After learning that a student was arrested for possessing a handgun on the Derby High School on Monday, teacher Edward Belsan was shocked and concerned.

“We always think that was going to happen somewhere else,” Belsan said. “… I’m from Chicago, so you expect things like that maybe in Chicago and not as much in a suburban Kansas school, so it was a bit of a surprise…. At the same time, it makes the possibility that somebody could do something dangerous more real.”

However, Belsan was not fearful from the incident, and, to him, the students he talked with today did not seem afraid, either.

“They seemed interested in finding out details but nobody seemed destabilized by it,” Belsan said. “At least, who I encountered today.”

To help ensure students’ safety if a similar incident occurs again, Belsan will continue encouraging students to speak up.

“I think that the key thing was the wonderful student — I don’t even know who that is — who had the maturity to do the right thing and say something,” he said. “Just I think, keep reminding students, ‘you guys see things that teachers don’t get to see.’ We all know students are way more aware of what some other classmates are doing than teachers are, so I think it’s great that this young person did the responsible thing and the mature thing.”

Belsan thinks President Donald Trump’s idea of training teachers to use guns would be complicated with potential risks.

“There are liability issues, there are training issues, there are gun security issues,” he said. “I personally am a gun owner and I really still don’t know what I think about it… I would be concerned that bystanders could be hurt because teachers — we just don’t focus with the mentality of law enforcement. We function with the mentality of protection, but we look to other people to handle those areas — our security folks and our school resource officers and our police department — so I think it’s a very very complicated issue with no simplistic answers.”