Don't Leave A Gun In An Elementary School Bathroom

Let me preface this post by writing that this is not about the second amendment or gun control. I'm limiting my writing to the story of the now former Rising Star, Texas school superintendent Robby Stuteville as best I can. If you haven't heard about this, Stuteville left his gun in an elementary school bathroom. A little later, a third grader found the gun and told his teacher. The teacher then asked another student to check the bathroom and confirm that there really was a gun in the bathroom. I'm just picturing what would happen if my third grader was in the same scenario. While I'd hope that he would tell his teacher, he might think it was a toy and play with it.

Texas is an open-carry state, and apparently, it is known that the superintendent and principal carry guns within the schools. In this NBC article, Monty Jones, the secondary principal for grades 6-12, said that he and Stuteville carry weapons because of school shootings that occurred throughout the country. How can you not be disturbed by this statement? The superintendent and principal feel the need to carry weapons because they fear that their schools could be next. While one could argue that the administration is preparing for the worst-case scenario, that's just a sad statement about the state of our country.

The other part of the story is that jumped out to me was that Stuteville resigned because he didn't want to be a distraction. Jones said that "No one to my knowledge called for his resignation. And the board certainly did not." NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! This is a got-to-go situation. Just because nothing bad happened, Stuteville doesn't get a pass. This could have been disastrous. You cannot be a leader and an educator and make this type of mistake where people could have been hurt or killed and keep your job. He needed to be fired. If you go to the Rising Star school district website, this is posted prominently on the front page.

Stuteville did the exact opposite and needed to go.