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200 utah teachers take free firearms training class | fox news
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200 Utah teachers take free firearms training class
Published December 28, 2012 | FoxNews.com ADVERTISEMENT
SALT LAKE CITY – Gun-rights advocates in Utah offered six hours of training Thursday in handling concealed weapons for hundreds
of Utah teachers in the wake of the massacre in Newtown, Connecticut.
The latest effort to arm teachers to confront school assailants was organized by the Utah Shooting Sports Council, which hosted the
training session to help educators become eligible for concealed firearm permits, FOX 13 News reported.
More than 200 teachers flocked to the training class in the Salt Lake City suburb of West Valley City. Raye Ann Blauer, a
kindergarten teacher, told FOX 13 she is considering using her permit to carry a firearm at school.
“[A]fter everything that happened in Connecticut, I want to be aware of how I can help in the classroom and protect my kids and
whatnot. Be aware,” Blauer said. “I think it’s really smart. Especially with everything that’s happened lately.”
English teacher Kevin Leatherbarrow holds a license to carry a concealed weapon and doesn't see anything wrong with arming
teachers in the aftermath of the deadly Connecticut school shooting.
"We're sitting ducks," said Leatherbarrow, who works at a Utah charter school. "You don't have a chance in hell. You're dead -- no
ifs, ands or buts."
In Ohio, a firearms group said it was launching a test program in tactical firearms training for 24 teachers. The Arizona attorney
general is proposing a change to state law to allow an educator in each school to carry a gun.
The moves come after the National Rifle Association proposed placing an armed officer at each of the nation's schools after a
gunman on Dec. 14 killed 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.
There are already police officers in some of the nation's schools. Parents and educators, however, have questioned how safe the
NRA proposal would keep kids, whether it would be economically feasible and how it would alter student life.
Some educators say it is dangerous to allow guns. Among the dangers are teachers being overpowered for their weapons or
students getting them and accidentally or purposely shooting classmates.
"It's a terrible idea," said Carol Lear, a chief lawyer for the Utah Office of Education. "It's a horrible, terrible, no-good, rotten idea."
Utah educators say they would ban guns if they could, but legislators left them with no choice. State law forbids schools, districts or
college campuses from imposing their own gun restrictions.
Educators say they have no way of knowing how many teachers are armed. Gun-rights advocates estimate 1 percent of Utah
teachers, or 240, are licensed to carry concealed weapons. It's not known how many do so at school.
Gun-rights advocates say teachers can act more quickly than law enforcement in the critical first few minutes to protect children
from the kind of deadly shooting that took place in Connecticut.
"We're not suggesting that teachers roam the halls" for an armed intruder, said Clark Aposhian, chairman of the Utah Shooting
Sports Council, the state's leading gun lobby. "They should lock down the classroom. But a gun is one more option if the shooter"
breaks into a classroom, he said.
The council said it would waive its $50 fee for the training. Instruction will feature plastic guns and a major emphasis will be for