3 ms·

They should allow it in schools as well. Would stop bullying quite quick.

by M8 11y ago

arethuza 11y ago
Out of interest, do kids get taught weapons handling and how to shoot at high school in the US? [NB I'm asking because some kids get taught these things in the UK]
- JoeAltmaier 11y ago
  High schools in most states don't have shooting programs any more. Also no wood shop, or metal shop, or automotive classes. Budget cuts. Youth groups do the training now. My son is a shooting instructor, was Director of shooting sports at our local camp for years.
  - arethuza 11y ago
    The Combined Cadet Force is pretty popular at private schools in the UK - the school my son is at even has a few ex-squaddies on the staff. It's pretty heavily subsidized by the Army - they get loads of gear to take home (not weapons, obviously) have weekly training sessions and weekend and week long camps a few times a year.
    - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
      Very cool! Where I live most youth programs try to distance themselves from the military, which is a pity and borderline shameful. Anyway, our Scout camp has a 24-station shooting range and trap station. Also archery for the younger folk. I'll look into the CCF, sounds exciting!
- hga 11y ago
  There's a Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps (JROTC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junior_Reserve_Officers%27_Training_Corps https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junior_Reserve_Officers%27_Tra...) program that's reasonably popular in many parts of the US, and weapons training is a popular part of it. When I did it in the late '70s it was small bore/.22LR in the winter when getting out wasn't so practical, and there was an opportunity to go to a "summer camp" where you would practice with real service rifles, practice grenades (they wouldn't let the young ones try out real ones), putting on a gas mask in a tear gas chamber, basically a junior boot camp sort of thing. My parents were no fun at all and wouldn't let me attend the latter :-( which due to eyesight was the closest I ever could get to the real thing ). And of course a rifle team, in which I had a lot of fun, small bore rifles, 50 feet, the "10" was a dot the size of the hole a needle makes in a piece of paper. Quite challenging and two years of early morning practice really improved my marksmanship, even got a nifty and 100% authentic Expert marksmanship badge (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marksmanship_Badges_(United_States)#United_States_Army https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marksmanship_Badges_(United_St...). We on the team helped with the safety monitoring and instruction in the winter rifle marksmanship and that was very worthwhile as well, teaching a novice well enough to get a Marksman badge was a great experience and generally useful for life. In fact, teaching others was one of the things JROTC explicitly taught, as they pointed out the Army has to constantly teach a lot of people all sorts of things. Definitely one of the most useful things I learned in high school.
  - arethuza 11y ago
    The CCF used to be called the "Junior Division of the Officers Training Corp" - but I think they renamed it to try and remove the association of public (i.e. private) school -> posh -> officer.

They should allow it in schools as well. Would stop bullying quite quick.

by M8 11y ago

They should allow it in schools as well. Would stop bullying quite quick.

Out of interest, do kids get taught weapons handling and how to shoot at high school in the US? [NB I'm asking because some kids get taught these things in the UK]

JoeAltmaier 11y ago
High schools in most states don't have shooting programs any more. Also no wood shop, or metal shop, or automotive classes. Budget cuts. Youth groups do the training now. My son is a shooting instructor, was Director of shooting sports at our local camp for years.
- arethuza 11y ago
  The Combined Cadet Force is pretty popular at private schools in the UK - the school my son is at even has a few ex-squaddies on the staff. It's pretty heavily subsidized by the Army - they get loads of gear to take home (not weapons, obviously) have weekly training sessions and weekend and week long camps a few times a year.
  - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
    Very cool! Where I live most youth programs try to distance themselves from the military, which is a pity and borderline shameful. Anyway, our Scout camp has a 24-station shooting range and trap station. Also archery for the younger folk. I'll look into the CCF, sounds exciting!
hga 11y ago
There's a Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps (JROTC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junior_Reserve_Officers%27_Training_Corps https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junior_Reserve_Officers%27_Tra...) program that's reasonably popular in many parts of the US, and weapons training is a popular part of it. When I did it in the late '70s it was small bore/.22LR in the winter when getting out wasn't so practical, and there was an opportunity to go to a "summer camp" where you would practice with real service rifles, practice grenades (they wouldn't let the young ones try out real ones), putting on a gas mask in a tear gas chamber, basically a junior boot camp sort of thing. My parents were no fun at all and wouldn't let me attend the latter :-( which due to eyesight was the closest I ever could get to the real thing ). And of course a rifle team, in which I had a lot of fun, small bore rifles, 50 feet, the "10" was a dot the size of the hole a needle makes in a piece of paper. Quite challenging and two years of early morning practice really improved my marksmanship, even got a nifty and 100% authentic Expert marksmanship badge (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marksmanship_Badges_(United_States)#United_States_Army https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marksmanship_Badges_(United_St...). We on the team helped with the safety monitoring and instruction in the winter rifle marksmanship and that was very worthwhile as well, teaching a novice well enough to get a Marksman badge was a great experience and generally useful for life. In fact, teaching others was one of the things JROTC explicitly taught, as they pointed out the Army has to constantly teach a lot of people all sorts of things. Definitely one of the most useful things I learned in high school.
- arethuza 11y ago
  The CCF used to be called the "Junior Division of the Officers Training Corp" - but I think they renamed it to try and remove the association of public (i.e. private) school -> posh -> officer.