State superintendent candidates weigh in on school safety [Video]

School safety is a key issue for many people in North Carolina, and the subject is top-of-mind as the state heads toward the November elections.

“It’s constantly on the news — school shootings, kids losing their lives, whether it be mental illness or just the school not doing their thing as far as securing the classrooms,” Raleigh resident Ashley De Los Santos told WRAL News Tuesday as she was leaving a pet store on Glenwood Avenue.

“It’s just not safe anymore, it seems like,” Gloria Brown, a parent of grown children, said outside a Target in northwest Raleigh.

Data shows that schools generally are still one of the safest places for children to be. But at least one North Carolina student has died from violence at school in each of the past three school years.

Schools are still relatively safe places. Just 3% of youth homicides take place at schools, …