During a recent “active shooter drill” held at Meadowlawn Elementary School in Monticello, Indiana, teachers were reportedly ushered into a room and shot “execution-style” with pellets by White County Sheriff Department officials who were running the training.
Subsequently, the Indiana State Teachers Association (ISTA) sent out a series of messages by way of social media calling for some clearer understanding of what exactly was being taught here. The training took place in January and while none of the teachers who experienced this madness have spoken out publicly, the New York Times did speak with a teacher who confirmed that active live pellets had been used in previous active shooter training sessions for teachers.
“What makes it more outrageous is they thought we would need to have that experience of being shot to take this seriously,” she said. “When I thought about it that way, I really started to get angry. Like we are not professionals. It felt belittling.”
Anyone who has ever played paintball knows that depending on the velocity set, you can get pretty badly hurt when being shot with pellets. ISTA vice president Keith Gambill released a statement to the public, as the union presses for an amendment to be added to school safety bill HB 1004, which allots a certain amount of funding for this kind of bananas “safety” activity.
"Educators should never have to endure being fired at with pellets in an active shooter training," said Gambill. "What happened to the educators in Twin Lakes is unconscionable and unacceptable. ISTA is fighting to make sure no other educators in Indiana face the kind of fear-based, injurious training again. ISTA is asking for a simple amendment that would prohibit a school or district from conducting or authorizing an active shooter drill where any school employee or student may have any type of projectile fired at their person."
Gambil also made the salient point to the Indianapolis Star that "We don’t demolish a building to teach teachers and staff members how to prepare for a tornado drill.” No, we don’t.