Patrick Neville was a 15-year-old sophomore at Columbine High School in 1999. He was on his way to a fast food lunch when the shooting started. Two students, armed with guns and pipe bombs, had stormed the Colorado school, on their way to killing one teacher and 12 students — some were Neville’s friends. Neville, now a Colorado state representative, says many of Columbine’s teachers and faculty acted heroically that day. But, he says, “I truly believe that had some of them had the legal authority to be armed, more of my friends might be with me today.”
“They’re just easy targets … for a criminal, a terrorist or anyone intent on doing harm,” Neville says. “I wake up every day and send my kid to school on blind faith that she’s going to return home safe when there’s really no safeguards for our schools.”
See the entire story here: Ideastream.org
Editor’s Notes: Ohio law already allows each individual school district to decide on their own to permit armed staff. They decide who, how, when and where their staff can best protect the children they are educating. Volunteers from FASTERSavesLives.org also just completed meetings with state representatives in Pennsylvania to help them update laws in their state to allow this type of local control.
Joe Eaton
Program Director – FASTERSavesLives.org
513-267-6088