Safety in Schools Headed in the Right Direction

Thursday night's School Board meeting on safety in the schools was very productive.

Mark Conrad introduced the plans of more security that will begin being implemented in a couple of weeks. Columbine locks that allow teachers to lock any door from the inside our outside of the classroom, cameras, buzzers and locked doors were some of the new features parents can expect in the next 6 months.

It helped ease the fear that parents felt about the easy access anyone has to our many unsupervised entrances in many of our schools.  There were many great suggestions by various parents and a great discussion had by all.

 My favorite line of the night was by Mayor Lozeau, saying "More guns are not the answer," when one person suggested we arm the teachers. Various reasons such as: teachers are not trained to use guns or react to stressful situations, any big kid can take a gun away from a teacher if they wanted to; police chief mentioned it would create confusion if he arrived on a scene and many individuals had guns, etc.

More meetings will be taking place, the school board meets twice a month and suggested that they could add to their meeting agendas if people had more suggestions.  I'm personally happy with the suggestions that were made and the discussion that was had. I am hoping to see some leaders in the different city departments fight for some gun regulations, especially in regards to semi-automatic weapons that shoot 6 bullets per second and are designed for mass shootings.

Safety prevention also should include better gun regulations so they don't get into the wrong hands. Five-hundred children a year die in accidental gun deaths and there were 11 mass shootings since Gabby Gifford was shot two years ago. At some point, we have to try and take steps to improve the laws to prevent innocent lives from being taken by mass shootings.

Nashua is a great city and we have great departments who are working hard to resolves these important issues. I hope more people head to school board meetings and continue the discussion.