• Live
    • Audio Only
  • google plus
  • facebook
  • twitter
News > World

US Weighs School Security Bill as Students Protest Gun Violence

  • Students, teachers and faith leaders hold a rally in front of Smith & Wesson world headquarters in Springfield, Massachusetts, March 2018.

    Students, teachers and faith leaders hold a rally in front of Smith & Wesson world headquarters in Springfield, Massachusetts, March 2018. | Photo: Reuters

Published 14 March 2018
Opinion

The bill would provide money for metal detectors and locks in schools in an attempt to curb gun violence a month after the school shooting in Florida.

The U.S. House of Representatives has passed a bill to fund metal detectors and locks in schools in a bid to curb gun violence on campuses after a month of heavy lobbying by survivors of the school shooting in ParklandFlorida that killed 17 people.

RELATED: 
Tuskegee Airman Who Met Castro, 'Buzzed' Racist Governor, Dies

The proposed legislation, which passed 407-10 and will now go on to the Senate for consideration, would allow the government to grant up to US$50 million a year for training, reporting systems, threat assessments and gun-intervention teams in U.S. schools.

The bill doesn't include funding to arm teachers, as was proposed by President Donald Trump, nor does it include the broader, national gun control proposals made by Parkland students, teachers and their supporters since the Feb. 14 massacre.

"The best way to keep our students and teachers safe is to give them the tools and the training to recognize the warning signs to prevent violence from ever entering our school grounds, and this bill aims to do just that," said Republican Representative John Rutherford of Florida, a bill sponsor.

Katherine Posada, a teacher at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School where last month's killings took place, asked a House committee to ban assault-style weapons like the AR-15 rifle used by Nikolas Cruz, the former student charged with the Florida murders.

"Some of the victims were shot through doors, or even through walls… How many innocent lives could have been saved if these weapons of war weren't so readily available?" asked Posada.

Hundreds of gun control protesters amassed outside Congress Wednesday, as students, teachers and administrators from more than 3,000 schools staged simultaneous walk-outs to advocate for gun control legislation.

At Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, hundreds of students chanted: "We want change!"

At New York City's Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School, students held placards reading: "Thoughts and prayers are not enough." The slogan  criticizes the 'thoughts and prayers' peddled all too often in the wake of mass shootings by legislators who have yet to create efficient gun control laws to curb the powerful pro-gun lobby led by the National Rifle Association.

In Los Angeles, high school students lay prone on their football field to form the hashtag #ENOUGH with their own bodies in their bid to put an end to mass shootings in the United States.

About 600 students at Booker T. Washington High School in Atlanta demonstrated by taking a knee in the hallways because the administration put the school on a 'soft lockdown,' prohibiting students from leaving the premises to protest.

Comment
0
Comments
Post with no comments.