Dear Knights,

Kids have emotions and opinions too, but most of the time that’s blocked out from the media and news articles because people believe we have no say or we just don’t understand the topic well enough to have an stance.

There are articles and news stories all about guns in schools and school shootings, but in those articles, there is rarely a quote from a student or anything about how the students feel about guns present in school. To me, a student perspective is the most important. We’re the ones who are the most affected by having guns in schools.

Many decisions in school districts are made without student consent, but having guns in schools has more effect on the students’ lives than changing the bell schedule or eliminating the cookie corner.

I feel more unsafe even thinking about armed weapons in my classrooms.

Schools in the southern region started allowing teachers to possess guns to protect themselves from any intruders. How can we trust these teachers though? We have first handedly seen teachers who disrupt the classroom and then get fired. And as a student, we barely know our teachers. We know them as Mrs. or Mr. “Smith,” which makes me more reluctant to trust them with a gun. Have they had gun training? Do they know how to properly hold and shoot a gun? What scares me the most is that a teacher would feel safer to have a loaded gun in the classroom and shoot someone to protect the students instead of having a better security system.

I believe that if there is a strict security system in the school, loaded guns should not be present. Let’s not take the chance of having a school shooting and have someone dying.

If guns in the classroom start becoming the norm, then teachers, principals, and the school districts need to take a step back and rethink their actions before an innocent person dies.

Sincerely,

Siena