(The following is part of a series of monthly submissions from the North Penn School District Board of School Directors. This month’s submission was authored by North Penn School Board Vice President Christian Fusco. The views expressed within are his own.)
In the wake of yet another school shooting in Nashville, Tennessee, school directors across the country are hearing familiar calls from members of their community to further fortify buildings and do more to protect children. Over the past decade, America’s schools have shouldered the responsibility of protecting students from an armed intruder without sufficient support from state legislatures or the federal government.
Today, bullet resistant glass, surveillance systems, visitor monitoring and security systems, intruder, evacuation, and lockdown drills, are standard in most schools around the country. Less common, but increasingly prevalent are school police departments and resource officers, armed security, and in some cases, even armed teachers are measures districts are relying on to respond to what has become a national crisis.
If you are a part of my generation, you remember a time when this was not part of the national dialogue. We did not need to practice intruder drills in 1995. The new normal is anything but normal. Mass shootings are not a natural disaster that cannot be prevented. This is a problem perpetuated by politicians not only standing in the way of common-sense gun legislation, but also actively working to deregulate laws designed to protect us that are already on the books. Ironically, many of the same elected officials demanding schools adjust their practices and their budgets to protect students are the same politicians working to further deregulate gun ownership in this country.
Just this year, Florida passed a law abolishing the need for gun owners to seek a permit for their firearm. Missouri failed to pass a bill aimed at banning minors from being allowed to open-carry a firearm on public lands without adult supervision. What could go wrong with an 8-year-old carrying a gun without mom or dad around? Not to be outdone, in Tennessee, instead of passing legislation to protect schools, lawmakers are moving forward on a law that would protect gun manufacturers from being sued by families like those who lost loved ones in the Covenant School mass shooting.
Schools will never be able to keep up if politicians donning AR-15 lapel pins keep moving the goalposts. Easing restrictions on who can own a firearm, deregulating where and how gun owners are allowed to carry a firearm and preventing law enforcement from having information about whether a person of interest owns a firearm makes our schools and our children less safe.
School districts across the country are doing their part. It is time for politicians to do their part to help us protect America’s school children.
Signed,
Christian Fusco
NPSD Board of School Directors, Vice President
Term Expiration: 2025
See also:
Submission: March Letter from North Penn School District Board of School Directors
Submission: February Letter from North Penn School District Board of School Directors
Submission: North Penn Superintendent Discusses Renovations, Grade Reconfiguration at High School
Submission: January Letter from North Penn School District Board of School Directors