Realizing the positive effects education has on their lives, most children and their parents want an education. But some of those same children have been caught bringing weapons into schools.
A school secretary in Brooklyn, NY recently spotted a loaded gun and almost $30,000 in a student’s backpack. Scanners, the following day, uncovered 21 banned items, such as tasers, pepper spray, and brass knuckles.
We do not know the difficulty some students have coming and going have to school. The students with the weapons pointed out they need weapons to protect themselves on the way to school and on the way home.
At a high school I worked in, we found a student who brought a loaded weapon into school. We arrested the student; and, in an interview I had with the parent, the student’s mother said, “Mr. Schargel you have it all wrong. He wasn’t bringing the gun TO school he was bringing the GUN OUT OF THE NEIGHBORHOOD. He goes to school early in the morning while it is dark and is confronted by people who want his school money or clothing. On the way home, he walks over people laying the street who want money or clothing.”
Many students face challenges and obstacles in their desire for an education that we do know or not think about.
Some material has been extracted from Preventing School Violence: A User’s Guide by Franklin P. Schargel to be published by School Success Network Press in January 2022.