Outraged parents call out school board after 6-year-old allegedly shoots teacher

In the first school board meeting since a 6-year-old allegedly shot his teacher in Virginia, parents expressed outrage and demanded the Newport News superintendent and the entire school board resign. CNN's Brian Todd reports. #CNN #News

81 comments

    1. To be more specific, the blame should fall squarely on the parents who vote for government representatives that vote against gun safety legislation. Point Blank!(to borrow a gun metaphor)

    1. The 6yr old obtained the weapon from his Democrat parents that were to busy attending a transgender rights rally to see what their mentally perversed child was up to…

    2. Failure as a country to fix the problem after the first school shooting… when you live in a country full of guns what do you expect

  1. I understand from the parents respect, but why did the 6-year old even have a gun to begin with? The fault shouldn’t just be on the school board, but on the parent of that 6 year-old too. This makes Newport News as a school look as though they have a callous disregard for the lives of their students.

    1. It’s called American need their second amendment. I’m 🇨🇦. Very SMALL % of school shooting here. Hoping things change. This incident is unbelievable.

    2. I agree. We currently don’t have all the legal infrastructure needed in order to fully hold parents accountable for shootings, but we absolutely need it. No serious person could possibly expect the community to be ok with blaming a 6 year old. It is so obviously the fault of the parent.

    3. Children get their hands on a lot of things they’re not supposed to have. Guns don’t load, aim and fire themselves. I know from personal experience that a person shooting a gun has to know exactly what they’re aiming at and where and how to properly hold and fire the gun in order to successfully shoot or hit something even at close range. It’s not as easy as a movie makes it look or anything. You don’t point and shoot and you successfully hit something. The only way the child killed the teacher by accident is if they had a 1 in a thousand chance lucky shot. It’s clear the child meant to murder their teacher or the gun was literally held near her body before being fired.

    4. @J Politics yes, law enforcement has already clarified that the shooting was intentional. That doesn’t make the parent any less responsible though. He’s 6.

    5. A six year old child has no concept of murder so don’t say he knew he was attempting murder. What does this kid watch on TV? Maybe that’s another valid question to ask. Violence is seriously glorified by our entertainment industry. That’s worth considering when talking about children handling guns. The mother was damn careless allowing an unsecured gun in the house. This 6year old could have just as easily shot her, himself, or a playmate! I’m sorry, but 6 years old is stll a baby! What do any of you remember about attending kindergarten? I barely remember it at all! I had a Roy Rodgers cap pistal…played with it all the time with other kids in the neighborhood. We loved playing Roy Rodgers, Lone Ranger, and Hop Along Cassidy from television! Six year olds live in a world of make believe.

    1. @Roger McMillan 2 month old account lol. Why so new ? So subscribed items. ?? Nothing. Just disinformation and anger

  2. What about the parents being responsible for their children’s behaviour? How many of these parents will be in to complain when their own children are sanctioned for antisocial behaviour? It needs the school board and the parents to have a sensible discussion about school discipline and for the parents to back teachers in the agreed policies. The gun issue is another situation entirely – and parents must be held responsible if their child is able to access a firearm – let alone a 6 year old taking one to school.

  3. You should be blaming the parents of the six-year-old not the school board members. The school board members did not put the gun in the hands of that six-year-old

    1. Of course the parents & child are at fault here! But in many instances aggressive behavior is dismissed by admin which can escalate the aggressive behaviors of both child & parents!! It’s not just kids that can be bullies. When admin looks the other way instead of doing their jobs to maintain control/security — people can get hurt!!

  4. How did that kid get his hands on the gun? Thats the question. He could have gotten it from anywhere, not just his parents. As for his parents, what kind of morals are they passing to this child?

    1. Virginia is the third most armed state in a country with more guns than people. Why would you bother to ask how a six year old got a gun? The United States is a joke. And every other country in the world knows it.

    2. You Really think a 6yr old who is almost never out of his mother or fathers company outside of bus and school suddenly can get a gun Anywhere? Then iv got a bridge to sell you.

    3. @Llynnyia you presume too much. Obviously there is a lack of parenting and/or supervision so who’s to say the child was being watched at all times? Even at 6 years old, not so smart person….

