This past week in the ‘if they only had a brain’ category Georgia’s Republican Lt. Governor Burt Jones introduced legislation that would reward teachers who undergo firearms training to get a permit to carry guns to school with a $10,000 dollar annual stipend, essentially paying teacher to make our schools more dangerous. While this knee-jerk reaction might seems like a solution to many, it crumbles under any sort of critical analysis. The problems are many:

1. Having guns in school increases the likelihood of accidents and unnecessary shootings. “The more guns you have in schools, the more accidents and death can happen,” says Melissa Cropper, president of the Ohio Federation of Teachers. The opportunities for accidents and the escalation of otherwise non-deadly situations will always vastly succeed the likelihood of legitimate self defense during a school shooting. Think of all the trigger-happy cops who shoot and kill people holding a marker that they mistake for a gun. Now apply that scenario to unruly high school students.
2. There is no guarantee that having a gun will prevent a school shooting.  Guns are an offensive weapon, not a defense one, and the advantage always goes to the aggressor. Armed guards were present at Columbine, it didn’t stop the shooting. Hundreds of armed officers arrived within minutes in El Paso, yet they retreated when they came under fire and were not able to stop the shooting. An armed officer was present at Parkland. He didn’t stop the shooting. To assume a poorly trained teacher would do any better is absurd.
3. Most bullets (90%+) fired durning a shootout miss their intended target, so gun toting teachers are more likely to hit a student by mistake than successfully disarm an attacker.
4. Guns + unstable people = bad news, and unstable people come from all walks of life. When police received a threat against a Jewish school in Ohio in March 2022, it turned out the wood-be attacker was the school’s own security guard.
5. Non fire-arm self defense is just as effective as having a gun. When mass shooting have been foiled, it is almost always by unarmed people. The Bear-Hug defense is almost as effective as a firearm. Someone cant shoot a rifle if they cant point it or move their arms.

Guns will never solve the problems that guns create. We certainly don’t need to be encouraging teachers to bring them to school.