For the record, I support the walkout. I'm not teaching at ten o'clock and I will join the students at my school. I'll try to help if I can. That said, there's a lot about this walkout that's curious, if not necessarily bad.

First, of course, there's the mayor's open support. You don't always get a mayor coming out and saying he's okay with a mass protest, but there you go. It's a good cause, and I'm glad he supports it. Then you get the convoluted directions from DOE, which is not really good at anything except violating the UFT Contract for no reason. Cooperate with people? That's not what they do.

Last week an administrator told me that Carmen Fariña directed that the seventeen minutes were excused, but anything beyond that would be considered cutting. I can see it now:

How dare you stay out for eighteen minutes, you little hooligan!

On the other hand, if you're gonna stay out for seventeen minutes, you need passing time. At our school, kids get four minutes to go from class to class. I'd argue they need five, but I already argue about enough things, so I won't do that right now. If they need four minutes, then they need to walk out at 9:56 and return at 10:21.

But kids will be kids, and one thing kids do when they're being kids is talk with other kids. So when you have, in my school at least, literally thousands of kids walking, can you expect them to return on time? Will they say, "Oh my gosh, I've gotta get back to Miss Wormwood's class by 10:17 so let me start walking at 10:13 to beat the rush." And if they all say that, won't the rush begin at 10:13? Or will the rush begin at 10:17, thus rendering tens of thousands of city kids to break Carmen's rule? Will that mean it's no longer a beautiful day, even if Macy's is open?

Who's to say?

More importantly, who will be moved by this protest? Clearly not the NRA, which is already trying to block the modest and far from sufficient measures the governor of Florida is taking to reduce gun availability. Did he clear those changes with them before offering them? Did they conspire to put them up only to challenge them in court? You never know, in the good old USA these days.

In our school, I was asked by one-on-one paraprofessionals what they were to do in case of the walkout. It's a pretty fair question. First, if you don't go with the kids to whom you're assigned, are you shirking your duty? And if you do go, and something happens to the kid, are you responsible? It seems like a no-win situation. Last I heard, they were allowed to go or not as their conscience dictates, but to let someone know if they were not planning to go so the kids could be covered.

For teachers it was a little simpler. Teachers would be permitted to go if all their students left. They would also be permitted to stay as conscience dictated.

In our school, the student government seems to have organized the march out onto our athletic field. They're actually making announcements about it. We've got a pretty cooperative student body. I'm impressed. When I was 15, if I walked out there was no way I was gonna return. I have to suppose we'll have 15-year-olds with similar leanings, and it will be a good day for Arby's and the nearby grease truck.

All this is small potatoes, though, compared to what will surely be a national story. Will we bring our useless politicians to the point where they represent We, the People instead of the gun industry? Time will tell, and Wednesday will have to be one in a series of many events to get us the answer we need.

I haven't read or heard a whole lot about the gun show loophole. This is important, because without closing it, there is nothing that will keep anyone from getting a gun. You might read about, for example, how terrible Chicago is, how they have the toughest gun laws, and how no law will keep it safe. But most of the guns in Chicago don't come from Chicago.

Now sure, it might be a minor inconvenience to leave your city when you need a gun. But if you're set on having one, you'll do it. NYC has pretty tough gun laws too. However, I drive in and out of New York City every working day of my life. If I want to buy a gun in Floral Park, it's a ten-minute drive. And if I don't like the New York State gun laws, I can always drive to a gun show in another state, like Vermont, and get whatever I want.

People who tell you gun laws don't work are right, in a way. The Florida legislators wouldn't even discuss an assault weapon ban, but declared pornography dangerous. They evidently want to protect their young people from pornography but not assault weapons. I'm not entirely sure why they feel that way. After all, it's 2018, and most people I know, outside of professional DJs, don't even own a pornograph any more.

Assault weapon supporters, though, have a good point when they say an assault weapon ban in Florida might not have much effect. Floridians could always take a road trip to, say, Kentucky, and buy one over there. If you're a lunatic set on killing a lot of people, you're probably willing to spend a few hours in your car to get the necessary tools.

So here's the thing--President Trump and the other people who take money from the GOP are outrageous hypocrites if they say regulation doesn't work. This is because they are now under so much pressure that they're proposing regulations. The only major issue is the regulation they're proposing won't work. I wouldn't be surprised if they had sat around, decided to enact regulation that wouldn't work. That way, when it didn't work, they could say, "See? We tried it your way, but it didn't work."

