Save the Youth  
By: Ryan DeSacia

There have been 193 deaths and 355 injuries in America related to school shootings from 1990 to the present. That is a very alarming statistic. There needs to be changes made to make schools safer across America. Kids and teachers need to feel and be safer at school. Parents should not have to worry about their child not coming home from school.           

           One immense problem is the lack of care for people who have mental health issues.  Signs of depression, antisocial traits, anger issues, blaming others for problems and being bullied repeatedly are signs of mental illness. 59% of the public mass school shootings the shooter had mental issues or had exhibited signs of mental concern previous to the shooting.   There needs to be more funding and resources put into schools to expand the current programs and create new ones. Increasing the training about mental health for the staff who works in the school community could aid in coping strategies for solving problems. Children spend a minimum of six hours at school on the weekdays. That is a vast majority of the child’s time spent at school. Research shows that children are more likely to reach out for help if it is offered at school. We should increase the amount of school counselors and psychologists in school communities. This would grant more time with a counselor for each student.        

There are 393 million guns owned by civilians in the U.S.A. There are only 326 million people living in America. That’s a gun for every man, woman and child in America. There are more guns than people. Guns are too accessible to citizens, and there is an urgency for stricter gun laws. One problem is we do not have uniform or standard laws for the country with regards to background checks when purchasing guns from an unlicensed dealer. Background checks on the unlicensed would assist in preventing guns ending up in the hands of individuals who should not obtain them. When background checks need further information to be taken, the FBI and ATF only have three business days until the dealer can sell the person a gun automatically. One big argument about keeping guns is that people hunt with them. One survey went out in Pennsylvania to 4,000 hunters, and the results show that hunters do not want semi-automatic guns; most of the guns that people kill people with in the school shootings are semi-automatic guns.    

We as a nation need to make adjustments to our gun control laws and help people who are suffering from mental health problems to get us out of this crisis we are in.  The government has an obligation to protect children while they are at school.