With thousands of people dying from firearm injuries every year, the gun safety policy has currently become one of the major public health issues. Gun safety policy is designed to explicitly address the issue of gun abuse, which eventually leads to accidental discharges and life-threatening issues. The vast majority of firearm injuries include damages from handguns, rifles, and shotguns. Although the gun prevention policy is extremely beneficial in society’s context in general, the issue rate is presently rapidly growing among children and adolescents who become victims of gun misuse.
According to the latest statistics provided by the CDC, more than 1,000 children die, and nearly 6,000 get a firearm-related injury treatment each year. Over the last years, the frequency of firearm injury incidents has been steadily rising. Such alarming dynamics makes people live in fear for them and their children every single day. Hence, it is one’s public duty to make sure that children and adolescents, being one of the major risk groups, are raised in a safe and violence-free environment. For this purpose, authorities define various policies to prevent gun abuse at educational facilities.
It can be real
Imagine the world where children feel safe in their environment without being afraid for their lives and the lives of their closest while they are away. Such a favorable scenario might be real once effective gun safety policy in the educational establishments is implemented across the state. Moreover, considering that approximately 5% of children witnessing shootings every year, the abolishment of free gun carriage would significantly decrease the violence rate among adolescents due to the absence of bad influence.
Existing law/policy on gun violence
- Increasing the Use of School Resource Officers is a policy proposed during Barack Obama’s presidency. School Resource Officer or SRO is a law enforcement officer responsible for the safety and well-being of the students. This policy’s major aim is to ensure that schools are treated as communities where everyone is responsible for their actions. Despite the purely benevolent cause, the corruption rate and overall mistrust in the law enforcement system have restrained the policy’s efficiency.
- The Gun-Free Schools Act, passed in 1994, presupposes the enhancement of the school administration’s actions toward violence prevention. According to the law, students accused of possessing guns were to be expelled from the establishment for at least one year. In order to ensure the efficiency of the procedure, the government is obliged to provide schools with sufficient funds to take immediate measures on gun violence.
What do our opponents think?
Opponents of the existing policies on gun safety often claim that the current controversial reputation of law enforcement does not allow them to take control over such an important issue as gun violence among children. However, while police actions may, in fact, sometimes be controversial, gun abuse is, by all means, unacceptable, so the slightest opportunity to combat it should be favored and supported by the public.
Policy Recommendation
One of the most well-known laws on safety in public schools is the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990. The policy implies capital punishment for the individuals who possess guns within a school zone and the guns’ discharge. Although the law proved to be efficient, it has one major flaw. The law itself contains an exception on gun possession as a part of a school program, making it possible to avoid the punishment. Hence, it is our duty as citizens to ensure that every incidence of gun possession within the school area is reacted to by law.
Suggested Resources
S.2070 – Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990
Firearm Violence Prevention
Childhood Firearm Injuries in the United States, CDC
Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence
School Safety: Guns in Schools