A school district in Pennsylvania has taken a unique approach to protecting students from school shooters: rocks!
Here’s more:
ABC 16 – The superintendent of the Blue Mountain School District is in the spotlight after telling lawmakers in Harrisburg his students protect themselves against potential school shooters with rocks.
“Every classroom has been equipped with a five-gallon bucket of river stone. If an armed intruder attempts to gain entrance into any of our classrooms, they will face a classroom full students armed with rocks and they will be stoned,” said Dr. David Helsel.
That was Dr. Helsel testifying to the House Education Committee last week in Harrisburg.
The superintendent of the Blue Mountain School District was explaining his unconventional form of protecting the students in their schools in the event of an active shooter situation: give them rocks.
“At one time I just had the idea of river stone, they`re the right size for hands, you can throw them very hard and they will create or cause pain, which can distract,” said Helsel.
Helsel says teachers, staff and students were given active shooter training through a program known as ALICE which stands for Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, Evacuate and they routinely hold evacuation drills for active shooter simulations.
But if a teacher decides to lockdown a classroom, there are rocks in a five-gallon bucket kept in every classroom closet that students could throw if shooters get inside.
Still, Helsel says the rocks are seen as a last resort.
“We have devices installed in our doors that help to secure them, to make it very difficult to break through,” said Helsel. “We also have, we train kids and talk about barricading the doors.”
As the Superintendent points out, this is a last resort measure. They have other measures in place to keep students protected, such as adding more armed security via support staffers.
But as last resorts go, big river rocks are certainly better than nothing. Who knows, maybe some of the students might be MLB pitchers in the making…