On Tuesday, Pennsylvania’s Pittston Area School District revealed it had placed one shotgun and one AR-15 in each of its schools for use by a resource officer in the event of an attack.

The Times Leader reported that news of the acquisition and placement of the firearms “was released during Tuesday’s regular monthly meeting.”

Pittston board president Frank Serino stressed that the firearms were part of a larger effort to enable law enforcement to respond more quickly to active incidents.

He indicated that “having the new rifles on site and accessible to school officers trained to use them could assure a quicker response than even the few minutes it might take municipal officers to arrive with similar equipment.”

On August 15, 2022, Breitbart News noted that Florida’s Indian River County School District added AR-15s to their schools so that students returning to class in the fall will have school resource officers who can access rifles in the event of an attack.

WFLA observed that Indian River County Sheriff Eric Flowers said, “If they’re coming at us with an AR-15, we’re going to return with the same or greater firepower.”

Sheriff Flowers told CBS 12 News that having the AR-15s in the school saves time in the event of an attack by saving resource officers from having to run out to their cars to retrieve a rifle.

A woman lights a candle at a makeshift memorial outside Uvalde County Courthouse in Uvalde, Texas, on May 26, 2022. Texas police faced angry questions  over why it took an hour to neutralize the gunman who murdered 19 small children and two teachers in Uvalde, as video emerged of desperate parents begging officers to storm the school. (CHANDAN KHANNA/AFP via Getty Images)

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News 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 and a Turning Point USA Ambassador. AWR Hawkins holds a PhD in Military History with a focus on the Vietnam War (brown water navy), U.S. Navy since Inception, the Civil War, and Early Modern Europe. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.