Among those speaking out in Maine Thursday about gun violence and proposals to arm school teachers were several hundred teachers, administrators, parents and students who gathered in the cold and wind in front of Portland City Hall.
Several were members of a group called Maine Educators United Against Gun Violence, formed in the wake of the Parkland, Florida shooting.
Teachers at Waynflete School in Portland played a key role in forming the group. Lindsay Kaplan teaches French at the private school. She told rally-goers that the time to talk about guns is now.
"When we have to give up precious teaching hours to practice what we'll do in the event that we're next, when we barricade our doors, scan our classrooms for things we can turn into weapons and familiarize ourselves with the sight-lines from all of our windows, we have to recognize that we've got it all wrong," she said.
Kaplan said teachers should be devoting every minute they have with students to building relationships and teaching critical thinking skills, instead of being forced to teach students that they are never safe.
The superintendent of Portland Schools, Xavier Botana, echoed that concern.
"Arming teachers to protect our children makes no sense," Botana said. "As educators, we're at our best when we are connecting with children, when we are supporting our children, not when we're throwing ourselves in front of our children to protect them. That is not what we went to school to do. And we will do it, as teachers in Parkland and in so many other places have done, but that makes no sense."
