Teachers Packing Heat

[Guest]

Overheard two longterm teachers talking about this yesterday.

"If I'd been carrying a gun all these years, I'd have used it by now."

We need fewer guns in schools. Period.

Metal detectors? More police presence? Better security measures?

 

[R. Richard]

We need fewer guns in schools. Period.

Metal detectors? More police presence? Better security measures?

Speaking from my own experience, your ideas would not work.

As they had a mandatory pat down for weapons, I used to come in to school other than via the front door. The scumbags they assigned to school duty were old, fat incompetents who had retired, but still drew a regular paycheck. If there was trouble, they made damn sure that the trouble was over before they responded. One reason why the old, fat scumbags failed and refused to provide any meaningful security was the problem of coming and going to and from school. If they leaned on the gangbangers, they would get beat up on their way in or out and their weapon stolen.

The schools I attended were a not very good joke. They specialized in memorizing useless information. The "students" realized that they were being warehoused to be dumped into the street so that they could provide low cost labor for such as MickeyDs. The only options they were offered were more exercises in memorization.

One place that was safe and secure in the schools I attended was the neighborhood of Whi' Boy. If you stepped out of line around Whi' Boy, you didn't get detention or counselling, or even jail. You got a Bowie knife in the gut or a .357 round in the head. Whi' Boy be bad; don't be steppin' out a line aroun' Whi' Boy.

 

[Guest]

Speaking from my own experience, your ideas would not work.

As they had a mandatory pat down for weapons, I used to come in to school other than via the front door. The scumbags they assigned to school duty were old, fat incompetents who had retired, but still drew a regular paycheck. If there was trouble, they made damn sure that the trouble was over before they responded. One reason why the old, fat scumbags failed and refused to provide any meaningful security was the problem of coming and going to and from school. If they leaned on the gangbangers, they would get beat up on their way in or out and their weapon stolen.

The schools I attended were a not very good joke. They specialized in memorizing useless information. The "students" realized that they were being warehoused to be dumped into the street so that they could provide low cost labor for such as MickeyDs. The only options they were offered were more exercises in memorization.

One place that was safe and secure in the schools I attended was the neighborhood of Whi' Boy. If you stepped out of line around Whi' Boy, you didn't get detention or counselling, or even jail. You got a Bowie knife in the gut or a .357 round in the head. Whi' Boy be bad; don't be steppin' out a line aroun' Whi' Boy.

Richard, your experience is not universal. And your hatred for public schooling is well-known.

At many schools these days, however, this is the norm.

All doors are locked except the main entrance. Students may leave from any door, but may only enter using the main.

Cameras monitor each door and every hallway. The main offices contain viewing screens and are accessible to administrators and security personnel.

Students are allowed into the building ten minutes before school begins.

Students must be off the campus ten minutes after school is over.

There is a full-time Spanish translation staff member on duty every day.

Students are not allowed to bring cell phones, iPod, etc. into the school. It attracts thieves.

Students are not allowed to carry backpacks into classrooms - those must remain in their lockers.

There are police on duty in the building all day every single day.

There are unannounced locker checks, which include the use of dogs to check for drugs.

There is a no tolerance policy for weapons. Students are expelled.

The dress code is strict. No chains, bandanas, scarves, hats, anything that could remotely be considered gang-related is monitored (depending on the latest "gang" symbols - specific shoelaces, pants rolled up on one side, etc.) No pants sagging. No tank tops.

We work with a gang task force that gives us updates of the latest gang activity.

I can recognize the gang symbols around town - ESL, for example - by their graffiti. We're a drug hub, straight up the highway from Mexico to Wichita and then over our direction.

The school is located in a high crime area. But we fight hard to keep the school as safe as possible.

Oh - this is a middle school, by the way.

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

Richard, your experience is not universal. And your hatred for public schooling is well-known.

At many schools these days, however, this is the norm.

All doors are locked except the main entrance. Students may leave from any door, but may only enter using the main.

Cameras monitor each door and every hallway. The main offices contain viewing screens and are accessible to administrators and security personnel.

