District Puts AR-15s in Schools

North Carolina sheriff cites Uvalde shooting delays for new policy
By Bob Cronin,  Newser Staff
Posted Aug 6, 2022 1:30 PM CDT
Citing Uvalde Delay, Sheriff Puts an AR-15 in Every School
AR-15-style rifles are displayed in June at Burbank Ammo & Guns in Burbank, Calif.   (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File)

A North Carolina sheriff said he's taking a lesson from the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. "Those officers were in that building for so long, and that suspect was able to infiltrate that building and injure and kill so many kids," Madison County Sheriff Buddy Harwood said. To make sure his deputies can act quickly in a similar situation, Harwood is installing an AR-15 in every public school in the county, the Hill reports. "I do not want to have to run back out to the car to grab an AR, because that's time lost," he said.

The weapons will be locked in safes, Harwood said, adding: "We've also got breaching tools to go into those safes. We've got extra magazines with ammo in those safes." Districts elsewhere are considering giving guns to teachers, per Axios. Ohio has approved letting school employees carry guns on campus with less than 24 hours' training, a policy opposed by teachers unions and police groups, among others, per the New York Times. School resource officers, by comparison, are required to undergo much more weapons training.

Some gun safety experts dislike putting weapons at the ready. There hasn't been much research into the issue yet, but what there is doesn't indicate that arming school employees helps. "Where there are more guns, there is more gun violence," Allison Anderman of the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence told USA Today. "We need to make it much harder for people who are intent on doing harm and committing violence to access guns in the first place," she said. The sheriff said he thinks keeping guns in schools is necessary but hates that the nation has come to this point. He can't just "say it won’t happen in Madison County," Harwood said. (More school shootings stories.)

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