How Safe Are College Campuses?
In reading the essay titled, “Guns Don’t Belong in the Hands of Administrators, Professors, or Students,” the author addresses the concern for safety on college campuses. The author Jesus M. Villahermosa Jr., who was a deputy sheriff for Pierce County Sheriff's Department for thirty-three years of dedicated service until he retired in 2014. Certifications include: being the first certified Master Defensive Tactics Instructor for law enforcement personnel in the state of Washington, serving as a Firearm's Instructor, and an Active Shooter Instructor. Villahermosa not only discusses important questions when considering the terms of firearms on campus, and in the hands of administration and faculty but offers his experience, while informing the reader, of the likeliness of more heightened danger due to inadequate training which could potentially lead to death and other repercussions for the person holding the firearm.
To illustrate his point, Villahermosa
…show more content…
Though some may disagree, it is evident with the uproar of different opinions of how arming our school campuses will greatly affect our society. How will teachers, parents, and the students feel about knowing there are weapons on campus, and what policy and procedures would be put into place to insure the gun handlers receive the proper training? That is to say, would it be possible to shoot and potentially kill an individual to save others, and in doing so, would the person be allowed to continue teaching while an ongoing investigation is proceeded? There are many avenues to explore when dealing with such an arduous, and controversial issue. Villahermosa’s essay gives the reader a lot to think about, yet the topic is alive and real in our society today. Where do you
School should be a place of peace and opportunity, but gaps in the system of gun control threatens the safety of faculty and students. School shootings have killed a total of 297 lives, young and old (Slate Magazine). Gun control has been a continuous nationwide debate for many years. It seems that no one wants to take a stance against guns unless they are personally affected. In order to take control of the matter and prevent more incidents from continuing schools need to change. To achieve a safe environment in schools need to educate faculty, safe and students, heighten security, and assess mental health issues.
While the debate and argument over the carry on campus law continues, more and more concerns are surfacing about the jeopardy it could put our nation in. Are students even mature enough for the handling of weapons? Students are not to be trusted with guns and college campus should stay a gun-free zone. Carrying a gun in general requires responsibility that people of a young age sometimes tend not to have. The handling a firearm and a lack of responsibility within a person can be a very dangerous situation. Judgement and maturity of such a young group are things to consider when thinking about the carry on campus law and a student’s capability to make smart choices when handling a weapon can’t be trusted.
Sitting through an hour-long lecture or waiting in line to speak with financial aid are some examples of an average day on campus. It is during these times when students are least expecting tragedy to strike. A student may hear a loud noise and think nothing of it until they realize that noise was the sound of a shooting rampage that has reached their area and by that time it’s usually too late. Campus safety is everyone’s responsibility and remaining on alert is the only way to ensure less people are victimized. One of the first, and most memorable, attacks happened on August 1, 1966. Charles Whitman, a former marine, took rifles and other weapons to the observation deck atop the Main Building tower at The University of Texas- Austin, then randomly opened fire on the surrounding campus and streets. Over the next 96 minutes, far longer than the average active shooter attack, he shot and killed fifteen people. Included in the death toll was one unborn child, and injured thirty-one others. The incident ended when police reached Whitman and shot him dead. During this event, civilians played a vital role in assisting first responders in the take down of Whitman and Allen Crum, a 40-year-old bookstore manager and retired Air Force tail gunner, accompanied police up the tower in pursuit of Whitman. While Crum was armed, it solely because officers handed him a firearm to assist in Whitman’s take down.
David Skorton and Glenn Altschuler wrote the essay “Do We Really Need More Guns on Campus.” This essay focus on the guns on campus controversy. There are two sides that the authors explain: the side in favor and the side against. Every side has points to think about it. For example, some reasons to be against the conceal are the fights, the lack of experience and the drug abuse. The side in favor has good reason too, as the importance to stop a mass shooting, the right to bear arms and the secure feeling that the gun give.
Dear Mortimer I am writing this paper to persuade you to rethink your position concerning the preemption of firearms regulation regarding college campuses. All over the world violence occurs when we least expect it. As the human race evolves, so does the technology we use. We have acquired the ability to kill a man without being in his general vicinity. With just the slight movement of my finger I can end someone’s life. One small confrontation could lead to a terrible travesty. In the United States alone, we have seen many shootings in educational buildings from the students themselves. When you put guns in the hands of students, you are asking for death. People may say it adds protection to people wearing guns, but what about the people without them? I strongly believe that if this bill is allowed to continue we be seeing a large number of shooting in buildings of education, which is unacceptable. One small miscommunication between two armed students could start a firefight.
Numerous studies have been conducted to determine if teachers should be in possession of a firearm while on school properties and if this will decrease the number and magnitude of school shootings. Many scholars believe equipping teachers with firearms will be costly and end up unnecessarily endangering more students, but many scholars claim that a teacher should be the last line of defense against a school shooter. The question this paper hopes to answer is how can equipping teachers who teach grades K-12 help to prevent school shootings in the United States. This paper will attempt to answer that question by examining the perspectives of school administration and law enforcement, the impact on student’s safety and education, the
A major issue in the United States is gun control. Due to multiple mass shootings in schools and public areas, restrictions regarding guns have been implemented across the United States. Andrew Parks, a student at The University of Alabama, wrote an article against gun restrictions. His article, “The University should allow concealed carry,” supports the idea of college campuses like The University of Alabama, allowing students to conceal carry firearms. In an article written by Jennie Kushner, the opinions of students on the University of Alabama’s Police Department’s gun policy are presented. The safety of student body relies on the students’ feeling safe. That safety comes from less gun control laws and policies on campus. Each of the articles stated provides information against gun control in different ways.