In this, they remind me of no one more than Bloomberg's DOE. I distinctly recall going to an out-of-building PD and hearing about a new program. I don't remember anymore what it was, but I remember thinking it was plainly ridiculous. I objected to the presenter, and his defense was, "Well, we had to do something."  I also remember my response. I said, "We don't need you to do just anything. We need you to do something that works." The DOE hack had no response for that.

Trump is proposing better background checks, but as long as the gun show loophole is open, anyone can get whatever they want without one. I don't believe mental illness makes people violent, and I read somewhere that only 3% of those who suffer from it are violent. Nonetheless, people who suffer from mental illness ought not to have access to military weapons. You might find that discriminatory, but it's not. No one but the military ought to have military weapons.

The game the NRA and the politicians owned by it is playing is saying that those who suffer from mental illness ought not to have access to any firearms at all. Maybe they're right, but what they're really saying is those who don't suffer from mental illness ought to have access to assault weapons. That way, they sell more assault weapons. And frankly, the NRA is not just a group of gun owners. It's a lobby for gun manufacturers.

What's more important, gun sales, or our safety, and the safety of our children? That's a pretty easy answer for me. In America, in 2018, we need to ban the sale of assault weapons, buy back as many as we can from existing owners, and arrange for fewer guns out there. The notion of arming teachers does precisely the opposite, and every other proposal Trump is now talking up serves only to maintain the status quo while feigning action.

The knee-jerk reaction to the Florida shooting, among jerks both with and without knees, was that we need more guns in schools. While we're on the subject of jerks, Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos thinks we need to have a robust conversation about them.

Now Betsy DeVos is all about using schools to make her rich friends even richer. I don't imagine there are a whole lot of gun manufacturers moonlighting as cabdrivers, so why not help them out?

DeVos had previously not made a big issue over the right to bear arms, focusing more on the threat of armed bears. But hey, whatever pulls money out of the pockets of working people and relocates it to those of people who least need it is good with DeVos and all her fellow Trumpies.

The public argument goes like this--the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. Like those who make such arguments, I've watched a lot of television. I have observed that good guys with guns tend to do better than bad guys with guns. This is true from 1950s westerns right up to the present day. Here's the thing, though--while as a teacher I consider myself one of the good guys, I haven't got the remotest notion what to do with a gun. And even if I were trained how to use it, I have no idea how I'd react to a bad guy with a gun.

Here's another fact--the fewer guns we have, the fewer people will be shot with them. Trump talks a big ball game about guns, at times even suggesting that "second amendment people" might take down Hillary Clinton. But when it comes his time to address the NRA, guns are not allowed. The Secret Service are expert in protecting the President, and they determined the best way to do so was to remove guns from the equation altogether.

If that's the way to keep people safe, our kids ought to be kept safe in precisely the same manner. Where there are no guns, there is no one getting shot, not intentionally, not by accident, not at all. My home has no guns, and no gun accidents either. My house does have a dog, and we do have dog accidents now and then. Sometimes he pees on the floor and I clean it up. Sometimes I accidentally kick him if I don't see him. I pet him and apologize and he seems to understand. But no one goes to the hospital or dies.

President Ronald Reagan was shot in 1981. He was surrounded by good guys with guns. In fact, as Secret Service, they were the best trained good guys with guns in the world. It certainly could have been worse, but even so it was unacceptable. Teachers can be taught about gun use, but we won't be the best trained good guys in the world, and hey, things on TV don't always reflect reality. Once the bad guys shoot the good guy with a gun, it's open season on said good guy's students.

As if that weren't enough, there was an armed guard at the Florida high school where 17 people were murdered. The guard never saw the shooter. Here's how we deal with this--we stop selling assault weapons to Americans. These weapons should be the exclusive province of the military, and the people who offer them to others are criminals, whether or not the law says so.

In Australia, they found a way to deal with mass shootings. They bought back a bunch of guns and made them unavailable. While that won't be perfect, it will at least curb the rampant availability of such weapons. We also need to close the gun show loophole that pretty much renders all state regulations moot.

If I have to insure my car for liability, you damn well ought to have to insure your gun for the same. It's nice that Trump, who took 30 million dollars from the NRA, is now paying lip service to this issue. But we need a lot more than that. Bringing guns into classrooms is one of the very stupidest notions I've ever heard in my life.

Related: Newt Gingrich states arming teachers is only long-term solution.