    1. @MK Sandals because they feel they should have been more vigilant about the warning. Just repeating what they just said in the video

    2. Isn’t it obvious? The should have taken this much more seriously and apparently have a history of failing to discipline the kids properly. They’ve had 3 school shootings in this area in like 4 years maybe something isn’t being done properly in the school and as a parent I would be upset too but ultimetaly it’s on the parents of these kids

  5. I’ve got a pretty good guess as to why we’ve heard essentially nothing about the parent(s) here or haven’t seen their photos – especially since when this happened in Michigan that kid AND both parents & their photos were all over the international media that day.

    If they’re being held accountable, this kids parent or parents should too. Enough is enough. Stop making excuses for these g-damned people.

    1. The parents gave a statement that the gun was secured (I don’t believe it for a second) and that their 6 year old son has an “acute disability” whatever that means. They were literally attending school daily with their child according to a plan that they put together with the teacher! I mean, seriously, one of the parents had to go to school with this kid and be in the classroom with him on the daily. Guess what? Neither parent was there that day.

    2. Who’s making excuses for them? Do you know something we don’t? I haven’t heard anyone making excuses for the parents.

    3. @Rachel Kristine If they were African American trust and believe those parents would be in jail and their face would be all over every national and international news media.By the way the incident happened in Virginia not Michigan in America.By the way majority of people living in Virginia especially Michigan is a high population of Europeans or whites for your FYI.Dont believe the hype of the news media in America.

    4. Newport News is in Virginia. We’re not seeing the parents because hes 6 by the way it’s also a military town.

    5. @Rachel Kristine He’s race Baton this happened in Newport News Virginia home of multiple military bases the kid is six that’s why you don’t see the parent.

  6. Parents continue to blame everyone and everything but themselves for the crap education system they created.

    1. @Gail Butcher the majority of parents voted for him, remember? The same parents who later voted for Bill Clinton who made our schools more like corporations. Good grief. Neoliberals. SMH.

    2. backwards logic. Here we have parents being proactive, trying to fight for a better education system, yet you are here saying it’s them who created the shitty system in the first place, Yes, there’s a lot of shitty parents, but you should educate yourself. The politics involved in education is to blame. Blame the government system. I have family who’ve been in education their whole lives. They’re more upset with the system and political climate than with parents.

    3. @Some Guy parents typically run the school boards. Start there. Activist school boards made our schools adversarial then they wonder why everyone is on different teams.

  7. Why arent the kids parents being investigated? This kid was 6, that gun didn’t materialize out of nowhere and I suspect that kid had other serious behavioral problems that weren’t addressed

  8. If a school child do good the parents will take all the credits. If the child do something bad, they will always blame the school

    1. A lot less of this craziness in Australia where they practice rational gun control and have sensible regulations. They don’t have controversial Constitutional amendments that get regularly misinterpreted like in America!

  9. As a British citizen I can see the elephant in the room – the US gun owning laws. Why are they not being discussed? This could not happen in the UK, because it is virtually impossible to own a gun, let alone a young child using one. All very sad and very preventable.

    1. Owning guns is a protected civil right in the US. They aren’t up for debate. Deal with it. Gun rights aren’t getting limited for everyone because some people aren’t responsible enough. In the UK it would be a knife or a bottle of acid, and you’d cover it up because they’d all be brown Asian muslim kids doing it.

    2. @East Africa His reasoning isn’t flawed at all, but yours is non existent. There is a higher rate of knife deaths in the USA than in the UK. You’re just parroting the only response gun supporters have but it’s meaningless. On the actual issue, 30 people died from gun violence in the UK last year, out of a population of 65 million. Nearly 20 K people died from gun violence in the US last year from a population of 330 million. If the rate matched the Uk, it would have been around 150 people.
      Bear in mind, there were 28K more gun deaths in the USA from suicide and accident, not including police shootings.

      Those are staggering figures with one root cause. That is is the proliferation of guns in the USA. Like I said, you have absolutely no point whatsoever.

