I've long been an advocate for armed teachers. I think it should be entirely voluntary, but teachers can and should be able to make that decision for themselves, especially in light of multiple high-profile school shootings that left both students and staff dead.

That includes the shooting at a church school in Nashville, Tennessee.

As a result, Tennessee changed the laws to allow teachers to carry guns. Yet, there doesn't seem to be a lot of interest in doing it, and there's a reason why.

Josh Arrowood carries his .22-caliber handgun most everywhere he goes in his rural Tennessee community — to church at Freewill Baptist, at the Food City store where he shops for groceries, and in the Greene County Courthouse, where he serves as a commissioner.

A new state law that passed this spring would let him, under certain conditions, carry the gun at his workplace, too — South Greene Middle School in Greeneville, where he teaches world history to sixth graders. And Arrowood, who’s had a handgun permit for 15 years, is open to doing so if it can provide an extra layer of security against a school shooting.

“I was in high school when Columbine happened,” he said, recalling the 1999 massacre at a Colorado high school. “And I remember kids putting things like a bat or a baseball in their backpacks so they could try to protect themselves if a shooting happened in their school.”

A gun, at least, “gives a teacher a chance if there’s an armed intruder,” he said.

But between concerns about his personal liability and ambivalence about the new law from local school leaders, he won’t be carrying his pocket-size gun to class this school year.

And because of the way Tennessee’s new law was written, he said, “I don’t expect anybody to take advantage of it.”

While the writer goes into how not a single school system has said they're deploying the system and instead focused on the opposition, there are bigger issues at play. There's a reason only hinted at above, as to why Arrowood doesn't figure anyone will take advantage of the opportunity to carry while at work.

See, in addition to requiring very specific training, there's an issue of liability.

But the law does lay down a set of conditions for a teacher to be able to carry a gun in school, including a training requirement, a mental health evaluation, and a signed agreement between the superintendent and principal, plus written authorization from local law enforcement.

And there’s another big hurdle: a provision that assigns teachers sole liability for anything that might go wrong with their gun, including an accidental shooting, or their failure to prevent a tragedy.

So teachers have to jump through all of those hurdles just to carry, but then they get no protection at all from lawsuits even if they don't act or don't act quickly enough?

Let's remember that Scot Peterson, the school resource officer at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School got a lawsuit for his inaction dropped despite being a sworn law enforcement officer, yet there's a possibility that an armed teacher who simply reactions slower than someone figures they should have might have to pay out of their own pocket to defend themselves?

After going through mandated training?

Look, I'm all for going after people for legitimate screw-ups, and I say that as a semi-reformed screw-up. But there needs to be some degree of immunity for teachers who are trained in accordance with the state requirements. They shouldn't have to foot the bill for a legal defense simply because someone's parent is looking for someone to blame for their child being hurt or worse.

At the end of the day, it seems pretty clear that this was a law that was never going to work. How everyone missed this, including myself, during all the discussions leading to its passage is beyond me, but we did. Now, the legislature needs to fix that.