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I have been teaching now for 27 years and I've never had such a stressful time.
Teaching as I have now.
In the era of school shootings.
Every day is a nervous wreck sometimes.
Prior to the shooting at my school, it was always this kind of looming thing that happened
in other places.
And then once it happened to us, now we're part of this terrible club of gun violence
survivors.
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Immediately after we returned, after the shooting here, I still felt safe, but I did not sign
up to have all of these added, asks, and responsibilities put upon me outside of what I am contractually
obligated to do.
It never feels normal because we can never normalize it, but it's become something that
we're way too used to as a country.
00;01;10;23 - 00;01;37;09 Unknown
And I will say that a term I've been using a lot to describe how I'm feeling and other
teachers and people who work in school us and students across America, we're all feeling
like we are sitting ducks.
To the person who tells me, you just need training and this is all you need to know
with the amount of ammunition that you can get and the power and lethality of the weapons
that we have.
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It happens so fast.
Prior to surviving a school shooting, myself personally, I watched on the news I knew that
they happened occasionally, but I never really had this impending sense that it was going
to happen to me.
We've all run through the drills.
They are very scary to do, but very important to do.
I ran through one scenario and I was very honest with my students and I cried in front
of my seniors.
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Because the, quote unquote, active shooter was outside of my door and I had made a mistake.
You want to know what it does to kids?
I'm with high school kids.
And the last time we had one, the people who were checking the doors had a flashlight.
And so we were in my room in this back room, and we could see the flashlight shining through
the shades.
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Several kids just burst out in tears.
And honestly, I felt I felt like crying, too.
I don't think we should drag children through these horrendous drills, and we certainly
shouldn't have them endure active active simulations that mimic real trauma and death, because
this the onus of gun violence is on the adults.
And so how dare we put this on kids?
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Unfortunately, I've become a pro at holding space for students when there's another school
shooting.
And if you can tell from the tone of my voice, I'm angry I'm I'm so angry that I know how
to have conversations with young people about about school shootings.
I was teaching standing in a cafeteria one time when there was a school shooting.
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Never once did I think we'd have to take safety measures and learn how to pack a room that's
bleeding too much.
I'm going to have to figure out how to turn my desk into a door anchor to kind of prevent
someone from going in.
This is something that was never taught in a class that was never explained to any of
the educators coming out during my era.
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I'm a teacher because whether I like it or not, I can't help but see the good in people.
And every one of my kids, I see the good in them.
And I am being asked now to not do that, to look for the red flags, to see them as potential
enemies, which goes against everything I am as a teacher.
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We all know that arming a teacher is not the solution because let's let's discuss the fact
that the good guys with the guns, the police, they had guns that didn't stop it.
And they're trained professionals and we're already seeing rapid, rapid turnover, resignation
of teachers, of educators.
This is just going to discourage more people to go into teaching.
00;04;27;03 - 00;04;46;26 Unknown
That would be the day that I retire from teaching, if not only for me, if I was forced to be
armed in the classroom, but even if other teachers volunteer to be armed, I would I
would retire from teaching if the shooter had gotten into my room that day.
I mean, I don't have a gun, but if I did I wouldn't have been able to access it.
00;04;46;26 - 00;05;15;22 Unknown
I would have been shot and killed.
I would feel better prepared if I felt that society cared more about teachers than they
do right now.
I have felt so much hatred towards teachers that I haven't felt even last year, nothing
like this.
The teachers are not OK.
They're not OK.
You've already they need an incredible amount of care and support.
00;05;16;05 - 00;05;43;22 Unknown
They cannot be told that.
You just need to kind of suck it up and move on.
And I don't think anybody actually says that to survivors that that's how it often feels.
I'm 20 years into this and I could tell you 20 years as an educator is hard.
20 years as a black educator is even harder.
And the repercussions on my health irreplaceable.