Kathy Walton said an 18-year-old shooter killed 19 fourth-graders at Uvalde Elementary School, months before her eldest son, Weston, was about to start full-time kindergarten. I found out School, a half-day drive south of her home she shares with her family.
The Fourth of July Massacre then took place in Highland Park, Illinois, a half-day drive north. The Walton family's life in Oklahoma sits right in the middle of both atrocities, right in the middle of America's heartland where mass shootings recur.
Within weeks, Ms. Walton's video went viral showing her worried mother teaching her son Active Her Shooter drills using a bulletproof backpack. spread in
Aside from bulletproof accessories, Ms. Walton told The Independent that she was just teaching the drills she learned in school. The 23-year-old was born in the shadow of the 1999 Columbine Massacre. This incident changed school life in America.
She grew up learning how to hide and fight intruders. And now, at a time when schools and shootings seem to be getting more intense and frequent, her young mother is teaching kindergarteners.
"It's very scary," Walton told The Independent. "I don't think so. I think the children should go to school and not worry about it." The way you say (ALICE: Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, Evacuate) shows how much of a cycle this is becoming across the US.
"It feels like when we were doing it when I was a kid...it doesn't really penetrate unless it's actually happening," says Ms. Walton. , added that her own school faced bomb threats.Knife threats and intimidation of any kind were taken seriously, but often by students who wanted the school to be canceled. only occurred.
But she believes in her own little son.
"He takes in information very much," she says, coupled with her calm account of current events.
"I think it's very important to have conversations because conversations happen everywhere," she told The Independent. "And just because ti hasn't happened yet at someone's school doesn't mean it won't happen or won't happen."
She wore a bulletproof backpack and an insert ( (offered by several companies) and decided to buy one for Weston to train him.
In the video she teaches him to hide, shut up and run. She also teaches her how to counter teachers who might stop him from grabbing a bulletproof school bag if it's not on his body. incident.
"I'm like, 'I need that! It's bulletproof!'" he says in the video, holding up a Spider-Man backpack.
Since her post went viral and has garnered 7 million views since last week, Walton said other parents reached out to her saying, 'My kids are inspired by me. It really made me feel.” good.
Walton, a stay-at-home mom married to a car salesman, said, "I expect nothing and I want to raise my children for the worst." It has been said that it is better to have and not need than to need and not have."
I warn you about complacency because I don't know if it could be the last.
At the heart of America's gun nation in Oklahoma, Ms. Walton says her training video for Weston is not a statement on firearms policy. I'm not saying anything against guns or pro-guns, I'm pretty neutral," she told The Independent. ``I'm all about the Second Amendment. I'm not going to take your guns away. I think it's bigger," she said, pointing to an incident that allowed her to go straight in and gain access to her classroom after returning to her former high school. She d graduated herself.
She is horrified as to who else is free to walk into the school despite all the obvious steps.
"Just because it hasn't happened to you doesn't mean you can't do it," she says. "And your children should at least know the seriousness of what can happen."
She adds: "It's really happening to our kids today. I think we need to be prepared for anything."
