Sight of school resource officers’ firearms is disconcerting to some.

The AR-15 rifle used in the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High is now a fixture at some Broward schools — but the firearms are being concealed so students don’t notice them. It seems to be working. “We believe we have a solution that would enable the sheriff and school resource officers to be comfortable they have the capacity to protect our school grounds the way they should, while respecting the concerns I’ve heard raised,” Superintendent Robert Runcie said.

For the first few weeks after the Feb. 14 shooting that killed 17 people, school resource officers carried the semi-automatic weapons openly on school campuses. But parents and others complained the rifles could scare kids. So now they are hidden in backpacks and safes.

“We had two [officers] walking around with rifles. It was driving me and the kids crazy,” Ty Thompson, principal of Stoneman Douglas, told his School Advisory Council this week. “Now there’s one, but the weapon is concealed, backpack style, so it’s not in your face.”

At the district’s request, the guns are not being used in elementary schools.

Stoneman Douglas currently has four deputies patrolling the school, as well as four more guarding the now-vacant threestory building where the shooting took place. Thompson said he expects that will eventually be reduced by half.

Joanne Wallace, a special education teacher at the Parkland school, said the deputies are now being discreet.

“It’s not like they’re standing where a lot of people see them,” she said. “I think they’re being very, very sensitive in looking at kids and teachers to see what kind of reaction they’re getting.’’

She said that while some students and teachers find the heavy law enforcement comforting, others find if unsettling.

“I think it depends on the person’s level of trauma,” she said. “For some, sirens or red and blue lights trigger emotions. I was far from the building so I had little contact with the incident, so my healing is a little further along.”

Dylan Bowerman, a junior at Stoneman Douglas, said he hasn’t noticed officers with rifles, but he supports the idea of them.

“I’ve seen many police officers, and I haven’t seen any with large weapons, with the exception of the first Wednesday we came back,” he said. “That’s not to say they’re not there, but I haven’t seen them.”

Amanda Edwards-Berlingeri, a senior who was inside the first classroom that gunman Nikolas Cruz entered, said she thinks arming officers with SR-15s gives a false sense of security.

She said even if police use the same gun as the shooter, “the person who attacks always has the upper hand. I think they’re doing this more to scare away shooters than to stop the actual shooter.”

She said she continually fears a shooting will happen again. Even if the school is protected from outsiders, it could be attacked by a current student.

“I know students whose parents have AR-15s,” she said. “It’s not that hard to conceal. You can put it in a duffle bag and bring it to school every day.”

Deputies normally pay for their own rifles, but the Sheriff ’s Office is allocating funds so that all weapons will be a standard size that can easily fit into a carrying bag, BSO spokeswoman Keyla Concepción said.

Right now, 41 of the 43 school resource officers employed by the sheriff are certified to use rifles. Concepción said deputies will be recertified for the new rifles and trained on the removal of the weapon from the case. She said that should be done before the new school year starts in August.

The Sheriff ’s Office serves schools in Cooper City, Dania Beach, Deerfield Beach, Lauderdale Lakes, North Lauderdale, Oakland Park, Parkland, Pompano Beach, Tamarac and Weston.

Local police departments provide school resource officers in other cities and they use pistols. Runcie said some have expressed interest in adding rifles.

“We’re working with them. Some want to put them in a safe and lock them up. We’ve got to work through all that,” Runcie said.

He said the school district also plans to revise agreements with cities and the Sheriff ’s Office to ensure the school resource officers are “quality, appropriately trained folks.”

Stoneman Douglas’ officer, Scot Peterson, was blasted by Sheriff Scott Israel for failing to confront the shooter. He resigned and retired.

Peterson’s handling of the incident has complicated some students’ views of school resource officers.

“Not all of the time a good guy with a gun can stop a bad guy with a gun,” said senior Hannah Karcinell. “At my school, the school resource officer did nothing.”

She said she hasn’t noticed the officers carrying rifles, but finds no comfort in the idea.

“I don’t think it would make students feel safer, especially after hearing that gun firing. And that gun was used to kill one of my friends and many more people at my school,” she said.

stravis@sun-sentinel.com, 561-243-6637 or Twitter @smtravis.