If you're a Pennsylvania teacher, you can Make America Great Again by bringing your gun to school. After all, you're a role model, so why wouldn't you want to protect yourself and your students by packing heat? And hey, if you're the kind of teacher who thinks bringing guns into the classroom is the way to do it, who am I to question you? Besides, what with you having a gun and all, I wouldn't dream of questioning you.

And after all, what could go wrong? Cops carry guns all the time, and it's not like people get shot by cops. Okay, well actually there were 498 people, this year, and 963 the year before. Admittedly, cops have a very stressful job. They have to deal with difficult people who don't always do as they are asked. On the other hand, teachers, well, we kind of have to do the same thing.

Personally, I can't conceive of an instance in which I'd have wanted to shoot a student. On the other hand, neither can I conceive of an instance in which I'd have wanted to carry a gun. The thing is, I wonder if someone inclined to carry a gun might be more inclined to use it. Now sure, they say the people who carry guns to school will receive training. I don't know about you, but I get trained in some new and indispensable way to teach each and every year. It doesn't mean I'm gonna use it. I also sat in a defensive driving class with maybe thirty people a few weeks back. Does that mean no one will have an accident?

There are risks involved with having guns in your home. There are higher risks of homicide, suicide and accidents involved with their mere presence. Does anyone think these risks won't be transferred to school? Does anyone think everyone in a school building is immune to bouts of temper, or losing control? I mean, believe it or not, even administrators are human.

I used to teach writing Saturdays at a community college. Whenever I teach writing, the first thing I do is, you know, make everyone write. That way, I can see where they are and what they need. One day, a student wrote something like, "Everybody has a gun. I have a gun." I was working with a senior tenured professor that day, and I told him I did not want this student in my class. He said he would take him. For whatever reason, I never saw that student again in any class.

I didn't know this student at all. I had no reason to believe he was crazy or dangerous. His bad judgment in letting me know that could easily have been naivete. He seemed perfectly friendly and non-threatening. In fact, he may have been boasting just to show me how cool he was. I didn't care. The risk of having someone with a gun in my classroom was unacceptable.

Now I've been teaching for over thirty years, both high school and college,  It's entirely possible I faced students with guns.without having the remotest clue. But the fact is, on the single occasion when it appeared to be a possibility, the first thing I did was say it was unacceptable. I guess I was fortunate that the professor said what he did. Honestly, I questioned his judgment. Perhaps he didn't see the danger I did. On the other hand, perhaps he did something to ensure the student's absence the next week. I would certainly have walked from that job rather than teach a student I knew could be carrying.

Given all that, I find it completely unacceptable that PA schools allow such a thing. Politicians who enable it are a bunch of morons, indifferent to not only education, but also human life. They will say this will reduce the chances of some gunman coming into the school and going nuts. I doubt it. There are simple reasons why homes with guns have more accidents, homicides and suicides than homes without guns. I don't doubt there are responsible gun owners, but neither do I doubt there are irresponsible ones.

I don't doubt at all that allowing guns in school will cause unnecessary and fatal incidents, and that the chances of such incidents are much higher than those of in-school terrorism.

This brings stupid to a very high level, right on par with allowing Donald Trump to be President.

I'm not Obama's biggest fan, and I didn't even vote for him the second time he ran. His education record is abysmal. But he's right about guns. How anyone can oppose background checks for people wanting to buy firearms is simply unfathomable.

Of course the Republicans hate everything Barack Obama does. That, I suspect, is why there's so much right wing opposition to his miserable and baseless education program. When GW Bush was in charge the GOP loved every stupid idea he had. They embraced every ridiculous idea he championed, including the notion that every child would be perfect by 2014 or schools would pay. But when Obama came out with Race to the Top, which was just as stupid, they said the Fed ought not to meddle in education.

I used to be horrified when GOP politicians said they wanted to abolish the Department of Education. Now, after years of Arne Duncan, and after Barack Obama found someone even worse in the form of Reformy John King, I'd be happy to see them blow the whole place up and salt the ground so nothing could ever grow there again. John King has no problem sending his kid to schools that don't use the crappy programs he imposes on our kids. Barack Obama has no problem doing the same. If these programs are so state of the art, why aren't they good enough for their children?

Nonetheless, Obama did a good thing by imposing rules on the lunatic gun lobby. It's outrageous and unconscionable that the GOP presidential hopefuls can oppose such common sense rules. Will Obama's order solve our gun problem? Of course not. But if even one fewer lunatic gets his hands on a firearm, if one fewer person dies, if there's one fewer mass shooting, it will be worth it.

