School Shooting: Thesis Statement

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Thesis:

By strengthening gun laws and improving school security, mass school shootings would become minimal and we would not have as many across the nation.

I. Have you ever asked yourself when this would stop, or how many more innocent children would have to die in order for something to change?

  • A. In 2018, there were 113 people killed or hurt in mass school shootings across the United States.
  • B. 2018 has been the worst year for school shootings yet.

II. As months go by, we continue to see stories on TV, social media, or even as close as our own hometowns where there have been mass school shootings.

III. In order for these mass shootings to stop, we need to improve the security of schools across the United States and also strengthen gun laws.

IV. There are many people across the nation that would also agree that we need to find a way to eliminate school shootings, so innocent people stop dying.

V. Today, I plan on identifying the problem of school shootings and then explaining two solutions I researched.

  • A. In order to explain and make my case today, I will begin by explaining the statistics of mass shootings in school and identifying the problem.
  • B. Secondly, I will describe two solutions that could be made in order to help minimize this issue.
  • C. Lastly, I will be describing the solution I think makes the most sense and explain why I think that.

I. Main Point #1: School shootings have been around for over 30 years, but in the past few years, the number of people injured or killed by these shootings has increased.

  • A. As Tanya Greathouse said in her article School Shootings published in 2019, a school shooting, in the typical case, is an event in which a student at an educational institution- an elementary, middle, or high school or a college or university- shoots and injures or kills at least one other student or faculty member on the grounds of that institution.
    • 1. 2018 has been the highest year of shootings or gun-related problems in schools since the 1970s. There were 94 incidents just in 2018 alone. Relating this back to my topic of strengthening gun laws, the majority of these occurrences involved the use of handguns.
    • 2. As Jason Silverstein wrote in the article There have been more mass shootings than days this year in 2019, as of September 1, the number of mass shootings across the US thus far in 2019 has outpaced the number of days this year, according to a gun violence research group.

II. Main Point #2: One solution to decrease the number of mass school shootings in the United States, would be to strengthen our gun laws across the nation.

  • A. Gun Control is a broad term that covers any sort of restriction on what kinds of firearms can be sold and bought, who can possess or sell them, where and how they can be stored or carried, what duties a seller has to vet a buyer, and what obligations both the buyer and the seller have to report to transactions to the government (NYTimes).
    • 1. As Colleen Walsh stated in the article Want to stop mass shootings? in 2019, the elephant in the room, the thing that makes us stand out among the 29 other high-income countries is our guns and our weak gun laws.
  • B. Something that would help have stricter gun laws would be to have stricter background checks on people buying guns.
    • 1. Although currently, you still have to receive a background check in order to buy a gun, there have been many loopholes found in the system.
      • a. Gun owners: training, loading their guns safely, storing their guns safely, having a reason to own the gun2. For example, as Richard Perez-Pena said in the article Gun control explained in 2015, the law prohibits gun possession by a person adjudicated as mentally defective by a court or other authority. Most people with a serious mental illness never receive such adjudication, and those who do can petition courts to have it reversed. Many mass shootings have been carried out by people who were recognized by those around them as being deeply disturbed, yet were able to own guns legally.
      • a. Nobody should have to worry about going to school or sending their child to school to receive an education and think that someone around them is carrying a firearm3. In some states, if you have a carry permit, you have the ability to carry a firearm onto public school grounds
  • C. Although there are two opinions to everything, I would think the vast majority of people in the United States would agree to strengthen our gun laws when it comes to school shootings because this would save innocent lives.

III. Main Point #3: The second solution I found on how to minimize the number of school shootings across the nation would be to improve school security.

  • 1. As Nicole Saidi said in the article 10 Ways to put brakes on mass shootings in Schools in 2012, We should have stricter security in schools, no matter how nice and safe an area seems to be.
    • a. Sometimes we can lose track of the idea that no matter where you live, no matter if it city or urban school, or how nice it is, a school shooting can happen anywhere
  • 2. As Paul Dughi said in the article How can schools increase security to prevent mass shootings? in 2019, there are several ways and ideas to make schools safer from shootings, for example, lockdown drills and active shooter exercises, increased awareness, increased police and security presence, visible security cameras, and metal detectors.
    • a. Although there is no ligament evidence that proves that these ideas will decrease school shootings, it is worth the try if it had the potential to save lives.

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