Let’s get the facts straight on public school funding
By Scott DiMauro, Ohio Education Association President
As a high school social studies teacher, I was always struck by what the then-future US President John Adams said during the criminal trial following the Boston Massacre: “Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.”
The fact is that Ohio’s public schools serve nearly 90 percent of students in our state. And, despite recent claims that attempt to twist the truth around public school funding in Ohio, the evidence is clear: More work must be done to finally fully and fairly fund our public schools, so that every child – regardless of where they live, what they look like, or how much money their parents make – can receive the excellent education they deserve.
The fact is that Ohio’s public schools are funded from the same line item in the state budget as private school vouchers. The last state budget did provide “record funding” for that line item, as indeed, anytime there’s an increase, that would set a new record. As noted in recent news coverage, the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce doesn’t yet know how much the state’s new universal voucher program will cost this year. But, with the explosion in the number of wealthier families taking public taxpayer dollars to pay for private school tuition for students who were already attending private schools in the first place, it is clear the state’s spending on the universal voucher program will far exceed the original budget estimates.
So, the fact is, when it comes time to pass the next state budget in 2025, that leaves less money in that line item for Ohio’s public schools. Exactly how much less and how will that impact public schools? It’s unclear. But, the uncertainty around those questions is causing school districts across the state to hold onto larger reserves to weather future state funding shortfalls, and in some cases, has prevented districts from feeling comfortable spending down the soon-to-expire federal pandemic-relief money that is currently inflating some of the figures. In the end, that uncertainty is hurting our students, as money that should be used to recruit and retain public school educators, address students’ mental health needs, and make up for lost ground remains unspent.
The Fair School Funding Plan, when fully implemented with updated formula components, should remove that uncertainty. Based on years of work and input from stakeholders across the board, the Fair School Funding Plan, which the state began phasing in in the FY 2022-23 budget, is meant to accurately account for how much it costs to educate a child and how much a local community can actually afford to pay toward that. And, it provides a predictable funding model, so school districts can accurately plan ahead. If the Fair School Funding Plan is fully phased in in the next state budget, as it was always intended to be, Ohio would finally have a constitutional school funding formula for the first time since the state supreme court started telling the legislature to stop chronically underfunding our public schools and truly fix the problems back in 1997.
Our lawmakers need to fulfill Ohio’s promise to our kids and commit to fully adopting the Fair School Funding Plan. They need to ensure that public tax dollars spent on private school vouchers come with the same academic and financial accountability as the dollars we spend on our public schools. They need to focus on providing the supports and resources our students need to succeed in a 21st century economy, because in Ohio, public education matters.
Ask Your State Senator to Support HCR 6: Urging Congress to Repeal GPO and WEP
Federal legislation is needed to repeal the unfair Social Security offsets that reduce the earned benefits of public employees in states like Ohio. The Government Pension Offset (GPO) and Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) are provisions of federal law that reduce the earned Social Security, spousal, and survivor benefits of those who also collect a public pension from states that do not pay into Social Security. Because Ohio is a non-Social Security state, many teachers, education support professionals and other public servants are adversely impacted by GPO and WEP.
The Social Security Fairness Act (HR 82 and S. 597) is pending before Congress and would repeal GPO and WEP, helping right this decades-long injustice. One way to help keep the pressure on Congress to act is for our state legislators to urge them to do so. House Concurrent Resolution (HCR) 6 is a resolution that urges Congress to repeal GPO and WEP. The resolution has already passed the Ohio House by a unanimous vote and is now pending in the Ohio Senate.
Write to your State Senator today and urge them to support this resolution. By doing so they will be standing up for Ohio’s public servants and help to improve their economic security in retirement.
Celebrate Educators with the Columbus Blue Jackets!
Join the Columbus Blue Jackets for special Educators ticket offers!
The Columbus Blue Jackets have partnered with The Ohio Education Association again this year to celebrate all Ohio Educators for the following game dates. Use discount code EDUCATOR at checkout to unlock your Buy One Get One Free offer today! | #ThankATeacher
- Tuesday, December 10 – CBJ vs Philadelphia Flyers
- Thursday, December 12 – CBJ vs Washington Capitals
- Saturday, December 14 – CBJ vs Anaheim Ducks
This special ticket offer includes a CBJ Gift exclusively for EDUCATORS, and a $5 concession credit on ALL tickets. The Offical Educator Appreciation game on 12/14 will include the same F&B credit & educator gift, as well as a post-game slapshot opportunity plus a chance to win special experiences and autographed CBJ items.
