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in Eastern Washington, there are a handful of small public school districts already armed. One, in particular, is under the microscope as administrators work to prove it can be done safely.

The Toppenish School District on the Yakima Reservation has been allowing educators to carry concealed firearms on campus since 2014.

The idea came during the Sandy Hook shooting. As Superintendent John Cerna watched the coverage on TV he asked, "How are we going to keep our kids safe?"

From there he floated the idea to other administrators of arming some personnel -- an idea the administrators thought was crazy. Then he went to the school board where he found a much more receptive audience. So he reached out to a former WSP trooper turned trainer.

"It's fairly easy. You can teach people how to shoot a gun. It's hard to teach people when not to shoot a gun," said Jon Ladines a security consultant with training experience across the country and into Central America.

His plan for Toppenish, and a handful of other districts since then, is a multi-faceted approach called gap training. In the event of an armed attacker at school, what should teachers do? Where should they go? What kind of training should they have? The idea is to buy time until police arrive and take over. Introducing firearms is only a small part of the plan but it's a controversial one in this country.

"I'm not a cop. That's not my job. That's not my training. But I'm also not ignorant. And the world has changed, which means education has to evolve with it," said Toppenish High School Principal Shawn Meyers.

He grew up in Toppenish, has two kids in the district, and knows many of the people in this small community.

"As an administrator, someone who's in charge of this building and 950 kids, I want to make sure we're doing everything we can to protect them," he said.

http://www.king5.com/article/news/local/how-one-wa-school-district-is-already-arming-administrators/281-523634725