Marco Rubio can stand up in front of God and everybody and say that released felons cannot vote, but have every right to buy guns. For the life of me, I can't figure out why someone who's unfit to select a leader is fit to carry around a firearm. But I'm not privy to the workings of the GOP mindset.

Sometimes it's good when Democrats are Democrats. Sadly, for working people, those times are few and far between. One thing that caused me to vote for Obama the first time was his support of the Employee Free Choice Act. That would've made it easier for working people to join unions. But alas, not only did he not help it pass, but as far as I can tell, he never pushed for it to come up for a vote.

I can't understand how anyone can reasonably oppose Obama's executive action on firearms. From what I read, 90% of the American public support this. It's obscene that the NRA and the gun lobby can supersede the wishes of the overwhelming majority of Americans, but that's where we are in the USA in 2016.

In the wake of the insane shooting that took the lives of churchgoers, for the offense of their skin color, a lot of Americans are thinking this--how the hell did that insane racist get his hands on a firearm? How can we keep firearms from lunatics and criminals?

It's very tough to do this in the United States. For one thing, the NRA is very powerful. It does everything it can to hinder any and all restrictions on firearms. And a big talking point is that there are too many, not too few laws. Another, around here, is how tough the laws are in New York and New Jersey. These arguments sound pretty good unless you consider them a little more carefully.

There's a glaring gun show loophole in the United States. I mentioned this on Facebook, and a commenter replied that New York had very tough gun show rules. However, if 33 other states don't, what difference does it make? You can go to some show, buy a gun, and bring it to New York or anywhere else with no issue. What difference does it make how tough the laws are in New York or New Jersey if you can freely go elsewhere and buy anything?

A chain is only as strong as its weakest link, and no one checks anyone crossing state borders. That's why Bonnie and Clyde were always crossing them. In Iowa, blind people can get gun permits. I'm not sure they can get driver's licenses, so they may have to enlist friends to drive them over state borders, but you get my point. State laws are largely irrelevant, and a poor argument against regulating firearms. While they don't work, it's ridiculous to determine, therefore, that legislation is useless. That implies Americans should shrug our collective shoulders, sigh, and say, "Oh well, I guess we'll have more churches and schools shot up." 

Another objection I hear is that many of the guns in these incidents are unregistered. Considering that anyone can go to any of 33 states and buy a firearm without a background check, that's not surprising. What's surprising is that any thinking person could oppose closing the gun show loophole. Guns don't magically rain from the sky. Gun owners should be responsible for accounting for their guns and immediately reporting their sale, disposal or theft. Guns need to be regulated nationally, not by state.

Some will argue that this violates the 10th Amendment, or that this abridges their rights under the 2nd Amendment. Some will say this violates the sanctity of the Constitution. But the fact is, the Constitution was not given to Moses by God on a mountaintop. Were that the case, there would be no need for amendments. And the amendments are not etched in stone on those tablets either.

It's our job to prevent further atrocities. It's our job to do everything in our power to remove options from lunatics. I don't see how that hinders law-abiding gun owners, but with all due respect, they are not priority number one for me. The presumption that their right to own guns trumps the right of churchgoers and students to worship and study in peace is a poor one.

This country bends over backwards to accommodate the NRA. It also bends over backwards to accommodate Bill Gates. It's time we do what's best for our people, rather than what's best for those who stuff the most cash into the pockets of our politicians.

UFT President Michael Mulgrew announced that, despite the preposterous demands of Tweed, there may be a road to a new evaluation process after all. Recent outcries in the press have suggested a solution that may be a win-win.

"As you know," stated President Mulgrew, "there's been a lot of talk about arming teachers. We've seen this come up, most recently in Michigan, and we think there may be a compromise here. You've probably heard the expression an armed society is a polite society. We at the UFT believe that an armed teacher may inspire a polite administrator."

An administrator, speaking on conditions of anonymity, confirmed Mulgrew's theory, saying, "I'm not giving a bad evaluation to an armed teacher. If I think some teacher is crazy, and that teacher has a gun, I'll just give a good rating and hope for the best. I don't care what the principal says."

And indeed, there is no talk of arming principals. Personally, I abhor firearms and wouldn't carry one on a bet. But I wouldn't hesitate to say I had one if it would keep some crazy administrator from judging me based on junk science test scores.

Mayor Bloomberg has not yet responded to the compromise offer. Mulgrew was very clear that this was only about arming teachers, and that if administrators were armed as well, the deal was off.