Texas school DNA kits are for missing kids, not school shootings

In May, a gunman killed 21 individuals — 19 college students and two academics, at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. That tragedy intensified debates about gun legal guidelines and methods to forestall school shootings, significantly in Texas.

When the subsequent school 12 months started within the fall, many individuals thought an initiative at Texas faculties was associated to that debate over school violence. School youngsters within the state, individuals claimed, have been being despatched residence with DNA kits in order that regulation enforcement may establish them in the event that they died in a capturing. A number of tweets, with thousands of likes, counsel the DNA kits were the state’s reply to school shootings just like the one in Uvalde 

Are Texas faculties distributing DNA kits to establish youngsters in school shootings?

No, Texas faculties are not distributing DNA kits to establish youngsters in school shootings. The DNA kits, which are not obligatory and stored on the little one’s residence, have been first made accessible to folks in fall 2021 to assist establish missing youngsters.

The Texas Education Code, as amended by Texas state Senate Bill 2158, duties the state’s training company with offering “inkless, in-home fingerprint and DNA identification kits” to all school districts, which oldsters or guardians of elementary and center school college students can obtain upon request. These kits are for dad and mom to carry on to in case their little one goes missing, once they can then submit the equipment to regulation enforcement to assist find the missing little one.

The regulation, which was launched by Republican State Senator Donna Campbell, has nothing to do with the capturing in Uvalde or school shootings generally. It went into impact Sept. 1, 2021, eight months earlier than the state’s deadliest school capturing.

“It has come to my attention that there is some confusion regarding the intent of the Child I.D. Kits currently being disseminated at schools,” Senator Campbell instructed KHOU. “The Child I.D. Kits for Safe Recovery Act was passed back in 2021 to provide aid in the reunification of missing and trafficked children. My hope is that these kits provide peace of mind to parents.”

The Texas Education Agency instructed KHOU in an announcement that the company is collaborating with the National Child Identification Program to distribute the kits. The National Child Identification Program, which creates and distributes such kits, is a “community service safety initiative” created by the American Football Coaches Association, based on its web site.

A sample of the ID card created by the National Child Identification Program has a spot for recording the kid’s fingerprints, and a spot on the nook of the cardboard for the kid to chunk down on so a pattern of DNA from their saliva will get on the cardboard.

DNA assortment is not uncommon for little one identification kits designed to assist regulation enforcement find missing youngsters. For instance, the Masonic Youth Child Identification Program features a cheek swab with a Q-tip to collect DNA materials. The Texas Center for Missing Kids encourages dad and mom so as to add a DNA pattern within the type of a child tooth or hairs with roots intact to its little one identification kits.

Neither the Texas State University Texas School Safety Center or the Texas Association of School Administrators link the regulation to school shootings of their descriptions of the regulation.

The Texas Education Agency stated the state’s faculties first distributed the kits to households with youngsters in elementary and/or center school throughout the 2021-2022 school 12 months, and to the present school 12 months’s incoming kindergarteners. The kits have been despatched to native school districts and faculties, who then gave the kits to folks upon request.

“The kits are designed to assist law enforcement in locating and returning a missing or trafficked child and are not distributed as a means of victim identification following a mass casualty incident,” the Texas Education Agency stated. “While this is the first time school systems are involved in the distribution of kits, Texas has facilitated a statewide child ID program since 2006 through direct distribution to parents.”

According to the National Child Identification Program’s history page, Texas has distributed the initiative’s kits at the very least three separate occasions earlier than — in 1999, 2000 and 2006-2007.

Use of those kits is voluntary and requires parental consent, the Texas Education Agency added. Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s website and the regulation’s textual content say dad and mom hold and retailer their kits themselves, solely handing the equipment over to regulation enforcement if their little one goes missing.

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