Schools

Education Secretary's School Safety Town Hall Set

Arne Duncan will speak to interested parties at Loch Raven High School in April.

U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan's school safety town hall, which will emphasize gun control, has been scheduled.

Baltimore County Superintendent Dallas Dance announced the visit earlier this month, noting that gun control is a topic Duncan is passionate about.

"Today, looking into the eyes of parents who have lost children due to gun violence, I am more committed than ever, and the President is, too," Duncan wrote in a Jan. 16 post on the U.S. Department of Education blog. "Those parents’ unimaginable heartbreak and extraordinary strength must motivate us to act. Now is the time. Our children, families, educators, communities and our country deserve better. We can’t let them down."

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The event is scheduled for April 10, from 6 to 7:45 p.m., at Loch Raven High School.

Mychael Dickerson, a school system spokesman, said the town hall is open to the public, but interested participants must register online to attend. The deadline in April 7, according to the National PTA.

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Betsy Landers, president of the National PTA, is also slated to speak at the event.

Duncan visited Perry Hall High School on in August 2012 to discuss education reform as part of a professional development event for county teachers. Not even a week later, Robert Gladden, 15, opened fire in the school's cafeteria, leaving a special needs student seriously injured.

Gladden pleaded guilty to attempted murder and was sentenced to 35 years in prison in connection with the incident.

The attack brought Perry Hall into the national gun violence conversation.


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