Please note that the 12/10 & 12/12 games will offer the special ticket package that includes ONLY the Food & Beverage concession credit and our special gift for educators.
If you have more than one educator in your group, or any additional questions, please call Alec Rivers at (614) 246-3852 or email arivers@bluejackets.com.
Groups of 10 or more will also qualify for even more savings on tickets!
OEA/NEA Member Back-to-School Guide
Educator-tested tips, advice, and resources for a successful start to the school year
Students may still be enjoying their summer vacations, but for educators, the beginning of the next school year is just around the corner.
NEA Experts have compiled a list of tools, tips, and resources to connect with every student.
Sections Include: Professional Excellence from Members, for Members | School Me Podcasts | Classroom Management
Additional Reading & Related Resources
- 2024-2025 OEA Member Resource Guide
- ONE — Ohio’s New Educators’ Resource Guides: New ESP & New Teacher Guide
- Protecting Our Schools and Communities with Mental Health Supports — You can’t always avoid stress, so learn how to counteract it.
- Suggestions to make schools a welcoming environment – Mad River Local Schools works to address chronic absenteeism (WDTN)
- U.S. Department of Education Back-to-School checklist for parents
- Read Across America — Create and celebrate a nation of diverse readers with 12 months of recommended books, authors, and teaching resources that promote diversity and inclusion
- Save Those Receipts — Educators can claim up to a $300 deduction to get money back for classroom expenses!
- Know Your Rights: A Back-to-School Guide – An NEA resource on your rights as a patchwork of state and local censorship and anti-LGBTQ+ rules have created doubt among educators
- Teachers: take care of your voice – A resource from the NIDCD, which supports research into the nature, causes, diagnosis, and prevention of voice disorders
- Resources from the The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on providing essential health care coverage:
August 12, 2024
Fear and Power: What Really Drives Issue 1
By Julie Holderbaum, Minerva EA/OEA
A teacher tells his students that phones are not allowed in class. One day, a student points out that the teacher is often on his phone. The teacher replies that the rule doesn’t apply to him, only to them.
A student turns in a research paper a day after it is due. The student knows that 10% will be deducted from the final score, which is the teacher’s late work policy established at the beginning of the year. However, the paper is returned with 50% deducted from the grade. When the student questions the teacher, the teacher simply says that she changed the rules.
A teacher decides to allow students to vote on whether to have homework assignments during the school year and 59% of the students vote not to have homework. When the teacher shares the results, a majority of the students rejoice! But then the teacher announces that since the NO votes didn’t reach 60%, homework is going to stay.
Any credibility these teachers had would be damaged at best and quite possibly destroyed by these actions. Not following their own rules? Changing the established, fair policies to much harsher ones? Eliminating majority rule? These teachers would be viewed by their students as hypocritical, manipulative, and untrustworthy…which is exactly how we should view the Ohio legislators who support Issue 1.
Ohio Legislators are failing to follow their own rules
In December 2022, the Ohio General Assembly voted to eliminate August elections in most cases. But now those same lawmakers argue that the rule they enacted doesn’t apply to them; it only applies to small, local elections.
Why the change of heart? Because a grassroots group of Ohio citizens has submitted petitions to get an amendment on the November ballot that would protect reproductive rights in Ohio.1
Many Republicans, who hold a supermajority in Ohio, do not want to see the citizen-based reproductive rights amendment pass in Ohio. Look, reasonable people can have reasonable disagreements on reproductive rights. But changing the rules to rig the democratic process is not what Ohioans want, and that is exactly what corrupt politicians did when, in spite of banning special elections in August less than a year ago, they put Issue 1 on the August Special Election in an effort to preempt the November election and make it more difficult for a citizen-based amendment to pass.
Ohio Legislators are changing well-established, fair policies.
