Former Education Sec: Boycott Schools Until Gun Laws Changed

Former Education Secretary Arne Duncan has suggested in a tweet a nationwide boycott of schools until gun laws are changed to protect students.

This is brilliant, and tragically necessary.
What if no children went to school until gun laws changed to keep them safe?
My family is all in if we can do this at scale.
Parents, will you please join us? https://t.co/Yo4wsFuJI5

— Arne Duncan (@arneduncan) May 18, 2018

Duncan was responding to a tweet from Peter Cunningham, the former assistant education secretary in the Obama administration, which he posted soon after 10 were killed in a mass shooting at Santa Fe High School in Texas. "Maybe it's time for America's 50 million school parents to simply pull their kids out of school until we have better gun laws," Cunningham tweeted Friday.

Duncan, who was education secretary for nearly seven years under President Barack Obama, has become increasingly vocal on demanding legislation controlling firearms to put an end to gun violence in schools, Newsweek reported.

For example, last month Duncan praised the student activists from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida for galvanizing the nation to enact gun laws, admitting that his generation and the Obama administration had failed to do so, according to EducationDive.

Duncan told the Chicago Tribune that the idea was intended to be provocative and admitted that "It's wildly impractical and difficult, but I think it's wildly impractical and difficult that kids are shot when they are sent to school."

Duncan, who is currently the managing partner of Chicago Cred, an organization that aims to decrease gun violence in Chicago, said he was also open to other creative ideas that could lead to policy changes on the issue.

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