The Gun Companies New Market....Students

Is school safe enough? Coming from a 13-year-old, all this talk about school shootings and guns are frightening. Who are they getting the guns from and why do they find the need to bring them to school? Don’t they realize what the damages will be? The friends of the teen shooters say that the “jocks” and popular people just couldn’t keep their comments to themselves. I guess that the old saying “Sticks and stones my break my bones, but words will never hurt me” has lost its meaning.


Between 1996 and 2007 school shootings have almost become a regular happening in the world as we know it. People aging from 6 years old to 32 years old. (Who could forget 32-year-old Carl Charles Roberts IV who just after kissing his own wife and kids goodbye for the day, he later entered the one-room West Nickel Mines Amish School and shot 10 schoolgirls, ranging in age from 6 to 13 years old, and then himself. Five of the girls and Roberts died.)



For those of us who just love statistics and facts here are a little facts that should persuade you not to get a gun permit while living with a person between the ages of 6 and 18. (Or 32!)
1. Estimate of students killed(in school shootings) between 1996 and 2007: about 100 students
2. Teachers killed: about 26
3. Principals: about 2
4. 1 police officer was killed as a result of a school shooting
5. Most school shooters end up killing themselves after their crime has been committed.
6. Only one shooting has been reported with gang violence on April 14, 2003 at John McDoungh High School in New Orleans, Louisiana. One 15 year old student was killed by 4 teenage students. The shooters wounded 3 other students, and the shooters didn’t even attend John McDoungh High.
7. U.S. School Shootings Total: over 35


The most amazing one to me is 6-year-old Kayla Rolland who was shot dead by her 6-year-old classmate in Mount Morris Township in Michigan. Kayla was shot with a 32 caliber handgun. After a little argument the Kayla shared with the boy, Dedrick Owens, pulled the gun on his six year old counterpart. Kayla would have been thirteen right now, and she still remains one of the youngest to ever be killed in a school shooting. There’s basically nothing that you can say except, why? Was Dedrick too young to understand his actions and/ or the consequences? Maybe he thought that nothing would happen?


Since I’m also a teenager, I too have feelings of depression and isolation. I get mood swings, and could at any moment be very angry. Everyone was teased at one point in there lives and some people are just better with dealing with it. But one way NOT to deal with it………to shoot your fellow classmates. Nobody deserves to die at such a young age.



As much as we would want to, school shootings will never end. We can’t stop them, and nobodies really trying to. But really, how far could you go to stop these sorts of tragedies? Daily or monthly gun searches? , Metal detectors in the entrance and exits? , Random bookbag and purse searches? Put police officers in hallways, classrooms, and cafeterias? Place video cameras in the bathrooms? Or is taping your child’s private session with the schools guidance counselor more of an adequate measure? (Since they have absolutely no problems with taping you conversations with your friends and colleagues!)The government has the funds to finance the never ending war in Iraqi, but don’t seem to want to fund the education piece of one of the biggest, and wealthiest pies in the world. I think that we have some of our priorities mixed.