Teachers to be ordered to "charge up the hill" into machine gun fire...

[Igel]

1. The only imbalance between a handgun and AR-15

would be the size of the magazine.

Most handguns are semi-automatic. Things like AR-15s more often have larger capacity magazines. Handguns can have 10 or 15 round magazines, but I suspect they're more rare. I've seen 30-round handgun magazines for sale. Beyond knowing that these things exist, can't say much more. Not my hobby.

Automatic weapons are rare. It's hard to tell that because so many people use "assault rifle" (selective fire, including an automatic setting) and "assault weapon" (invariably semi-automatic) as though they were the same thing. One's been heavily regulated and all but banned for quite a while.

I'll repeat what I wrote last night. I've known teachers who wanted to carry handguns. They'd have them on their person at all times. And instead of going out after the shooter, they'd be behind a locked door with their students: If the intruder came through the door, they'd be waiting for him. Unless the intruder used a student as a human shield, it would be unlikely students would be between the two fighters. Behind the intruder would be pretty much empty hall. Behind the teacher, students. They weighed the usefulness of having a gun against the usefulness of not having one.