Courtesy of Michelle Donnay
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Michelle Donnay, a school teacher in Minnesota. It has been edited for length and clarity.
I remember when the Columbine shooting happened in 1999. I had just started my eighth year as a teacher and was a middle school teacher.
The shooting sparked conversations among myself and my sister, also a teacher, about whether we could stand in the way of a shooter if they attempted to kill one of our students.
At the time, I had a young child. I knew — I couldn't give my life for my students if it came down to me or a student. My children needed their mother.
When I started as a teacher, dying for my students was not written in the contract. It wasn't what I signed up for.
Although I've never been at a school with an active gunman, I do recall at one of my high schools, learning that there had been a case of bullets found in the school.
We had entered a "soft" lockdown, with the door simply closed. These lockdowns occur when there is a threat in the nearby area but not on the school grounds.
After finding out that someone had brought bullets into the school, I and the other teachers were very upset. Why hadn't we gone into a "hard" lockdown, with doors locked and blinds closed?
It made me uneasy about what would happen in case of a real emergency.
Another time, I was in class when someone came and closed my door and said that there was a lockdown drill happening. It turned out the speaker in my classroom had been broken. I hadn't heard the drill announced. What if that had been the real thing?
As much as I would naturally worry about the risk of a school shooting at my place of work, I don't allow myself to think about it. Teachers have tens of thousands of things to think about at any one time while teaching. If I let myself dwell on an impending shooting, I wouldn't be able to focus on all that I need to do for my students on any given day.
I'm strong for my students, but when I'm alone, I often feel the weight of what it means to be a teacher in this day and age.
When I heard about the Georgia shooting that happened last week, I was at school. I had to keep calm and teach my children. But when I got home, I was overwhelmed and cried endlessly, decompressing.
This is the world we go to school in now.
As much as I want guns off the streets, I just don't think it is going to happen. There are too many guns, and the NRA is too strong.
I'm not entirely sure what the answers are, but I think one solution is to focus on the children who are withdrawn and frequently miss school.
I also think there should be more mental health services available for children and young people. This generation of children and young people is the COVID generation. So many have suffered mentally as a result of spending over a year and a half with hardly any social interaction.
But it isn't just COVID; our youth are growing up with so many issues that lead to anxiety — gun crime, the climate crisis, and social media.
They need support unlike any other generation has.
However, this generation also has a lot going for it. So many of them are kind and accepting. I'm hopeful that as they see the issues in our society, they will work hard to change things for those who go after them.
