Gov. Greg Abbott directed the Texas Education Agency to create a school safety and security chief who would report to the agency's commissioner.
“The Uvalde shooting has added another layer — outright fear — to the reasons why teachers are questioning their profession,” Texas AFT President Zeph Capo said. “They know that they would put themselves in the line of fire to save their students, and they also know that more guns inside schools are not the answer.”
Hundreds of flowers, trinkets and photos encircle a fountain in Uvalde’s main plaza to honor the 19 children and two teachers who were killed in last week’s Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde.Nicole Hill, the union’s lead digital organizer, said during a Wednesday press conference that the threat of gun violence will only exacerbate the existing teacher and school staff retention crisis. When AFT surveyed members earlier this year, 66% said they were considering leaving the profession.
In the wake of the 2018 Santa Fe High School shooting — in which a 17-year-old killed 10 classmates and injured 13 others in a town southeast of Houston — the state Legislature adopted laws to. Part of that legislation distributed $100 million in grants for schools to “harden” campuses, making them more secure in order to deter potential violence and other risks.
“That’s not a serious number when we’re talking about the funding necessary to make sure that schools are safe,” he said. “We may have started down the road, but we’ve certainly not finished the road of actually providing necessary and adequate funding for our public spaces, in particular schools, to ensure that they’re safe for our students and our educators.”
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