Burleson Schools Training To Defend Against Gunmen
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Jay Gormley
Reporting
(CBS 11 News) BURLESON In the City of Burleson, teachers are taking a 'September 11th' approach to safety. Norwood Elementary Principal Lisa Crane says the means to defend our schools can be found in the classrooms.
"Do we need to put armies in schools? I have a small army here," she said.
The Burleson Independent School District is training its’ teachers and students to fight back if a gunman walks into a classroom.
"Just because the gun goes off does not mean you can't still fight. You can still try to gain control of the situation where you can still get the children out," Lisa said.
The idea came about when, ‘then’ policeman, Greg Crane asked his wife, “What would you do?” Lisa didn't have an answer. "Crawling under a table and hoping and waiting for rescue is not a recipe for survival," Greg said.
With the help of fellow police officers and military friends, Greg trains teachers and students how to attack instead of standing idly by.
“The first rule of defense is to understand that everything in a classroom can be used as a weapon; a pencil, a book, scissors, picture frames, even a computer monitor," Greg said.
Greg’s wife agrees, saying, "Anything that will throw that person off for a minute and give those children a fighting chance."
Part of the course, called Critical Incident Response, involves a training video that shows students throwing objects and then rushing and tackling a gunman.
Greg teaches that, "Between the sight and the sound, the noise, the mayhem and the chaos… the gunman has to mentally deal with that. Which means he’s thinking of that and not about pulling the trigger?"
All 600 teachers in the Burleson ISD have been trained for Critical Incident Response and the district just received a $95,000 federal grant to train all of the students as well.
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