Nearly 220 Texas School Districts Allow School Staff to be Armed

Nearly 220 Texas school districts allow school staff to be armed for defense of themselves and their students.

The Corpus Christi Caller-Times reports that the exact number of school districts allowing armed staff sits at 217.

At the beginning of February there were just over 170 Texas districts allowing armed staff, but that number grew as district after district responded to Parkland and other school shootings by changing policies to allow staff to defend their students.

The 217 school districts that allow armed staff represent 21 percent of Texas’s 1,023 independent school districts. That is 21 percent or just over one in five.

Texas implemented their armed staff policy in the months after the heinous December 14, 2012, Sandy Hook Elementary School attack. In that attack a man entered the school with stolen guns and spent over nine minutes shooting innocents without any armed response. The policy adopted by Texas “allows school districts to arm school employees and created an additional category of a certified peace officer known as a ‘school marshal’ who can conceal carry a handgun.” It is intended to ensure a Sandy Hook-style attacker will not find a school full of defenseless innocents if he dares to attack.

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News, the host of the Breitbart podcast Bullets with AWR Hawkins, and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.