Students are allowed into the building ten minutes before school begins.

Students must be off the campus ten minutes after school is over.

There is a full-time Spanish translation staff member on duty every day.

Students are not allowed to bring cell phones, iPod, etc. into the school. It attracts thieves.

Students are not allowed to carry backpacks into classrooms - those must remain in their lockers.

There are police on duty in the building all day every single day.

There are unannounced locker checks, which include the use of dogs to check for drugs.

There is a no tolerance policy for weapons. Students are expelled.

The dress code is strict. No chains, bandanas, scarves, hats, anything that could remotely be considered gang-related is monitored (depending on the latest "gang" symbols - specific shoelaces, pants rolled up on one side, etc.) No pants sagging. No tank tops.

We work with a gang task force that gives us updates of the latest gang activity.

I can recognize the gang symbols around town - ESL, for example - by their graffiti. We're a drug hub, straight up the highway from Mexico to Wichita and then over our direction.

The school is located in a high crime area. But we fight hard to keep the school as safe as possible.

Oh - this is a middle school, by the way.

It's so much different now than when I was in middle school. 10 year olds carry hand guns. But as you say they are confiscated at the door and the students expelled.

Unfortunately, the latest wrinkle - Thet leave school after class, get their guns and roam the neighborhood.

Teachers packing weapons won't do anything but cause more problems.

 

[R. Richard]

Richard, your experience is not universal. And your hatred for public schooling is well-known.

If my experience were universal, most of you would not have survived.

At many schools these days, however, this is the norm.

All doors are locked except the main entrance. Students may leave from any door, but may only enter using the main.

Right! And students leaving are not permitted to allow other students in as the leaving students exit. In your dreams!

Cameras monitor each door and every hallway. The main offices contain viewing screens and are accessible to administrators and security personnel.

Without knowing a single fact about the situation I would assume that the cameras are largely unmonitored during critical times. The average school uses all security personnel to monitor students entering the school at the start of the school day. If you use administrators to monitor the screens, you very probably use a two person team. A security person forces an administrator to monitor the screens at the point of a gun. Adminstrators ALWAYS have much more important tasks than insuring the physical safety of students.

There is a full-time Spanish translation staff member on duty every day.

This made me laugh. When I went to school, the head of the foreign language department was a "Spanish teacher." The guy could not talk to the local Mexican people because the "teacher" could only speak "Castillian Spanish." Yeah, right.

Students are not allowed to bring cell phones, iPod, etc. into the school. It attracts thieves.

Let me guess. Teachers are not subjected to the same restrictions. This last teaches the students a valuable lesson: "All of us are equal, but some of us are more equal than others."

Students are not allowed to carry backpacks into classrooms - those must remain in their lockers.

A good move. It assures the faculty that things like RPGs are not in the hands of students during classes.

There are police on duty in the building all day every single day.

Let me just ask you a couple of simple question. At Manual Arts High School, the principal drug dealers were "teachers." Do the scumbags at your school also exercise authority over the "teachers?" Does the presence of fat, lazy, incompetent scumbags in your school instill respect for the police among the students?

There are unannounced locker checks, which include the use of dogs to check for drugs.

BINGO! You have a number of English teachers holding paid positions at your school. Said English teachers are deemed capable of evaluating student essays to the level of one of 13 grades [F+ and F- are almost never given.] From your statement, above, it would appear that you think that dogs are smarter than your English teachers, in that a dog can tell if a student is using drugs, but the English teach cannot. I concur that the English teacher are very probably incompetent [based upon my own experience.] However, it would seem easier to hire competent English teachers, rather than evaluate the talent of four footed animals.

There is a no tolerance policy for weapons. Students are expelled.

I used to wear a zipped up jacket to school every day; hot weather, cold weather, rain, shine. No one wanted to know what I had inside my zipped up jacket. The last was because of some very nasty rumors about what had become of those who did find out. Expelled? You mean they couldn't force me to memorize crap? I could sleep all day and steal books from the public library at night to LEARN? [I always returned the books. After a time the librarian left me a reading list based upon the books I was borrowing.] There was no damn way the scumbags were going to see me expelled where they would have to deal with me in the street!

