Some schools in the United States are stocking up on AR-15 rifles to be used to tackle a gunman, but critics fear the measure will lead to more accidents.
The North Carolina school district and the sheriff’s office are working together to improve safety, with one of the semi-automatic rifles placed in each of the six Madison County schools.
Opponents warned it “doesn’t make any sense”.
Dorothy Espelage, UNC Chapel Hill Professor at the School of Education, who has conducted decades of school safety studies and research, told WLOS-TV: “Why do they have to have these AR-15s? No sense.
“What will happen is that we will have accidents with these guns.”
The introduction of the weapons is said to be a reaction to the shooting at a school in Uvalde, Texas in May which left 19 children and two teachers dead.
Buddy Harwood, the Madison County Sheriff, said each of the guns will be locked inside the school’s safes, which will also contain ammunition and breakthrough tools for the barricaded doors.
“I hate that we’ve gotten to a point in our nation where I have to put a safe in our schools and lock it up for my deputies to acquire an AR-15,” said Mr. Harwood.
“But we can turn it off and say it won’t happen in Madison County, but we never know.
“Hopefully we never need it, but I want my kids to be as prepared as they can be.”
He added that county school resource officers trained with instructors from Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College.
The shooting revealed systemic failures
According to a report written by a Texas House of Representatives investigative committee, the Uvalde shooting revealed systemic failures and “extremely poor decision making,” causing more than an hour of chaos before the gunman was finally confronted and killed. by the police. .
Wade:
CCTV cameras show police using hand sanitizer as a Uvalde gunman attacks
“Those agents have been in that building for so long and that suspect was able to infiltrate that building and injure and kill so many children,” Harwood told the Asheville Citizen Times.
“I just want to make sure my deputies are prepared in case that happens.”
