It should be a 100%. They also need to get armed security.
My alma mater had its own police force, and it was really helped. It reduced not just shootings, but violent crime in general.
EDIT: Also the FBI needs to be investigated. Apparently they were warned several times about that Florida shooter. It's just utterly unbelievable, Wray should be fired, and a special counsel set up to investigate this unbelievable failure. Ex. The Fbi said it couldn't verify the shooter, who used his own name on youtube with death threats. Unbelievable!
You realize that most countries in the world have neither armed security, police, or even metal detectors in -any- of their schools and don't have these issues?
And yet as an EMS responder, I've seen and heard personally of the challenges that come with it.
There are cases where shooters have been brought down by "a good guy with a gun".
There are others where there have been plenty of armed security around, even police, and it's done nothing to stop things.
And there's been cases where now you have a bunch of inconsistently trained people running around an active shooter scene, confused and terrified, possibly injuring bystanders or each other. "Hey, are you the shooter?" Shooter: "no, i'm just like you, hunting him too!" (if indeed the reaction is not "see gun, shoot").
If we went this route, I'd probably rather have the military (though I know that comes with even more 'concerns' for our 'freedom') - more tightly controlled rules of engagement, more experience with and training with respect to returning fire, compared to law enforcement, who only do active shooter exercises themselves a couple of times a year, if that.
Active shooter scenarios are terrifying, to state the obvious. I've been involved in training at a school here in Washington where even as a medic, we go in while the shooter is still active, covered by a SWAT team, for pulling victims out of the hot zone, and it is loud, it is confusing.
I appreciate that you're trying to be realistic to the culture here, and I agree that 'yes, there would most likely be civil uprising if we attempted to claw back firearm ownership', so then the only alternative is an escalating arms race.
Which the NRA, which long ago ceased to be a sportsman's club and is now "by with and for" the gun manufacture industry, can't fail to be happy about.
The defining moment for me was Sandy Hook, when it was "decided" that the murder of 20 six to seven year olds was an acceptable "but regrettable" price for the freedom to bear arms.
It makes me genuinely depressing sad, but its completely true.. the right to bear arms, is deemed worth having children shot regularly. Breaks my heart.
They can apply for the privilege of having a gun. Just like the rest of the world.
An automobile is hundred times more essential than a hunting rifle for most Americans, yet America has no problem making driving a privilege. Somehow nobody's worried about evil government confiscating everyone's vehicles so that they will be forced to march on foot...
Yes. Here en Denmark hunters can own rifles etc. But you need a hunting permit, that requires training in gun handling, safety, shooting etc. It also consists of an actual test. You need to keep the rifle safely stored, I believe it needs to be locked away, with the firing pin, kept in a different place, away from the rifle.
There are millions of black-market firearms available in the United States that may be acquired by a motivated killer with relative ease. I'm not entirely convinced they can "unfry that egg", so to speak.
For now, in the short-term, I think the suggestion that we could harden these soft-targets with on-site security is an idea worth examining. Perhaps, even staff with pertinent experience, training, and the trust of the faculty, could volunteer as "sheepdogs" and are permitted access to weapons on-site, during such emergencies?
By no means to I want you to take the above as a complete solution, but neither is simply banning guns. What does that even mean, anyway? Why not ban murder? Crime-stats make it clear that illegally-owned handguns are most-often used to commit violent crimes, after all. Criminals don't seem to care what the laws are.
As always, it is important to note that this issue is highly politicised, to a maddening degree.
My alma mater had its own police force, and it was really helped. It reduced not just shootings, but violent crime in general.
EDIT: Also the FBI needs to be investigated. Apparently they were warned several times about that Florida shooter. It's just utterly unbelievable, Wray should be fired, and a special counsel set up to investigate this unbelievable failure. Ex. The Fbi said it couldn't verify the shooter, who used his own name on youtube with death threats. Unbelievable!