While schools in Arizona are adding armed posses and schools in Connecticut are arming janitors, a Minnesota school has turned to bulletproof whiteboards as its last ditch defense against attackers. Two students died in a shooting in the Rocori School District in 2003 so the school has purchased 18-by-20-inch whiteboards that can be used by teachers for instruction or bullet protection.
Maryland-based Hardwire LLC is tapping into the near hysteria over school shootings, even though such shootings remains incredibly rare.
The boards are $109 a pop as opposed to normal white boards that cost as little as $23.
I must confess some skepticism on the practicality of a shield for a teacher. First, it appears to protect only one person and only from a frontal attack. The teacher would have to lose use of one hand and arm in managing children. The teacher would also have to find the board in the chaos of a shooting. The teacher would then be protected while the kids behind him or her would be exposed. The magic board strikes me as more of a psychological than practice protection for these reasons.
What do you think?
Source: USA Today
Tony C. 1, April 30, 2013 at 10:19 am
Dredd: Kids are more likely to die in vehicle accidents going to or from school, or by disease of some sort, than they are by school shootings.
Perhaps …
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Death among children and adolescents
And:
(National Center For Child Death Review).
My comparison is valid. If you think having 30 or 40 armed people who are trained to teach (or worse, nuts that Sheriff Arpiao dredged up) is a good thing you have not been in a school recently. I also would guess that you have never imagined what a free-fire exercise would look like in a school or how the cops would react when entering a building with a known shooter & 40 armed, semi (if at all) trained people with guns.
Cops carry guns & get a lot of training yet they end up getting shot, shooting the wrong person or misusing their guns. Imagine that times 13000 schools
dkenner, aren’t you just engaging in simply more lecturing in your weak attempt to end the lecturing?
“Lecturing” is feature of this blog, not a bug. But I digress…
The comparison was apt, as both statements, whether bomb or gun, speak to an untreated state of HIggledy-Piggledy of the mind. One is just further advanced in its destructive power. At the root of both lay fear unrecognized.
If the good guy with a bomb isn’t worth debating, arming with anything else isn’t worth debating either.
In response to Roger’s “good man with a gun” theory, Frankly wrote: “Roger, if only there had been a good guy with a bomb in Boston because we all know the only way to stop a bad guy with a bomb is with a good guy with a bomb.”
Uh, no. There may be many good reasons not to have armed protectors in schools, but the “good man with a gun” scenario is worth debating, even if we reject it. In no way is it parallel to “a good man with a bomb.” That is a very stupid comparison, which you then follow up with an appeal to rational discussion.
Pro tip: don’t lecture others on rational discussion if your own comparisons are inane.
Dredd: Kids are more likely to die in vehicle accidents going to or from school, or by disease of some sort, than they are by school shootings.
Perhaps, and we have legislated to reduce kids (and adults) dying in vehicle accidents, and we have worked in medicine to reduce kids dying by disease, and required vaccinations for the worst of those among kids.
I think this type of comparison is nearly meaningless, and shallow and callous in the bargain. A child is also more likely to die in a vehicular accident than they are likely to die of cancer (2 to 3 times more likely); that does not imply we should abandon all research into the detection, prevention, and treatment of childhood cancer.
“A > B” is not a helpful observation when we are trying to minimize “A+B”, and focusing on A instead of B can thwart progress if A is intractable, or we are already doing all we can for A, but there is still some opportunity to reduce B.
Wouldn’t it make more sense to have a bulletproof lock and door on the classroom? Bulletproof or not, a bullet can strike that whiteboard with enough momentum to knock the teacher over, or at least knock it out of their grip and leave them exposed. A bullet will hit with about the momentum of a hard swung baseball bat; it will be damn hard to hang onto that board.
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/04/02/nra-backed-group-unveils-plan-for-guns-in-schools/ The father of one of the kids that was killed at the school approves of the boards. The boards strike me as being rather benign when compared with arming the teachers.
Lets see, teachers stand up in the front of the room…. Might just have to purchase them full riot gear, with Kevlar Vests…… As the chances of a bullet hitting them before the whiteboard is better than shooting fish in a barrel….
bettykath, Thread winner!!!
RogerJ is correct. There is only one thing worse than no security, and that is a false sense of security. I was teaching after Columbine. The high school where I was working hastily put into place an ID badge system for all people in the building. The problem was these badges were EASILY counterfeited. I pointed this out to the dull/normal principal and she scowled and ignored it.
Ridiculous.
“Duck and cover” didn’t cost the school district a lot of money and was just effective.
This item is beyond silly, but there is an entrepreneur for every occasion. I mentioned this here before, but both the FBI and Secret Service came out with extensively researched white papers on school shootings after the Columbine incident. At that time my youngest was still in High School, so I approached the Principal to discuss the papers and other security issues with him. He knows of my decades of experience in the area of security and forensics, so it was not as if he thought I was just another concerned parent.
He was unaware of the documents. I told him I would be happy to conduct some in-service seminars for the school staff and administration. He made some polite small talk, but I never heard from him about taking me up on my offer. He expressed no interest in obtaining copies of the FBI and Secret Service white papers either.
I then went over to the School Board offices and talked to the (then) Superintendent of the school district. Same thing.
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2013/04/22/education/school-district-gets-bulletproof-whiteboards
“The teacher would then be protected while the kids behind him or her would be exposed. The magic board strikes me as more of a psychological than practice protection for these reasons.
What do you think?”
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The comments tend to agree with you JT and I do too.
This may also instill an inflated sense of fear in kids because of a scenario where, as you pointed out, school shootings are rare.
Kids are more likely to die in vehicle accidents going to or from school, or by disease of some sort, than they are by school shootings.
False sense of security… False promises …. More wasted money…are they a contractor for Halliburton …..
If the teachers feel more comfortable with these whiteboards, they can have them. The whiteboards strike me as a much better expenditure than the GUNS that the NRA wants to bring into the schools.
Sounds like a way for somebody to make a lot of money for a lot of nothing.
Roger, if only there had been a good guy with a bomb in Boston because we all know the only way to stop a bad guy with a bomb is with a good guy with a bomb.
Now, with the stupid bumper sticker thinking out of the way, maybe we can have a rational discussion of the topic. This is like so much of the ‘security’ we have seen instituted since the insanity set in after 9/11. It seems like they are doing something even thought it is obvious they are not doing anything useful – window dressing. Some morons actually bought “bomb detectors” that were nothing more than divining rods. Even educated people can be stupid about things they have not been trained in.
I agree. This is window dressing, intended to convey a (false) sense of security. The NRA was widely derided for the comment “it takes a good guy with a gun to stop a bad guy with a gun” yet there is truth in this platitude. Just ask the Israelis, who post armed parents and teachers in their schools. My fear is that now the terrorists have seen how our society reacts to a massacre of schoolchildren by a deranged man, the next massacre will be an act of jihad, like Beslan. We had better be ready.