Proponents of Issue 1 say its purpose is to defend the Ohio Constitution against frequent attacks of special interest groups. What legislators are really trying to protect is their own power and take freedoms and rights away from the citizens of our state. When Ohioans made it clear that we are willing to exercise our rights to try to amend the Constitution when legislators fail to represent our values, the legislature put an issue on the ballot that would make it difficult for citizens to ever again affect a change in the Constitution.
It is already extremely difficult for a citizen-led group to get an amendment to the Constitution on the ballot. There are multiple steps that require signature gatherers to obtain certification from the Ohio Attorney General, the Ohio Ballot Board and meet signature thresholds both at the statewide level and in 44 of Ohio’s 88 counties. Since 1913, only 71 citizen-based amendments have made it to the ballot, and of those, only 19 were approved by the voters. This is most certainly not an overused tactic to change the Ohio Constitution.
If Issue 1 passes, instead of meeting the signature requirement in 44 of Ohio’s 88 counties to move a proposal to the ballot, the threshold would need to be met in all of Ohio’s 88 counties, giving a single county the ability to thwart the will of the remaining 87. Issue 1 also eliminates the 10-day period petitioners have to gather more signatures if not enough of the original signatures meet the requirements. These harsher demands make getting a citizen-led proposed amendment to the Constitution extraordinarily unlikely and cede all ability to amend the Constitution to deep pocketed special interest groups (some of whom may not even be in Ohio) and the Ohio General Assembly.
Ohio Legislators are ending majority rule.
In the unlikely event that an amendment makes it to the ballot, Issue 1 would require that 60% of Ohioans must approve an amendment in order for it to pass, as opposed to the current standard of a simple majority, 50% + 1. (Ironically, Issue 1 only needs a simple majority to pass). Majority rule has been the default threshold for victory in Ohio elections for more than 100 years, but fearful of losing their power to ordinary (and organized) citizens, the legislature decided to change what determines a winner mid-game, handing the ability to veto the will of the majority of voters to a minority of the vote. Issue 1 is an attack on our voting rights, plain and simple.
It’s crucial to remember, however, that Issue 1 is not about abortion.
Issue 1 is about all citizen-proposed amendments to the constitution, not just one, as Secretary of State Frank LaRose says. He stated (rather disrespectfully, I would argue): “(Issue 1 is) 100% about keeping a radical pro-abortion amendment out of our constitution. The left wants to jam it in there this coming November.”2 Jam it through? Is that how he views Ohio citizens who exercise their democratic rights by following the legal (and lengthy) process to make changes to the state constitution?
Let’s be real. The move to protect reproductive rights is simply the catalyst causing our legislators to fear losing their unilateral power.
They’ve managed to largely protect their own power by gerrymandering the state, but citizen-based amendments to the constitution represent a threat that there is no easy way to quell, short of changing both the rules that have been well- established for years, and the rules they set themselves less than a year ago.
Regardless of the outcome of Issue 1 in August, the reproductive rights amendment is heading for the November ballot. I urge you to base your vote in November on your feelings about abortion and reproductive rights.
But I beg you, don’t base your vote in August on your feelings about abortion and reproductive rights. Issue 1 has nothing to do with that. Issue 1 has everything to do with an already powerful legislature trying to further silence their constituents. Their gerrymandered supermajority affords them the ability to pass a myriad of laws with impunity, but that’s not enough for them. They want to take away one of the only guardrails we have left as citizens to determine the future of our state when one party gains a trifecta of dominance in our state government and stops listening to the desires of we, the people of Ohio.
It’s worth noting that the egregious consequences of passing Issue 1 would impact BOTH parties.
Republicans and Democrats alike have the same rights to get a proposed constitutional amendment on future ballots, about any number of issues. Issue 1 makes this more difficult, regardless of the political leanings of the citizens who begin the process.
I wonder if the legislators who support Issue 1 are more afraid of losing power or of the Ohioans who refuse to remain silent and allow the legislature to set the course for our state without our input?
As educators, we must be vigilant in using our voices to advocate for change when laws are manipulated to reflect personal agendas instead of the will of the people. With the recent expansion of universal vouchers, the state will spend billions of dollars, with little oversight, funding private and charter school tuition and homeschooling for families, regardless of how wealthy those families might be. Furthermore, the legislature has stripped power from the elected State School Board and given much of the decision-making authority in education- related issues to an appointed partisan official.