The dress code is strict. No chains, bandanas, scarves, hats, anything that could remotely be considered gang-related is monitored (depending on the latest "gang" symbols - specific shoelaces, pants rolled up on one side, etc.) No pants sagging. No tank tops.

I don't give a damn what your rules are, NOBODY forces me to wear a dress!

We work with a gang task force that gives us updates of the latest gang activity.

I can recognize the gang symbols around town - ESL, for example - by their graffiti. We're a drug hub, straight up the highway from Mexico to Wichita and then over our direction.

The school is located in a high crime area. But we fight hard to keep the school as safe as possible.

Oh - this is a middle school, by the way.

Let me guess. The Gang Task Force (GTF) has cushy offices, probably not in a local school [Me deal with punks face to face; no way!] The GYF "counsels" local teenagers to walk the straight and narrow ["Why do you pay that fat, stupid, ugly, incompetent bitch to harrass me when I have to come here for free?" "I am not gonna' answer your smartass remarks." "Would it help if I used shorter, simpler words?]

The GTF, of course, has snitches who tell them the latest gang info. Right! And the bad boys are not smart enough to "prep" the snitches before a GTF interview?

The only sane, reasonable scumbag/school administrator suggestion I was ever aware of toward keeping the school and surrounding areas safe was made by my nemisis, "Detective Seargent Halloran." Halloran suggested, "The best thing we could do to improve the security of the area around Manual Arts High School would be to pay White Boy to relocate to someplace far away" [Halloran's suggestion was not accepted.]

 

[Guest]

Jesus. I'm not going to even attempt to discuss this further because you vehemently attack the facts based strictly upon your own warped experiences.

You do possess a great deal of misinformation about my situation, however.

A couple of Zoloft could help you with your anger issues, Richard.

 

[R. Richard]

Jesus. I'm not going to even attempt to discuss this further because you vehemently attack the facts based strictly upon your own warped experiences.

My experiences are fact. Thus, you accuse me of using facts to attacks the facts.

JesusYou do possess a great deal of misinformation about my situation, however.

A couple of Zoloft could help you with your anger issues, Richard.

I don't claim to understand your situation. I do, from personal experience, understand the situation in the public schools. By the way, I also know why the public schools fail and I have developed and tested a method to solve the problem, so I am not just a tourist passing by.

I don't and never have attempted to use drugs to alter my perception of the world. Instead, I used hardware and training to deal with reality.

 

[SeaCat]

Schools are schools are schools, and each one is different.

I started out in school in a tiny little town in Upstate New York. I went through elementary school in a place called Verona. (Which no longer exists.) I went to my Freshman year in High School in a school called Vernon, Verona, Sherril High School. (Better known as V.V.S.)

From sixth grade on through nineth grade I routinely walked a trapline both to and from these schools. I dragged a sled loaded with traps and critters. (These were locked in a shed during school hours.) I routinely carried a hatchet, a belt knife and a rifle. I would walk into the school carrying these and store them in the Principles office with no problems.

Then I moved to the Cape. Now I went to school with a mixed bag. Some of the kids there were fishers. They worked on fishing boats or in associated areas. Some of them were the kids of the rich. The so called poor, the working class normally had at least a pocket knife on them. Many of us had things like flensing or filet knives in our lockers or our cars. We needed them for our jobs after work. Many of the rich carried other weapons. They needed them because Mommy and Daddy said they needed them to protect them from the Riff Raff. (Most of the troubles with weapons in the school were caused either by the rich kids, or by the friends of the rich kids coming down from Boston.)

We had no police in our schools. The staff took care of the problems as they arose. Yes the police were only a phone call away, and yes they were occasionally called but only after the problem was solved.

I graduated in 1984.

I know the situation has changed. A couple of years ago I drove past my old High School and didn't recognise it. It now looks like a fortress or a prison. It is almost three times the size it used to be, and now has two restaraunts as well as a police substation in it. I could see the external cameras arrayed around it. I don't know if I would want to go there now.

Cat