting. If my kids knew I had a gun, I’d become one of “them” and not a person students could trust and come to for guidance and help. This was my power. Having a gun would have negated a lot of it.
It is also very well known and proven by research that possessing a weapon is more likely to become a threat to someone close and known than it will ever be used to protect against outside evil. This is the main reason I never went home for the gun. I feared what might happen if the weapon fell into the wrong hands, or if I accidentally shot the wrong person. I also didn’t want to hurt Steven, a victim himself. I could never forgive myself if I seriously injured or killed a student. Knowing this brought me back to reason.
I’m glad to say I took the right road and went into highly vigilant teacher mode unarmed. If Steven came after Frank, he’d have to go through me first, and I had an advantage many teachers who confronted school shooters didn’t have, a relationship with the potential shooter. Steven had the opportunity previously to charge through me and he didn’t. He still, I prayed, had some rational thoughts, although these were fading fast as his illness progressed. Even as deranged as he was, there was still a good probability he would have turned away once again if I blocked his path, gun or no gun, and probably far more likely to turn away from an unarmed person who posed no threat. I was one of the “good guys” and even Steven in his severely disturbed mind knew this. He did not want to hurt me. Of course, I am most grateful for never having to test my convictions and analysis. I did, however, have lots of experience playing classroom defender, as thousands of teachers do every year in our country.
I never had a physical fight break out in my classroom in 34 years of teaching. When tempers flared, I always moved between the antagonists who never tried to intentionally hurt me, although I did get a lump or two by punches thrown around me aimed at the other combatant when involved in breaking up fights in places like the cafeteria or hallway.
My most memorable battle casualty came from an emotionally disturbed special education student who leaped in the air trying to spit over me onto another girl but missed her target and instead planted a good gob of goo right between my eyes. After the anger died down, the poor kid was so supremely sorry for her actions she apologized almost daily for two months and was ashamed beyond words in spite of my acceptance of her apology. She never intended to harm me. Once a relationship of trust and respect is established between a teacher and student, it is exceptionally rare for the student to deliberately cause physical harm to a teacher. This was my shield and armor, more protective than any gun, and absolutely safe where a gun most definitely is not and far too often wounds the innocent.
I was not surprised the NRA came out for armed guards in schools in wake of the Sandy Hook tragedy. It was the only logical policy move they could make under the circumstances. The call is political theater but does deserve some mention as the NRA is at least correct in one respect I’m very sad to say, and that’s the need for someone to have a firearm on campus to protect from outside intrusion from a heavily armed world or a weapon toting student who goes ballistic inside. I am deeply saddened to say we need this level of protection, but know all too well how dangerous our world has become and fully aware of the serious issues arriving on the doorsteps of many schools on a daily basis.
My lack of respect for politicians calling for armed teachers is rooted in what happened to my school when their kind cut deeply into Texas school budgets the year before I retired. In the wake of billions cut from schools by Texas politicians, my district reacted as it had to. One of the budget cuts removed the police officer from our small school for at-risk teenagers when we worked daily with many active gang members who had easy access to all sorts of weapons. We had no metal detectors or any form of weapon screening. With the budget cuts, we were left with no protection at all. These are the same guys who the following year wanted to give me a gun so that all would be well, total BS from people who liked to pretend they cared only when it’s politically convenient and costs nothing more than your average Saturday Night Special.
Simultaneously with the huge funding cuts, we were flooded with severely disturbed students of all kinds in an attempt to reduce dropout rates. It was a very dangerous situation that could have easily made headlines, but one quite common all across our country. Teaching, at least good teaching, has always been a hard job. At one time, at least in most places, it wasn’t particularly dangerous. It often is now, even in places like mostly middle class Newtown. This is a reality and a very sad indictment of the culture of violence in America.
But I don’t want an armed guard. I want a donut or two. Donut, as we all called him, was a police officer at a large high school I worked in for nine years. I never fully appreciated Donut’s work until I spent a lot of time patrolling the halls with a two-way radio as a substitute administrator, a job I did quite a bit before moving off to work exclusively with at-risk kids at a smaller school. The experience was valuable. The job, however, was all the worst of working in schools with little of the good.
Donut got his name because many didn’t think he worked very hard. But my frequent involvement with Donut on the job revealed all the behind closed doors hard work he did. Donut, I soon learned, was just as much counselor as he was a cop.
Trained school police officers like Donut are not security guards or soldiers, they are professionals entrusted to work with and protect kids and staff. School police officers go about their job quite a bit differently than many in other law enforcement positions. Making a lot of arrests isn’t the objective. Donut was a street corner psychologist as well as armed force. The gun came last, if at all, and most like Donut never have to draw it, but it’s there if needed, and it was needed at the front door at Sandy Hook.
Every school could use Donut today, a trained professional with a serious and very complicated mission demanding full attention, something a teacher simply hasn’t the time to do with all of the other required duties and should not for reasons just explained. Many schools absolutely need a good Donut, and just as much, access to mental health care and treatment for students and family too.
What we don’t need are politicians who pretend to protect children and then do everything they can to ignore their needs.