With legislators making moves like this, we can ill afford to lose any of the tools we have as citizens to make changes that better reflect the interests of Ohio’s educators, students, and families.
Ohio legislators who support Issue 1 might well be motivated by a fear of losing power. But there is great power in losing the fear of standing up to those who ignore our interests.
Fear, I predict, will fail. Because just like the teachers in the scenarios above would quickly lose credibility, our legislators are playing games that will cost them the trust of Ohioans.
Join me in voting NO on Issue 1 this August and send the message to politicians and their special interest backers that we, the people of Ohio, will fight for our freedom and right to determine the future of our state.
1 The full text of the proposed amendment can be found here: https://www.ohioattorneygeneral.gov/getattachment/cf27c10f-b153-4731-ae9e-e3555a326ed9/The-Right-to-Reproductive-Freedom-with-Protections-for-Health-and-Safety.aspx
2 https://signalcleveland.org/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-august-vote-on-issue-1/
VESI
NOW LIVE
The Ohio Education Association (OEA) has partnered with Ursuline College and VESi to offer members a yearly subscription to online graduate courses. The subscription allows OEA members access to up to nine graduate credit hours (three courses) for only $200. You can enroll in one course per term or two courses during the summer. This exclusive benefit is only available to OEA members.
Click here to register: http://www.virtualeduc.com/oea
OEA members recommend pro-public education candidates for statewide, legislative races
[September 7, 2022] Decisions made in Ohio’s statehouse and by other elected officials impact what happens in our public-school classrooms every day. Ohio Education Association members have spent the last several months interviewing candidates in political races around the state to make recommendations about who will best serve Ohio’s students, educators, and public schools if elected to office. The full list of OEA member-recommended candidates is now available here.
Among the many recommendations made by OEA members who serve on the OEA Fund State Council and District Screening Committees, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Nan Whaley has received OEA’s recommendation. “Whaley was instrumental in the Senate Bill 5 fight in 2011, serving as a key voice in the effort to protect collective bargaining rights in Ohio. As Dayton’s mayor, she was able to implement universal pre-K across the city and championed gun safety reforms that would make our schools safer,” OEA President Scott DiMauro noted. “Ohio needs Nan Whaley as governor.”
OEA members have also voted to recommend Representative Tim Ryan for U.S. Senate and Justice Jennifer Brunner, Judge Marilyn Zayas, and Judge Terri Jamison for the Ohio Supreme Court. Other OEA member recommendations include Representative Jeff Crossman in the race for Attorney General, and Mayor Scott Schertzer in his bid for Treasurer of State.
In races for the General Assembly, OEA members are recommending several educators-turned-candidates, including State Representative Joe Miller (D-53), Sean Brennan for House District 14, and Sophia Rodriguez for House District 84. “When educators represent us in the statehouse, Ohio’s students win. These candidates know better than anyone what our students need to succeed and how lawmakers can provide meaningful support for our public schools. They also know firsthand how damaging bills dragging our schools into manufactured culture wars have already been, so their voices in the ongoing battle to ensure our students have the freedom to receive a fair and honest education will be crucial,” DiMauro said.
The decisions about who to recommend for office are made entirely based on the candidates’ views on public education issues, or in the case of an incumbent candidate, on their record regarding public education issues. Political affiliation and views on other issues are not factors in these recommendations. “OEA members know having pro-public education leaders in office is essential for the future of our public schools,” DiMauro said. “We thank all of the members who have dedicated so much of their time and energy to the candidate screening process to ensure the best pro-public education candidates receive Ohio educators’ support.”
