I don't get all the resistance to putting a cop in schools

[BarackTheVote]

160. 1. The person most likely to shoot up a school, goes to that school

so it's not always going to be a matter of keeping the shooter out of the building, because they're probably already in it. The most important thing is early warning, accurate information, and escape routes.

2. Security guards are positioned at every entrance in courthouses, capitals, and federal buildings, as well as some post offices. Do you feel that these are unnecessary as well?

3. This one just makes no sense. This is part of the guard being a uniformed on-duty police officer. He would know the damn SWAT team and they'd know him, and they would be in communication with each other.

4, 5 & 6. You want to put your kids in a cube that they can't get out of? What if there's a fire? The building you're describing would be a death trap in so many ways. Besides, these school shootings are usually perpetrated by one or two gunmen, there has yet to be an all-out invasion or siege scenario. Locking down the school, trapping students in large areas, and not giving them ANY way out of class rooms is the worst case scenario. You've turned the halls and cafeteria into killing floors. If you can escape through any classroom, then you're less likely to find yourself int he line of sight of a gunman, and once you're outside, your survivability rate skyrockets.

7. Quick and coordinated evacuation strategies that can avoid the gunman or men is absolutely necessary. And I agree that it's probably not possible to stop all casualties at the onset of an incident. BUT, depending on how the school is designed, and the readiness of the teachers, students, and police, you can cut the casualties by a huge number. Nobody should be sitting ducks in a classroom or hallway, everybody should have a place to go where they can flee the building.

8. Agreed as far as the firearms go, but improvised explosives are not difficult to make using common and readily available household items. Besides, who's to say the maniac of the future won't just light a bunch of fires in the school building, because with the school building you described, his mortality rate would be close to total.