Back in the grim days following the Columbine High School atrocity, I pushed hard for the “Israeli model” of armed school personnel. After the Maalot massacre, an all-volunteer program was put together for school personnel and family members of students who were trained by Israel’s civil guard and reported to school with concealed handguns. It was fabulously successful in both stopping and deterring armed terrorist attacks on schools. The concept has much in common with the hugely successful FFDO (Federal Flight Deck Officer) program for armed airline pilots. (It matters not whether the “terrorist” in question is motivated by religious zealotry, politics, or madness. What matters is that a protector with a gun be in place to stop the evildoer with a gun.)

After the recent Sandy Hook atrocity, not only did the NRA come up with a plan for something similar here (while also pushing for more armed police assigned to educational institutions as SROs, or School Resource Officers), but we’ve seen similar plans actually implemented in places like Texas, Utah, and Arkansas.  It is a solid, realistic approach to a genuine problem.

I call your attention to an excellent little book published in December of 2012, “School Administrators Guide To Practical Handgun Training.” The author is Richard Rosenthal, a retired lawman with an impressive 40-year career behind him. The first half of that was twenty years with the NYPD. There, he worked Homicide and Narcotics, served as a helicopter pilot, and spent many years teaching at the Firearms and Tactics Unit, which is where I first met him long ago. Retiring after putting in those twenty, he spent a like period as Chief of Police in Wellfleet, Massachusetts.

Having dealt with school administrators as a chief of police, Rich understands their thinking. His credentials make it clear to them that he’s not some sort of right-wing lunatic, and give him credibility in certain circles where gun enthusiasts simply will not be listened to by decision-makers. Rich is not only a master firearms instructor, but a shooting incident survivor himself. His advice on vetting and training armed volunteers and managing such a program is absolutely spot-on.

I highly recommend “School Administrators Guide to Practical Handgun Training.”  It’s available for $19.33 plus shipping here.

1 COMMENT

  1. Thanks for posting that Mas. Missouri recently passed a veto proof bill allowing teachers to be armed.

  2. I strongly suspect that the Obama people want to keep the “Gun Free” school zones, hoping, and expecting, more mass killing of school childreen, so they will have the excuse that they can use to keep pushing for more Gun Control laws, eventually leading to Registration, and then Confiscation.

    Putting armed teachers, or anybody else who is armed, into schools would be defeating their agenda, and their goal, to totally dirarm America.

  3. If there is a fire in a school the school is equip with fire extinguishers and automatic sprinkler systems.

    If someone has a heart attack they have AEDs and people trained in CPR.

    If there is a tornado they have safe areas to go to survive.

    Yet, if a mad man enters the school with any type of weapon looking to do evil the best most of the personnel can do is pray – which has been banned in almost all public schools in this country.

    Schools are suppose to be institutions of learning yet those who run them refuse to learn the very apparent lessons history has tried to teach us so well.

    1: Evil will happen regardless of what the law reads or how you prepare for it.
    2: Being prepared for evil is the best way to survive it.
    3: Evil prefers easy targets of opportunity.
    4: Guns in the hands of trained good people are the best bet to stop those with evil in their hearts.
    5: Refusal to acknowledge any of the above you makes you an easy target of opportunity.

    19 days and counting before Illinois joins the rest of the union with some sort of concealed carry law. The ice age cometh.

  4. The problem I (as a civilian firearms instructor for thirty years) have with programs like FFDO is the legal fiction involved. The theory is that anyone armed to protect an aircraft or a school should be a LEO.

    In reality, they aren’t. The only place FFDOs have any authority is the aircraft, they aren’t even allowed to carry out of the cockpit. They certainly aren’t expected to enforce any laws, or arrest anyone.

    Texas is following the same route, creating “school marshals.” Another bill would require 40 hours of training if teachers want to carry.

    Self-defense is not law enforcement. Airline pilots should be pilots, with necessary authority as the OIC of the aircraft. This gives them plenty of authority to carry a gun and defend the aircraft, without pretending they are cops.

    Note that I’m NOT saying police training is useless, just that most of it doesn’t pertain to self-defense.

  5. The NRA Wimps Out on Armed School Defense

    Posted on May 20, 2013 by Robert Farago

    The National Rifle Association’s National School Shield Task Force has released its post-Newtown report on school safety. It’s about as controversial as the move to put healthy food into school lunches. The Task Force’s findings—small schools have the worst safety, safety plans are often inadequate, School Resource Officers are a good thing, etc.—are hardly a revelation. Their six recommendations are equally unobjectionable. What is surprising is what the report doesn’t include. But first . . .