Social Links
ACTION ALERT – Urge your State Representative to Oppose SB 83
RESOURCES
Resources from NEA
- Student and Educator Mental Health
- Safe School Communities
- School Gun Violence Prevention and Response Guide
- Context for Teaching Students with Autism
Read Across America
- Video recordings – Watch OEA-R and OEA members celebrate Read Across America by reading books
- Or watch any of the recordings on Facebook: Read Across America Playlist
- Create and Celebrate a Nation of Diverse Readers – resources from NEA
Ohio Schools Magazine digital editions
- October/ November 2024
- 2024-2025 Member Resource Guide
- June/ July 2024
- February/ March 2024
- December 2023/ January 2024
- October/ November 2023
- Ohio Schools archive
PRESS RELEASES
- September 20, 2024 – OEA thanks Ohio Congress members from both parties for their work to move bipartisan Social Security Fairness Act forward
- September 13, 2024 – OEA Encouraged by Improved Student Outcomes for 2023-2024, but Notes More Work is Needed to Make State Report Cards a Useful Tool for Parents
- August 29, 2024 – OEA congratulates the 2025 OTOY
- July 1, 2024 – OEA congratulates CNP on ballot signature success
- June 20, 2024 – As teacher license fee hike looms, OEA calls for Controlling Board action
- June 3, 2024 – OEA distributes thousands of free diverse books
- May 15, 2024 – OEA Applauds Cell Phone Law
- Press Release archive
LEGISLATIVE WATCH RELEASES
- September 12, 2024 – This is our chance to end GPO-WEP
- August 23, 2024 – OEA Applauds State Controlling Board Decision to Approve Full Funding for the State Board of Education
- August 9, 2024 – U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown Calls for Vote on Repeal of GPO/WEP
- July 2, 2024 – Senate Bill 83 Stalls Out Before Legislative Recess; Take Action to Stop Teacher License Fee Increase; House Bill 214 – Professional Conduct Policies; Senate Bill 104 – Transgender Bathroom Restrictions Amended into CCP Bill; Senate Bill 168 – Various Education Regulation Provisions
- Legislative Watch archive
- Legislative Scorecard – An interactive Legislative scorecard for each member of the Ohio General Assembly
EVENTS
- October 26-27 – Bargaining Boot Camp – Southwest (this event has reached capacity)
- November 2-3 – Bargaining Boot Camp – Northeast (this event has reached capacity)
- November 9-10 – Bargaining Boot Camp – Central (this event has reached capacity)
- November 15 – Cleveland CAVs vs Chicago Bulls
- November 18 – OEA Virtual Trivia Night
- November 19 – OEA New President Power Hour: Advocacy and representing your members
- November 23-24 – Bargaining Boot Camp – Northwest (this event has reached capacity)
- December 10 – CBJ vs Philadelphia Flyers
- December 12 – CBJ vs Washington Capitals
- December 14 – CBJ vs Anaheim Ducks
- January 21 – OEA New President Power Hour: Helpful tips for successful negotiations
- January 25 – Cleveland CAVs vs Houston Rockets
- January 25-26 – AE ONE Annual Conference
- February 2 – Cleveland CAVs vs Dallas Mavericks
- February 18 – OEA New President Power Hour: Best practices in communicating with your members and the community
- February 21 – Cleveland CAVs vs New York Knicks
- March 2 – Cleveland CAVs vs Portland Trail Blazers
- March 7-9 – NEA Leadership Summit
- March 18 – OEA New President Power Hour: Your voice in the OEA Democratic Structure and resources available to you and your members
- April 15 – OEA New President Power Hour: “What If” Sharing problem-solving strategies
PUBLIC EDUCATION MATTERS PODCAST
Subscribe and Listen to Public Education Matters on a variety of podcast networks
Transistor RSS feed | Apple podcasts | Listen on YouTube | Spotify | Amazon music
Oh Yes, We’re Social — Join the Conversation!
Updated October 24, 2024
Public Sector Employment and Political Activism: Using Your Voice While Protecting Your Job
The First Amendment protects all citizens of the United States by limiting the government’s ability to abridge freedom of speech. However, when the government is also a person’s employer things can become a bit more complicated. The following are some resources and guidelines to keep in mind when engaging in political activity.
When performing job duties such as classroom instruction, transporting students, communicating with parents, coaching, etc., it is important to be aware that your conduct is considered as a representation of your employer. As such, these and other activities do not receive the same First Amendment protections enjoyed by the average citizen.
