[url=http://www.toledoblade.com/Education/2013/01/10/Montpelier-school-board-approves-carrying-of-handguns-by-custodial-staff.html]Paranoia never leads to good ideas, does it?[/url]
[quote] The Montpelier Exempted Village Schools Board of Education has approved the carrying of handguns by its custodial staff.
The 5-0 vote of the board Wednesday night to allow handgun training for four custodians to be able to tote weapons at the K-12 campus at the Williams County school came after last month's deadly shooting rampage at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut.
School officials say that having armed personnel - believed to be the first for any school system in Ohio - is designed to thwart incidents of violence and prevent what happened in Newtown, Conn., from occurring here.
"Sitting back and doing nothing and hoping it doesn't happen to you is just not good policy anymore. There is a need for schools to beef up their security measures," Superintendent Jamie Grime told The Blade today. "Having guns in the hands of the right people are not a hindrance. They are a means to protect." [/quote]
Well, at least this isn't as bad of an idea as [url=http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/18/sandy-hook-solutions-megan-mcardle_n_2324045.html]throwing kids at[/url] school shooters. At least this idea sounds solid on the surface. Then you realize that Virginia Tech had a police department, Columbine High School had 2 armed officers (who fought with the shooters before they entered the school, even), and that Fort Hood is a military base. All of these places had mass shootings, and there's absolutely no evidence to suggest that arming school staff will stop these tragedies. And when we're making policies, evidence should trump gut feelings every day.
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I don't feel like custodians are the best people to be arming.