Concealed carry and college campuses are two major topics currently in the media, yet these two topics are rarely used in unison, until now. The topic of whether or not concealed carry should be allowed on college campuses is a now mainstream debate with multiple views and numerous differentiating opinions. Many of the general public question if campus police is capable enough to protect a university’s enormous student body? Another commonly discussed issue is if concealed handguns actually do deter crime, and if they are capable of aiding in stopping a mass shooting spree? Or if guns on campus, carried by fellow classmates would make students as a whole feel more cautious or on the opposing hand make students feel more secure with guns carried on campus? If guns are allowed on campus, how will this affect a growing student’s ideology? These questions and many more are highly spoken of in our social media based generation, the answers to these questions help to improve our knowledge on this debate of concealed carry on college campuses, which will lead us to form our own individual opinions on this debate topic based on the facts and evidence presented.
Last but not least, the author also makes an abundant use of appeals to the reader’s Pathos, appealing to the reader in a way that reaches them in a personal and emotional way. The author begins and ends this article with this same appeal, to draw the reader in, as well as to open them up to the information that the rest of the article provides and leave the reader thinking about it. He begins the article by mentioning some of the more infamous college campus shootings, such as those that occurred at Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois University, and then proceeds to make his case against concealed firearms on college campuses. This viewpoint is prominently displayed in the third section of the article, in which the author writes about how students who go on these shooting
According to the NCSL, National Conference of State Legislatures “Over the last five years, campus safety legislation has been a hot issue across the country”. Authors like Jazz Silva are standing up for student’s rights that some State Legislatures might not care about. Not only are weapons dangerous but it is unsafe to students who may struggle with mental health issues. College campuses are safer than the communities that surround them. The University of Louisiana system states “93% of the violence against students occurs off campus.” Allowing guns on campus would lead to an escalation in violence, can lead to an increased number of suicides by college students, and the possibility that a weapon can go off by accident.
Students and staff with guns are not only a danger to other people, intentions malicious or not, but also to themselves. Students under high stress and emotional distress in general do not need to be around tools that can cause so much harm with so little effort. This argument, with the resounding knowledge of the high use of mind altering drugs on college campuses, mixed with the statistics surrounding the unhealthy psyche of students should be enough to show that campus carry is a bad
Every day parents send their children off to school with the expectation that they will be returned home safely at the end of the day. However, with an ever increasing number of school shootings some parents are pulling their children out of school because they feel as if school can no longer offer the same sense of security as they once had. Some schools are pressing for the right for school instructors to carry a loaded weapon on campus. School instructors should be allowed to carry a loaded weapon on campus because it helps prevent school shootings, it protects them during school shootings, and gives students and staff an added sense of security.
About 4,400 colleges and universities in the United States forbid the carrying of guns on their campuses (“Colleges”). With more and more shootings on campuses, especially with the tragedy at Virginia Tech in 2006, the states are starting to rethink their position on whether guns should be allowed on campuses; especially in Texas, where Texans are known for their guns. Even with a state like that, however, the questions still remain: Will allowing students with guns make campuses a safer environment? Will it make students feel safer? As most controversial issues goes, there are two sides to the debate.
Students walk college campuses thinking of homework, friends, social happenings, but rarely thinking about their safety. Students on college campuses are defenseless against an armed assailant because an armed assailant can shoot and harm many students in a short time before the police arrive. There are opposing views about allowing concealed weapons on college campuses, and the debate has been making news lately with the number of school shootings and people getting killed and injured rising. According to Robert Birnbaum in The Magazine of Higher Learning, “More Guns advocates argue that college students and faculty should be able to carry weapons for their own protection, particularly since history has shown that colleges can’t protect them from assailants” (Birnbaum 7). For students to properly defend themselves against armed assailants, they should be allowed to carry concealed weapons on campus.
“Colleges and universities occupy a special place in American society. They are much more than a series of buildings and collection of individuals. Instead, they are dynamic living and learning environments where individuals with varying levels of maturity interact, often under stressful circumstances. While recognizing the right of responsible individuals to possess firearms under other circumstances, the unique characteristics of a university campus make the presence of firearms problematic. The shootings that have occurred in recent years at US colleges and universities have generated passionate debate about how best to prevent such violence and whether persons should be allowed to carry concealed guns on campuses. Experts believe there is no credible evidence that students or staff carrying guns would reduce crime. In fact, research has shown that the brains of most college students have not fully developed regarding impulse control and judgment” (Dickerson). Therefore, guns should not be allowed on college campuses because it would lead to an escalation in violent crime, distract from the learning environment, and lead to accidental discharge incidents.