There are two resources that provide helpful guidance to those employed and licensed to work at Pre-K – 12 public education agencies. The first is the Licensure Code of Professional Conduct for Educators, which can be found here: https://education.ohio.gov/Topics/Teaching/Professional-Conduct/Licensure-Code-of-Professional-Conduct. The second is locally adopted school board policies, which are often found on individual district websites and can also be requested directly from the local Board of Education. While the Code of Conduct and adopted board policies mainly apply to the performance of professional tasks or when representing the employer within the community, it is important to remember that some expectations extend beyond the regular workday and workplace.
Social Media: Social media is about being social. Something may be shared with friends, or with privacy settings cranked to the max, but that doesn’t mean it can’t or won’t be shared beyond the intended audience without your knowledge and consent.
- A good guideline for social media use is to always assume what is posted, liked, shared, or uploaded can be seen by everyone in the community. Keep your professional life separate from your personal (and political) life.
- Don’t engage individuals who just want to argue, abuse, or name call. Block, unfriend, or even find a better platform for more meaningful dialogue.
- Avoid using social media when frustrated and/or angry. It may seem like the perfect outlet for stress, but failure to consider your choice of words and content can have negative employment consequences.
Technology: Technology is paid for through public dollars and provided to public employees to assist them in their professional duties. Using the employer’s devices, Internet connection, software and/or platform for non-business-related purposes can result in discipline and termination.
- Don’t use employer technology to access personal accounts, including social media, to engage in political activism. Make sure you have read and understand the acceptable use policy (AUP).
- Don’t expose, present, or fail to prevent students from accessing inappropriate material. Not sure what counts as inappropriate? Check your employing board or campus adopted policies.
Engaging with Students, Colleagues, and the Community on Political Issues
As public education employees, most of your day is spent with students, colleagues, and community members.
Friendships, familiarity, and acquaintances are developed within the work environment. For Pre-K – 12 employees:
- Don’t offer your political views to students or use one’s position to proselytize personal political beliefs.
- Always make sure content, resources, and topics for instruction are developmentally appropriate and clearly connect to the academic standards for the grade level and topic.
- If asked, don’t feel you must share your personal political beliefs. Reinforce they are personal and not connected to the day’s learning. For some, their motivation may be to goad, distract and/or cause trouble for the employee.
- Even when communicating with adults, never use technology or make comments which share obscene material, promotion of violence, disparagement of students, or disparagement based upon gender, gender identity, race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, military status, or religion.
Reference: Principle 9 Appropriate and Responsible Use of Technology Licensure Code of Professional Conduct for Educators
Also remember, if you are facing discipline, immediately contact your union representative, officer or OEA Labor Relations Consultant (LRC) before participating in any proceedings related to the accusation. Please see the Weingarten Rights page for more information on your rights during investigatory interviews: https://www.ohea.org/member-center/weingarten-rights/.
A Teacher’s Brain Following Yet Another School Shooting…and Yet Another Misguided Response by Legislators
By Julie Holderbaum, Minerva EA/OEA
Another school shooting? 19 students killed? And two teachers?
He bought the AR-15s legally, just days after his 18th birthday? And bought another weapon just a few days after buying the first, with a high-magazine clip? Doesn’t anyone besides me see that there should be a red flag in some system somewhere that signals local police to check this person out?
Would it have made a difference in this case? Maybe not…but we will never know, will we?
Is this for real? Is a local group really raffling off an assault rifle as a fundraiser for a youth program? Are they really asking kids to sell tickets for an assault weapon when kids were just slaughtered with the same type of gun, to the point of needing a DNA sample to be identified? I’m not sure if there is ever a right time for that sort of fundraiser, but less than a month after Uvalde?
And now the legislature passed what? A bill to LOWER the number of required training hours to 24 for teachers to carry a weapon in school? Didn’t my daughter need 50 hours of behind-the-wheel training just to get a driver’s license? Why would a teacher, who is not in the field of law enforcement, need so few hours of training to carry a gun in a school?
How would that even work? Would it be a hand gun? Locked and loaded in a drawer somewhere? Is a handgun going to be any deterrent to a person carrying an assault rifle? Would I have time to get to it if I needed it? And how would I know I needed it? A loud noise in the hall? Would I get my gun and peek my head out to see if action is needed? Would eight other teacher heads be peeking out in my hallway, guns drawn?