    3. @The Media Lies I disagree. If the Second Amendment is an amendment, then that means it can be amended, right? Also, the Second Amendment is widely misunderstood by the general public. It was originally written by the founding fathers for the sole purpose of establishing a well regulated militia in the event of an attack on our government by all enemies, either foreign or domestic. At the time it was written, the founding fathers were not in favor of supporting a professional standing army. The Second Amendment was written for this purpose, not for arming individual citizens to protect themselves. However, over the years, the Supreme Court has interpreted the Second Amendment to include the right to defend one’s individual property. Thanks to them, we continue to live in the WILD WILD WEST. Heaven help us!

    4. You are of course, completely correct. And the mental midgets attempting to discredit you are part of the gun crazed perverted 2nd amendment clueless mob. Unfortunately it will likely get much worse before ever getting better. If divine justice existed, the fools clinging to guns would perish by them, leaving the rest of us to live in relative peace.

    1. How did the “KID” know how to use a gun – remove the safety, aim, and pull the trigger. All that seems pretty complicated for a 6 year old. He didn’t get all that from watching TV or playing video games – hopefully!!

  10. Apparently, this child had a history of disciplinary issues. As a former elementary teacher, discipline is nearly impossible when parents don’t care or don’t believe the teacher. There’s nowhere to send the student except to another teacher’s classroom for limited amounts of time. The problem exists due to the parents but that can’t be controlled. There needs to be a wing of the school that deals with kids who refuse to cooperate.

    1. @Jim McLoughlin Probably so but I don’t think we’re getting the full story. It seems that unruly behavior has been swept under the rug in this district because they don’t want to look bad and that it has been a well-known problem within the community. That leads me to believe that the child in question has had many altercations that were ignored. Oftentimes, when a child is repeatedly unruly, and especially if they are very young and are violent or make violent threats, this would lead to a home visit by the principal, the teacher, and possibly a social worker. It’s very uncommon for a child as young as 6 years old to not want to be liked by their teacher let alone want to kill them. Something is going on at home that is brainwashing that kid to the point that they are acting highly abnormal. A home visit could have potentially uncovered some dangerous parenting and had that child removed from the home. I’ve been on many home visits and some of them did result in children being removed from the home and rightfully so.
      I have an example for you but it’s not as extreme. When I was a student teacher in a first grade classroom there was a young girl who was behind her peers as far as academics go so she kind of struggled. I would work with her a lot and she took a liking to me. She was black and I’m white. One day she said to me, “Mr. L, I hate white people.” To which I replied, “Really? Do you know that I’m white?” Her whole world crumbled right there. In shock, she exclaimed, “You are?!”
      The reason I bring this up is because it’s obvious that someone had been brainwashing her. In her mind, I couldn’t possibly be white because I was very nice to her and I cared about her. Someone had been brainwashing that child who brought that gun.

    2. I thought people were saying that teachers are the most dangerous people in America. I thought teachers are being vilified across the country. Now they are acting outraged that a teacher got hurt? Pick a lane people.

    3. @Ken L Thanks for that as it confirms a lot of aspects surrounding this event. I must say America never ceases to amaze us outsiders when it comes to social and education issue.

    4. @Jim McLoughlin It’s because half the country’s population believes nothing should be done regarding anything unless money can be be made even though they’re not wealthy themselves.

  11. Ummm, be ANGRY with the parents of the child. They need to determine how did the student get the weapon in the school?
    Now if someone fell short of their responsibilities as a staff member, then they must be held accountable. I work in a school district at a HS and the blatant daily disrespect and just a one day suspension gets me riled up every time.

  12. As a former educator I can verify that when admin ignores student behavior it is equivalent to condoning it!! Aggressive behavior towards a teacher is a significant act of defiance towards an authority figure & a bad sign of things to come!! Too many administrators want the big bucks but NOT the responsibility!! Any lack of consequences is interpreted by the child or parents as “it’s ok” to harass or threaten teachers!! Any wonder teachers are getting harder to find or are leaving the profession??!! 😳😤

    1. 100% correct. States must reform the manner in which school administrators are evaluated to place discipline, morale and safety as their primary responsibilities. Evaluations should include input from teachers, school staff, students and parents. Any administrator who does not meet the minimum standards established by the state would be given one year to correct their deficiencies. Failing a second evaluation would mean their administrative credential would be suspended or revoked.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.