Sadness....Uvalde teacher speaks

If the gunman has free rein to walk around as he pleases because the police aren’t doing their jobs, does it really matter how the kids are grouped?

We’re told to group them out of sight of the door/window and there’s often only one spot in the classroom that meets that requirement. Once the gunman is inside the room, not much you can do.

The guns are the problem. There is nothing schools or teachers can do that will be consistently effective against a guy with an AR-15 and body armor who has nothing to lose. It seems there’s nothing even the police can do. The guns are the problem.

I just can't wrap my head around this senseless violence against children. That teacher will never be the same in so many ways. Wishing them a full recovery from their physical injuries and a really good Dr to help them with the mental part.

When I was working part time retail, our training for a hostile intruder was everyone hide in different spots, no one be together, because it upped our chances of survival.

We have active shooter training this fall. I'm curious as to any changes we may have. I think I'd rather have smoke bombs or something to distract a shooter rather than just throwing books. I think some of the things we are asked to do are somewhat done to make us feel better and not as helpless. I feel like my only protection is being on the second floor. So sad.

So sad. It is just so sad. There is so much that could be done to help prevent these situations. Keep doing what you can think of...I emailed my congress people. I vote. I pray. I cry.

I was thinking just this when I subbed recently in the 1st grade class that's the very first one after the front door. And yesterday in pre-K, which is on the 1st floor but down the hall and around the corner from the 1st grade hallway, the other teacher and I spent some time discussing what could be moved in front of the door to slow down a shooter. She said she'd already planned on pushing a heavy wooden storage unit in front of the door, while the other teacher corralled the kids between the cubbies and the wall. Yes, all in a bunch because how do you tell pre-k kids to hide alone or even with one other kid?  

It's absolutely horrible that we are having these conversations.   

We had a company come into our business to do an active shooter training.  When the shooter saw you hiding, he just said, Bang.  He left a gun shell by you.  You knew you were dead.  The people on the top floor decided to make a run for it and they found a second active shooter outside waiting for them all.  

My boss and I decided to roll her giant wooden table to the door.  The guy did try to get in, but left for easier targets.  When it was finished, my boss said she was impressed that I thought to put that honking piece in front of her door.  I told her it was the first thing I thought about that table when I went in for the interview 2 years prior.  Coming from the classroom, I tend to find the exit or safest place to hide if I am in place long enough.

When I taught in a small private school in MI, we had to do active shooter drills. We were lucky enough to have a bathroom in each classroom ( which meant kids weren’t constantly in the halls) which we were supposed to hide in during a shooting.
In reality though, I told the class I would simply open the back door and they should hide in the woodlands behind the school. I never let my 4th graders take their shoes off in the classroom for this reason.
Now I live in Japan where no one carries guns, so the kids only do earthquake drills.

The drill where we hid anywhere in the building and some ran outside was for a business and not at a school.  The guys had real rifles and hearing them outside the door and hearing Bang! and knowing a shotgun shell was left by your teammate was a lot scarier than I thought it would be.  

There were a few who opted out.  It was just too stressful for them.  We were just supposed to go about our afternoon and know that at some point we'd here something that told us to get out or hire.  I felt like I was in a good place for the drill, and I knew that no one was getting inside the locked room with the huge table in front of it.  I actually feel way more exposed in schools.  Very few places to hide if you have even one other kiddo with you.

It comes down to accepting the fact that the people who run our country have decided that no number of dead children and adults is worth angering a minority that wants the right to any weapon, any time, any place.

If your school comes under attack, survival will come down to sheer luck. Where does the shooting start? Are you in the bathroom at the time, or locked in a room during your prep hour? Or are you out on campus supervising lunch or recess? Will you hear it in time to evacuate, or will you be surprised by being one of the first victims.

You'll die, or you won't. Your kids will die, or they won't. The rest of America will say "oh, so sad, thoughts and prayers, we must do something to stop this." And then the people who run the place will pretend to care for a little while and everyone will move on. The usual suspects will be blamed - the video games, fatherless homes, doors, lack of doors, not enough guns on school campuses, too many guns on school campuses.

And in the end, you will either be dead and your family will be left to mourn your loss or you will live with the trauma.

Because this is how America has chosen to be.

At any time, the people keeping changes to the laws could be removed from office. But they won't, because the people who vote for them like what they do.

Your life as a child or as a school employee means nothing to anyone outside of your own family and friends. Sandy Hook showed us that 26 wasn't a high enough number to make any changes.

Maybe if you really want change, you should start arming the LGBTQ community, the Muslims, POC, the migrant caravan. But taking guns away from the type of people who do these mass shootings is off the table.

I have to say that I am glad we don't put the kids through them.  It was challenging enough to do it as an adult that was only responsible for myself.  

Our drills consisted of a morning class explaining the mind of most killers, the guns they use, how to get them off the person and how the afternoon experience would go.  We met the "gunman" and he told us exactly how it would go down with him saying bang.  After the drill, we all got back together (about 100 of us), and people shared what they learned and it really was beneficial.  I just cannot fathom doing this with kids though (never heard of kids doing these kinds of drills).