    In terms of “best practices,” the Task Force report is a tour de force. It highlights effective prevention techniques to guard against potential school shooters within the student population. It illustrates the importance of physical security—at great length and in considerable detail. It analyzes bus movements and transportation “vulnerabilities.”

    The Task Force report offers mission critical information for schools looking to improve their emergency response plans; including the provision of an Incident Command Center and the processes and equipment needed to assure communications during an active shooter incident. There’s even a bit on how to reunify students and parents in a crisis.

    The National School Shield Task Force report is comprehensive, with a plethora of helpful links. Anyone interested in school safety, anyone tasked with protecting children against an active shooter or shooters (including a terrorist attack), is well advised to eyeball the document.

    Strangely (politically?) the word “armed” doesn’t appear until page 92. This despite NRA Veep Wayne LaPierre’s post-Newtown call for an armed guard in every school in America. In fact, the Task Force takes a decidedly non-forceful approach to the topic of armed defenders inside schools.

    Our goal in the ensuing discussion is neither to advocate for nor against all or any of the possibilities in a specific case; rather, it is to provide a cogent analysis of some of the potential benefits as well as the accompanying risks to introducing armed personnel of various forms into schools. The ultimate decision regarding whether to introduce any form of armed security at a school must always be made by local stakeholders on the ground; nevertheless, it is the belief of the National School Shield Task Force that many schools across the country stand to benefit from the presence of armed security and,in the quest to make our schools safer, should leave no option off the table.

    So much for NRA “extremism.” Or, I’m afraid, efficacy. And maybe even credibility. Who was it that said “the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun”? Why that was NRA Vice President Wayne LaPierre, immediately after the Sandy Hook spree killing—at the same time he urged Uncle Sam to put an armed guard in every school in America.

    The NRA Task Force moots four types of armed school security personnel: School Resource Officers (SROs), private contracted security, armed citizen volunteers; and principles, teachers and other school staff. The Task Force is highly antagonistic to the two latter categories.

    Reading between the lines, Asa Hutchinson’s mob actively argue against armed “non-professionals” safeguarding schools. Here’s their caution against armed volunteers (similar to the warnings issued about armed school personnel):

    . . . because such an individual is neither an SRO nor a professional security contractor, an additional burden may be placed on a school or school district in ensuring that such an individual is highly trained to operate with a weapon in a school environment. It is absolutely imperative that schools consult with subject matter experts, local law enforcement, and other stakeholders in ensuring that any individual carrying a weapon on school property undergo a physical exam and preferably psychological testing, as well as extensive initial and in-service training throughout their service . . .

    [Schools] should seriously consider the legal and physical risk of having a weapon on school grounds and that even the most highly trained individuals are capable of negligent behavior with their weapons . . . A multitude of other choices-
    including but not limited to weapon choice, weapon security, weapon retention, ammunition choice, weapon ownership, and weapon storage–must be addressed by the school and qualified security and weapons experts.

    I profoundly disagree. Not only is the Task Force giving ammunition to those who believe that citizens shouldn’t be armed generally, they’re making it seem as if defending school children through force of arms requires spec ops training.

    As a graduate of SIG SAUER’s Active Shooter Instructors’ Training Course I recommend school-specific training for armed defenders. And a rifle. But TTAG’s active school shooter simulation proved that specialized training isn’t necessary to take out a spree killer. A .38 revolver did the trick in the hands of “rank amateur.”

    Erecting barriers to armed school personnel is counterproductive, to say the least. If more guns (in the hands of law-abiding adults) equals less crime on the streets, why doesn’t that formula apply in our schools? Which brings us to what’s missing from the equation: a call to remove barriers to arming members of the school community.

    For example, NRA’s National School Shield Task Force report says nothing about repealing the Gun-Free School Zones Act (GFSZA) of 1990. The Act makes it a federal offense to carry a firearm inside a school zone unless the gun owner has a carry permit (so much for Constitutional carry) and the school doesn’t ban firearms from its grounds and the surrounding area.

    Clock this text: “Nothing in this subsection shall be construed as preempting or preventing a State or local government from enacting a statute establishing gun free school zones as provided in this subsection.” In other words, the GFSZA surrenders Americans’ Constitutional right to keep and bear arms at the school gate.

