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New Texas law to allow teachers guns, increase MH services
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
mental health weekly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1556-7583
pISSN - 1058-1103
DOI - 10.1002/mhw.31947
Subject(s) - governor , safer , tragedy (event) , state (computer science) , mental health , law , psychology , political science , criminology , sociology , engineering , psychiatry , computer security , computer science , algorithm , aerospace engineering
Texas will allow more teachers to have guns in school and will increase mental health services for students under bills Gov. Greg Abbott signed into law June 6 as major parts of the state's response to a 2018 mass shooting at a high school near Houston, Rare News reported. School districts will be allowed to place as many armed teachers or school personnel on campus as they see fit. The new laws also are designed to put more mental health counselors on campus, train teachers to recognize mental health problems and create “threat assessment teams” to help identify potentially dangerous students. “We are proud to have responded to one of the most horrific days in the state of Texas,” the Republican governor said of the shooting at Santa Fe High School in which eight students and two teachers were killed. “We can never erase the pain that this tragedy caused, but we can act to make our schools safer.”