If nothing was wrong and we grabbed our weapons in error, would the students in our classes be traumatized by seeing their teachers with loaded guns?
Or has this lockdown-drill-school-shooting cycle become so normalized to them that they wouldn’t even be phased at seeing the same people who teach them their ABCs or pre-calc wielding a dangerous weapon? And if so, what does that mean for the future of our country?
And what if the threat wasn’t in the hallway, but in my classroom? One of my students? Even if I could get to my gun, would I have the ability to shoot one of MY kids? Knowing he suffers from depression and can’t use our school resource mental health counselor because of insurance issues? Knowing his past experience with abuse? Knowing that he has not felt seen or heard or loved at home in years?
Could I shoot that kid?
And if I did use my gun, even if I saved lives, could I live with myself? What would the repercussions of pulling that trigger have for my own mental health? Would I ever be able to look at my students the same way again? Would they ever be able to see me in the same way again?
What if I hesitated? What if more were hurt because I struggled to pull the trigger? How could I ever teach again? How could anyone trust me again? How many lawsuits would I face because I didn’t act fast enough?
If trained law enforcement officers hesitated to enter Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, what makes anyone think teachers would be comfortable entering a spray of gunfire and endangering themselves? Especially with only 24 hours of training?
On the other hand, how many lawsuits would there be if I leapt into action, misread a situation, and shot an innocent person?
If we were required to actually carry our guns with us at all times, could I ever concentrate enough to teach effectively? How can I teach my students that words can change the world, that literature can move souls, that the power of a well-turned phrase can penetrate the hardest of hearts… while carrying a gun?
How’s that for a mixed message? Words have power, but guns are faster? Is that what we want to teach?
Beyond sending mixed messages, could I ever teach without constantly worrying about my weapon? About who is looking at it oddly today, about turning my back on anyone, about helping one student at her desk while my gun is about 2 feet away from the hands of the student in the desk next to hers? Would I have to keep one hand on my weapon at all times? As a TEACHER?
Surely I wouldn’t be required to carry a gun, though, right? I already check my classroom door multiple times a day to be sure it’s still locked; I already weigh the options of teaching with my door shut and locked for safety from shooters to teaching with it open to allow for more airflow and safety from COVID; I already jump at every odd sound or unannounced lockdown; how much worse would it be if I knew multiple people in our building were carrying guns?
This legislation won’t just affect the mental health of our students, will it?
I’m so tired of hearing that “the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun”; if that’s true, why were weapons not allowed at the recent NRA convention in Texas? How could a room full of good guys with guns be a threat? Shouldn’t that be the safest place in the world? Why aren’t more responsible gun owners fighting for universal background checks, for a raise to the age limit to buy certain guns, for red flag laws, for a required waiting period before possessing a gun after purchase?
With so many Americans in favor of at least some reform to gun laws, are legislators who refuse to advocate for safer gun laws just afraid of losing their jobs? Afraid that without the money of the NRA and other pro-gun lobbyists they won’t be able to fund a successful campaign? That they would lose their power, their position, their ability to provide for their families? But don’t those same legislators force educators to live with those fears every day, knowing that if we teach about racism or other sensitive topics in the wrong way, we could lose our jobs thanks to their laws?
If they think we can’t be trusted to discuss elements of America’s troubled past or the current events of the day in a responsible manner, why would they deem us responsible enough to carry a gun in school?
When will our politicians put people over power? When will they set aside pride to work with the other side? When will the safety of our communities take precedence over an election?
If the politicians currently in office aren’t willing to make changes, is the blood of the victims of the next shooting on their hands….or on ours?
If this isn’t the time to persist in our efforts to persuade responsible gun owners to join the cause, when is?
If this isn’t the time to promise our children that we will do more than pause to remember the victims and pray that this never happens again, when is?
If this isn’t the time to preserve the sanctity of our classrooms as places of learning, belonging, and growing, when is?
If this isn’t the time to pursue real action by promoting politicians who run on a platform of actual changes to the law, when is?
If this isn’t the time to protest, when is? Aren’t the protest signs true? “The power of the people is greater than the people in power?”
Isn’t the truest form of political protest voting out those who have made empty promises but not practical efforts at positive change?
How many days until November?