    In many states, teachers, administrators and school staff members who want to carry a firearm to defend their lives and the lives of their charges can’t do so legally. The GFSZA also reaffirms local and/or state prohibitions against parents (a group completely ignored in the Task Force report) carrying a firearm in the school parking lot, never mind onto school grounds.

    Clearly, the NRA Task Force decided to take a non-controversial, relatively “gun-free” approach to school security. In so doing, they may have gained supporters amongst school communities antagonistic to gun rights guaranteed by the Second Amendment. Let’s hope so, because that’s the only reasonable excuse for failing to fully confront the question of civilian armed defense within our schools.

  7. The bottom line we cannot protect kids in schools without posting school officers, armed security, volunteer retired police… in every single school and allow at least the school administrators to be armed as well with passage of proper firearms training.

    Gun free zones = easy place for crazies to go to kill/harm innocents people.

  8. People who are legal to carry, should be carrying everywhere they go.

    Not just in schools and airplanes.

    Gun free zones should be by personal choice. You don’t want to carry, don’t.

  9. Glad to hear the idea is propagating, and Louisiana also has SROs attached to the high schools.

  10. I am sure most communities could arrange a person to walk around school grounds couple days a month. Get +20 people and you could have someone there every day.

  11. LarryArnold Says:
    May 20th, 2013

    [….]..”Note that I’m NOT saying police training is useless, just that most of it doesn’t pertain to self-defense.”

    I agree with LarryArnold. Self defense, while it does have a legal definition, has nothing to do with law enforcement. In a life or death situation, what the law allows is the farthest thing from the defenders mind. I would confidently say that any law enforcement officer will agree.

    Yet legal realities are created by the parties in charge, ie: unions, be they state or federal, teachers or law enforcement. If it is allowed that simply anyone who is legally permitted by law to possess firearms to carry in a school, then it becomes and issue for the LEO and teacher unions with a vested interest in expanding their reach through membership and dues. (Follow the money) Law suits will follow. The implication is that to do so would require a non-LEO person to be as well if not better trained than those tasked with enforcing law. Anything less than that is unacceptable. That is the reason why, in my own view, unions and legislators want the legal justification to stop a threat but also the release from liability that being government sanctioned brings with it if something goes wrong. However, millions of people a year successfully defend themselves and loved ones using a firearm that have never seen the inside of a training academy. I don’t think you need “specialized intensive” training to defend against an attack.

    All of the above is only my opinion.

  13. Totally agree with Paul (reply above) the administration wants as much violence as will occur in order to shore up their distorted agenda to disarm America.

    Any reasonable answers to gaining control of violent, evil intent – which is sure to rise up again – will be ignored. The number one goal is to take away the arms of law-abiding American citizens.

    Question is – are we going to allow it to happen?

  14. Mas,
    could you explain what you mean when refering to the FFDO program as “hugely successful”?

    It’s been my understanding that the .gov was so against this program, that there are virtually no armed pilots, due to the asinine qualifying requirements. The whole program comes across as a joke, due to the deliberate actions of those managing it. I want armed pilots. I would prefer the rule being that an aircraft doesn’t roll without at least one armed person in the cockpit.

    Same for schools. I want a minimum number of armed teachers/staff, and for the school day to be canceled if they can’t meet it.

    “Gun free zones” should be abolished everywhere.

  16. Will, despite less than enthusiastic support from Washington, there are still a helluva lot of self-motivated FFDOs out there. We can’t prove a negative, but strong deterrent effect against hijackers can certainly be reasonably construed. Morale is high among the armed pilots. There has been no downside. Sounds like success to me.

  17. One problem i see with the school resource officers that is never discussed is that (one) they are sometimes plumb jobs given to those riding out to their retirement or borderline physical fit who stay invisable in their office.(two)far too many sro’s are always going to meetings ,conferences,award presentations,etc.and are not avaliable for actual campus duties.(three)some school Administrators treat sro’s as body guards and running errends and such.Armed staff would be more effective and discreet.

  18. I know this post is old, but I’ve been perusing your blog all day! Just a comment on SROs; My experience with them has been awful. Kids getting arrested at school is the only outcome I observed from their presence, but as Mas said, “you can’t prove a negative”. Getting into scuffles at lunch, vandalizing school property, drinking and smoking are all things that should be dealt with by parents and administrators in a reasonable way. I witnessed kids getting slapped in cuffs in front of their peers countless times for these activities. Seems totally inappropriate to me that those behaviors can’t be handled in some way other than giving a reckless, hormone ridden child a criminal record and fines to pay.