(By Amanda Mayes, Huff Post, 30 May 2022)
This group of students was still new to me, but I adored
them. Sure, they had their moments when they would rather be sucked into a
phone screen than discuss the ramifications of gerrymandering, the intricacies
of supply and demand, or the Gilded Age.
But teenagers deserve more credit than we ever give them.
They are kind, intelligent, insightful and bold. I was
supposed to be their teacher, but I learned so much about myself and the world
from them. When they are of age to vote, they will ignite this world with
compassion. We do not deserve them, especially when we continuously fail to
protect them.
That day, I was running my first active shooter drill.
When I sat in these same desks and walked down these same
halls six years earlier, the only scenarios we rehearsed were for tornadoes,
fires, and asking a special someone to prom.
But this is the new normal. My students were restless. It
was a planned drill ― not always a given, as some drills are enacted without
warning. But the notice did little to calm nerves and suppress the reality that
we must rehearse for the possibility of our own deaths.
I reviewed my lesson plan, glared at the finicky overhead
projector, took a sip of coffee, and waited. No one knew when the principal’s
voice would come over the intercom, triggering the drill.
The drill came and went, and melted into the new normalcy of
a modern school day, with full knowledge that our paper-thin classroom walls
were no match for automatic weapons fire.
But this is not normal. This should not be normal.
We ask our teachers to do so much — to be educators, caregivers,
counselors, nurses, peacekeepers, custodians, disciplinarians. And now we ask
them to be human shields.
When I stumbled into teaching, it had not crossed my mind
that I would have to grapple with my own mortality and weigh the worth of my
life against those of my students, despite growing up in this era. I was in
third grade when Columbine stunned the world of education. I was in 11th grade
when the Virginia Tech shooting happened.
“Yes. Yes, of course I would,” I told the teenager who had
asked if I would protect my students.
I made the decision to sacrifice myself to save my students
should an active shooter enter my classroom. Part of teaching is believing in
the future and believing in a better future. My students must survive to make
that future a possibility.
But it is not a decision I should have to make.
With each new mass shooting, the arguments against
common-sense gun restrictions appear like clockwork:
“If we armed the teachers, this wouldn’t happen.”
I am an educator. A mentor. A helper. A guide. A light. I
will not be relegated to a role of perpetuating this American culture of
violence. I will not be complicit in the weaponization of myself and my fellow
teachers.
“This is the price we pay for our Second Amendment
freedoms.”
Why have many in this country decided that owning weapons
outweighs the safety and lives of our children and teachers? How many dead
students and dead teachers is your “freedom” worth to you? How high are you
willing to set the price to defend an amendment that has been outpaced by
technology? How is worrying about being shot at school or a movie theater or a
grocery store freedom? Your paranoia and misguided belief that “courage
is a man with a gun in his hand” has corrupted the original intent of
an antiquated amendment.
We accept reasonable limitations to our other rights. Why is
this such a struggle with the right to bear arms?
“Guns don’t kill people; people kill people.”
It is beyond time to limit access to tools used to kill more
efficiently. Why are you so terrified of your neighbor that you need an assault
rifle? Or feel the need to conceal and carry when you do your weekly grocery
shopping? This is a reflection of you — of your need for false power, of your
suspicions, of your cowardice — not a reflection of the society you purportedly
fear. An AR-15 or other military-grade weapon serves no purpose other than that
of destruction.
“This is an act of a mentally ill person.”
Stop equating mental illness as a requisite for murder.
Start supporting mental health care. Start normalizing discussion about mental
health. Start considering the mental health of those affected by gun violence.
“Now is not the time for politics. Now is the time to
send thoughts and prayers.”
Thoughts and prayers comfort those left behind. They also
assuage the consciences of those who plan to do nothing, who will continue to
support the status quo because it is comfortable, familiar, and politically expedient.
These days I occasionally teach political science as an
adjunct at a college. Every classroom I enter triggers the same process: Check
the door. Take note of how it locks. Plan how to cover the windows. Find
potential barricades. Make a plan. Rehearse.
This process is more difficult at a college because the
classroom is not mine. It is used by several faculty members throughout the
day. Desks arrangements may be reconfigured. The blinds may be opened or
closed. Keys may be misplaced. A first aid kit may have vanished to another
room.
Each time the classroom could be different, which
necessitates quickly generating a new plan. I have lost sleep running different
scenarios in my mind to be prepared for the next day.
Creating a plan in case of an active shooter is second
nature now. It is part of the process. Along with preparing my lecture notes
and stashing my best dry erase markers, I think of ways to save the lives of my
students.
This should not be normal.
Instead of asking teachers to take on the impossible, to
accept the reality that they could die doing their job, ask yourself: Who
would have to be gunned down in your life for you to act?
Yes. I will sacrifice my life for the lives of my students.
But do not let this become my reality the next time I teach. Do not let my life and the lives of my
students fade into statistics.
