Ed Chelby is a father and an Army veteran who decided to turn his fear after the latest school shooting into action. That's why he's been standing guard outside the school his daughter attends since the Uvalde mass shooting that rocked the entire country.
As parents continue to fearfully send their kids to school each day, with dark thoughts in the backs of their minds, Ed's decision to stand guard is something just about every parent can understand.
He even said the school was happy to let him do it, and fellow parents expressed relief at his presence.
Ed didn't just show up outside of Saegert Elementary one day. He says he asked permission from the superintendent, who thought it was a good idea. And for Ed, taking action is incredibly important, given it's not just his daughter who is in the building every day. His wife also works there as the school nurse.
“I said I would just be out there unarmed to let people know that I’m watching. Let the parents have a little bit of relief,” he told news station KWTX.
So Ed is out there every day, making sure everyone who walks up to the school is supposed to be there. “I’ve had a lot of emotional people come up to me,” he said. “They didn’t want to send their kids to school. They struggled with sending their kids to school. And I told them, I was like, ‘I got them.’”
Clearly, the Army vet's actions are not alarmist. They're completely reasonable given the climate of constant gun violence and mass shootings. While anxieties are certainly up right now, they're up for good reason. Mass shootings have been happening constantly, and the most recent slaughter was one of the worst we've ever seen.
Ed was already in the process of becoming a security volunteer for the school. Then the shooting took place in Uvalde, and he asked to start standing guard immediately.
“I can’t let this go,” he said. “This is just a testament to the sleeplessness caused by the grief I experienced.”
Samantha Longfeather-Locke, a mother of a student at the school, posted a photo of the dad on social media. “The world needed to know what he was doing because I feel that, that’s sparking some sort of change to start," she said of why she chose to share it.
“Him standing in front of the school, that’s reassuring — feeling that we get to go home and see our families this summer."
