It looks like a Texas school district will be first in the nation to finally take a common sense approach to school shootings. Rather than allow students to be lambs waiting to be slaughtered by a crazed gunman, teachers in one tiny Texas town will be able to intervene.

A tiny Texas school district may be the first in the nation to allow teachers and staff to pack guns for protection when classes begin later this month, a newspaper reported.

Trustees at the Harrold Independent School District approved a district policy change last October so employees can carry concealed firearms to deter and protect against school shootings, provided the gun-toting teachers follow certain requirements.

In order for teachers and staff to carry a pistol, they must have a Texas license to carry a concealed handgun; must be authorized to carry by the district; must receive training in crisis management and hostile situations and have to use ammunition that is designed to minimize the risk of ricochet in school halls.

Superintendent David Thweatt said the small community is a 30-minute drive from the sheriff’s office, leaving students and teachers without protection. He said the district’s lone campus sits 500 feet from heavily trafficked U.S. 287, which could make it a target.

“When the federal government started making schools gun-free zones, that’s when all of these shootings started. Why would you put it out there that a group of people can’t defend themselves? That’s like saying ‘sic ‘em’ to a dog,” Thweatt said in Friday’s online edition of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

It’s at times likes this that I’m most proud of being a Texan. Every law abiding citizen should have the right to defend his or herself in America. So called “gun free zones” are absurd, because then the only person with a gun is the crazed lunatic.

Had a teacher had a gun at Virginia Tech, it’s very unlikely that lunatic would have been able to murder 31 people before killing himself. The idea is to at the very least stop a school shooting from turning into a double-digit blood bath.