COLCORD, Okla. -- Colcord Schools is one of the first local districts to arm school staff members since Oklahoma passed a law in 2015 allowing school districts to authorize employees to carry handguns.
The Colcord School Board passed a policy in January 2018 allowing the school to arm select employees, including both teachers and support staff, who have passed stringent training requirements, according to Superintendent Bud Simmons.
The district has been very conservative and thorough in the process of implementing the policy and only recently hung signs that state, "Please be aware that certain staff members at Colcord Public Schools can be legally armed and may use whatever force is necessary to protect our students," he said.
Oklahoma passed a law in 2015 allowing local school boards to adopt a policy to authorize staff members to carry handguns if they have an armed security guard license or a reserve peace officer certification, according to the Oklahoma State Courts Network website.
In Arkansas, schools are allowed to hire employees with armed security guard certification, however the Siloam Springs School District has no plans to arm teachers or school employees, according to Superintendent Jody Wiggins. Instead, the district relies on a strong school resource officer program, with five officers in the district, as well as a host of other safety measures.
Colcord's first step toward better security was to hire James Blower as school resource officer in 2018, Simmons said. Blower is a certified instructor who has helped train employees and implement the new policy.
In order to be armed, school employees must have a valid Oklahoma Council on Law Enforcement Education and Training (CLEET) issued armed security guard or reserve peace officer license, according to the school policy. The employee must also have a valid Oklahoma Self-Defence Act License and must prove their handgun skills by earning a qualifying shooting score on a law enforcement course at least once a quarter.
Employees are required to keep their firearm concealed on their person or locked and secured, the policy states. Participation is completely voluntary for the more than 100 employees and staff members must be approved by the school board and the administration. They must provide their own weapons and ammunition, which must also be approved.
The district has gone beyond the required training and has taken a vigilant and thorough approach, addressing topics such as recognizing an assailant and what to do when law enforcement officials get on scene, Simmons said.
The policy allows the district to pay staff members a stipend for participating in the program, but the school district isn't currently paying stipends, Simmons said.
Simmons said there are armed staff members in each of the district's three school buildings -- the elementary school, middle school and high school. He said he can't reveal the number of staff members who are armed or their identities because of a 2017 amendment to the state law requiring confidentiality. He noted that the identities of the employees who are armed are also confidential to other school staff members.
Arming staff members is not a decision that Simmons takes lightly. As a Colcord graduate, who has spent 22 years teaching in the district and six years as superintendent, he has strong ties to the community. His two children attend the school, but he feels that all 620 students are his kids, he said.
He also had some reservations. Educators, who focus on nurturing kids, inherently have a different mindset than law enforcement officials, who focus on safety and security, he said.
"It's really uncomfortable for me, extremely uncomfortable," he said. "It's something I really had to meditate and pray about it honestly before I brought it up to the school board and talked about it as an administrative group. It was just a strong conviction that we needed to look at this."
Colcord Schools have never received any threats of violence, Simmons said. However, the campus is arranged in a way that is difficult to secure.
The rural location of the school district also played into the decision, he said. It would take three to five minutes for the small Colcord Police Department to respond, while response from the Delaware County Sheriff's Office and Oklahoma Highway Patrol could be 20 to 40 minutes longer depending on whether there are any officers in the area, he said.
In any sort of mass shooting incident, five seconds is an eternity and most shootings have lasted seconds to minutes, he said.
"The reality of it is, the adults we have on campus are going to be the first responders to an armed intruder," Simmons said. "If they are unarmed they are going to be casualties. If they are armed, they may have the ability to neutralize the threat before they get to accomplish their goals."
Most assailants are looking for a soft target, but because of the school resource officer and armed staff members Colcord is no longer a soft target, Simmons said. The signs also serve as a preventative measure letting would-be attackers know they will be met with resistance, he said.
"As the superintendent, as the board of education, as the administration, we just felt like if we could possibly save some lives then why not do it?" he said. "I guess that was probably the deciding point on that."
Simmons said Colcord looked to other Oklahoma districts who have armed staff members, such as Chouteau and Locust Grove, when writing its policy.
Locally, the Kansas, Watts and Oaks school districts do not have a policy arming teachers, school officials confirmed.
"We've talked about it, but our board, and me included, don't think that's the answer," said Jim Burgess, superintendent of the Kansas School District. "That's just adding fuel to the fire."
"We don't have one and there has been no discussion on it," said Wyman Thompson, superintendent of the Oaks School District.
The Oklahoma Department of Education doesn't keep a record of school districts that have implemented a policy allowing staff members to be armed, according to Steffie Corcoran, communications director.
The Oklahoma State School Boards Association also does not track school district policies, said Christie Watson, communications director.
"It's a local control (issue) for local communities to decide whether it is right for their school district or community," she said.
Shawn Hime, OSSBA executive director, said his organization encourages school board members to talk to local law enforcement agencies about all the factors involved. For some small rural communities, it can take local law enforcement 20 to 40 minutes to arrive on scene, he said.
Districts are also encouraged to look very closely at who they designate as their security personnel because it is very difficult for employees to do multiple jobs at once, he said. Employees need to be focused on their job of protecting students when they are carrying or would have access to a firearm.
Simmons agreed that having the right employees is key to arming staff members and said having trusted staff members with the right mindset enables Colcord to arm employees.
"I think every district is different, every community is different, and they need to do what's the best in their communities," Simmons said. "I wouldn't think it's the answer across the board for everybody to do. No, I think it's what's best for Colcord."
General News on 12/11/2019