Wanted: Experienced Teachers (with good shooting skills)

 

   This past week, the tiny little North Texas town of Harrold made it into not only the local news but the national news.  Harrold is a “blink and you’ll miss it” bump in the road about 30 miles northwest of Wichita Falls.  The town itself (ABOVE) has maybe 100 people that live in the actual town limits.  It has a truck stop, a grain elevator, and an old school. That’s it.  The school, according to news reports, has about 110 kids total from grades K-12 that all attend the one campus in town.  This is one of those tiny schools where each graduating class has about 8 or 9 kids total.

  Harrold Independent School District’s Superintendent has decided that his school district, which lies adjacent to major highway 287, is in danger due to the fact that according to him, the county sheriff’s office is “30 minutes away”.  With no readily available law enforcement, the kids and staff are in danger in case of an armed intruder entering the school, and the slow response time from the nearest sheriff’s deputies.  I used to live in this area for years and in-fact I used to drive past this tiny school every day when I worked in Wichita Falls.  This town is located 14 miles from Vernon, Texas where the Sheriff’s office is located. It is also located only 6 miles from the nearby town of Electra, Texas which has it’s own police force. It is also, as I indicated, right on major highway 287 which is heavily patrolled by the Texas Department of Public Safety. (State Troopers)  The Superintendent would like the state and nation to think that his district is smack out in the middle of nowhere where if an attack were to occur at his school, it would be at least a half hour before any help would arrive. This is NOT the case.  Electra’s police could respond to an emergency in less than 5 minutes. The Sheriff’s office, driving full speed, could be there in 10 minutes. It’s not ideal, but it’s far from being “in the middle of nowhere”.

So, why the fuss?

The Harrold ISD is going to be the first school district in the US to allow teachers and staff to actually carry concealed handguns while working at school. Teachers packing heat!  The Superintendent proposes that any staff member who obtains the necessary license to carry a concealed weapon will be allowed to actually carry that weapon while working during the school day. Teachers that are “packing” will not be identified to the children, must pass a course in crisis management and hostile situations, and have to use ammunition that minimizes the risk of ricochets if the gun is fired in the building,

Texas law outlaws handguns on any school property, UNLESS, the district authorizes the carrying of such weapons.

So, students of Harrold ISD, you better do exactly as the teachers tell you this next school year. A teacher yelling at you to “sit down and shut up and don’t make me come back there!!!”…..takes on an all new meaning if the teacher is packing heat.  The district’s test scores should go up quite dramatically as there is no better motivating tool than a kid knowing the Math Teacher, once a mild-mannered little old lady, is now a squinting Dirty Harry wannabe mumbling …….”I know what yer thinkin……did I fire 6 shots or only 5…….well being as how this is the .44 magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world and could blow yer head clean off….ya gotta ask yourself a question…….do I feel lucky?……well……do ya punK?”

Marge Huggins: Math Teacher