Oklahoma House approves firearm safety training in K-12 schools
A bill allowing firearm safety training in public schools overwhelmingly passed the Oklahoma state House Monday with bipartisan support.
House Bill 3312, which passed 84-10, would allow schools to choose whether to offer the training, though the bill’s original version would have required the course in all public schools. The training must be age- and grade-appropriate, politically neutral and include no live ammunition.
The training would promote “practical, life-saving education,” said the bill’s author, Representative Ryan Eaves, R-Atoka.
Students in elementary grades would be taught not to touch a found firearm, to leave the area and to tell an adult. Older students would receive instruction on safe handling and storage of firearms, how to avoid injury when finding a firearm and school safety.
The Council on Law Enforcement Education and Training and the Oklahoma State Department of Education would develop a curriculum for the training and decide the earliest appropriate age to receive it. The program couldn’t bear any organizational affiliation, except for a state-issued brand.
A school would have to give parents the choice to opt out their children from the training.
HB 3312 doesn’t dictate who must give the training, but having a CLEET-certified school resource officer or a member of local law enforcement teach the course “shall be considered best practice,” under the legislation.
“It’s not my intent that every second grade teacher in Oklahoma is now teaching firearms education,” Eaves said. “I don’t think anyone here wants that. That’s not the intent.”
The measure heads to the Senate for consideration.
