Bad guy with gun? Pa. schools get — bats

In an effort to protect students in the event of a mass shooter, a school district in Pennsylvania has “symbolically” armed its teachers — with baseball bats.

The Millcreek Township School District in Erie recently distributed 16-inch wooden sluggers to each of its 500 teachers as a way to emphasize fighting back as a response to an active shooter, according to superintendent William Hall.

“They’re the little souvenir bats that you buy in baseball parks,” Hall told The Washington Post. “They could be used as a weapon but so could a number of things in a classroom.”

Hall said Millcreek officials have discussed how to respond to school shootings for about five years, but always with a focus on hiding from an attacker.

But the Feb. 14 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland prompted the northwestern Pennsylvania district to revisit its policies, he said.

The district sent out a survey asking how parents would feel about arming people at its schools who were not police officers.

It also revised its active shooter response plan to emphasize fighting back as an option.

To drive the point home, the district ordered $1,800 worth of the baseball bats and handed them out to teachers at a recent in-service training session about school safety.

“We want to change the culture in our district to incorporate best practices,” Hall said.