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Are our schools prepared?

Posted by: tdt -

By TAMMI KATE LEDFORD

The horrific events at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, have many Texans questioning the safety of the schools in their own community.  Many Americans are asking how such a traumatic ordeal could have been avoided. Many Texans believe that armed faculty members will make the schools safer, and the House of Representatives will review legislation in the Lone Star State to allow designated teachers to be armed.
The proposed Protection of Texas Children Act (PTCA) would allow schools to designate members of their faculty as “school marshals”. The PTCA would appoint one armed individual for every 400 students enrolled in each school.  In addition the Act explained that the marshals could “use lethal force upon the occurrence of an attack in the classroom or elsewhere on campus.” These designated individuals would be existing faculty members with concealed handgun licenses, who would provide their own firearms and undergo additional firearms training including added safety measures. The bill states that only the principal, members of law enforcement, and district administrators would know the identity of the school marshals. The appointment of school marshals would work much like air marshals on commercial aircraft.

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