Iowa School Districts Roll Out Mandatory Gun Training For Middle Schoolers

Middle school students in two Iowa school districts will attend mandatory firearm safety classes beginning next year, The Hill reported on Saturday.

Students enrolled in both the 7th and 8th grade at schools in the North Butler and Clarksville districts will be required to take part in a mandatory hunter safety course taught by the Butler County Conservation Board, Radio Iowa reported on Thursday.

The course will reportedly be implemented into the students’ PE curriculum.

Interested high school students will have the option to attend a voluntary class.

North Butler Superintendent Joel Foster told the local outlet that the classes are geared towards teaching students how to “use weapons responsibly, how to respect them, understand it’s not a video game and those sort of things, that maybe we’ll cut down on our chances of having a severe incident."

The classes will also serve to instruct students on how to handle real-life situations they might not expect, Foster said, giving an example using his daughter:

"If my 12-year-old girl is out babysitting a 3-year-old and the 3-year-old walks out of mom and dad’s bedroom with a handgun or a shotgun, she needs to know how to handle that," Foster said.....

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