 That's New York Democratic Congressman Jamal Bowman arguing with Kentucky Republican Thomas Massey over how to stop school shootings like the one in Nashville that left three students and three adults dead. It's understandable that tempers, flair, and voices rise in the aftermath of such horrific events. When faced with such situations, the urge to do something, to do anything, is nearly impossible to resist. But is Congressman Bowman right that more guns lead to more deaths? The short answer is no. Over the past few decades, the number of guns in America has increased massively, so much so that there are now more guns than people in the United States. Yet federal crime statistics say that firearm homicides dropped about 40% between 1993 and 2018. For other crimes involving guns, the decline was 71%. Violent crime did spike during COVID and while the most recent data is incomplete, it's clear that gun-related violence remains far below where it was 30 years ago, despite more guns than ever being out there. That's great news, especially since reducing the number of guns in circulation presents not just immense pragmatic challenges, but almost certainly insuperable constitutional barriers. When it comes to schools, the 2020-2021 academic year, the latest for which full data is available, did see the highest number of school shootings with casualties this century. Thankfully, there are too few violent deaths to generate statistically significant conclusions, but the long-term trends show no increase in homicides or suicides among students, staff, and teachers. Overall, schools are becoming safer and safer. With the government finding that between 2009 and 2020, non-fatal crime rates dropped for students ages 12 to 18 from 51 to 11 victimizations per 1,000 students. What about Congressman Massie's contention? He appears to be correct, though contrary to his claim that there's never been an accidental weapons discharge by a teacher, a January 2023 RAND Corporation study found that teachers have indeed been involved in accidental discharges of weapons. On the larger question of arming teachers, RAND simply says there isn't good enough data on whether doing so would increase gun violence or reduce it across eight categories such as stopping mass shootings or preventing suicides. What then is to be done? Those schools are already gun-free zones or have strict controls on who's allowed to carry while on campus. Many have armed officers on campus, despite no evidence that such a presence deters violence. Recent school shootings, like the one last year in Ivaldi, Texas, where law enforcement officials not only did nothing to prevent an active shooter, but restrained parents trying to rescue their children underscore that police need better and more effective training. A 2018 school shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida highlighted how many red flags school staff, police, and social workers had ignored. It's deeply unsatisfying to simply say that the people in charge of school safety need to do better. But it might be the best option, especially if the rush to do something means trying something that we already know is impossible, ineffective, or both.