Targeting youth

SWOOPE — Some of the teenagers at a National Rifle Association-sponsored shootaround sports camp this weekend got their first exposure to handling firearms, with all learning lessons about the care and use of firearms in a fun, controlled environment.
At the Third Annual Stonewall Jackson Area Council Venturing/NRA Shootaround Sports Camp at Camp Shenandoah, about 70 teenagers spent Saturday learning how to handle rifles, shotguns, pistols, air rifles and muzzle-loaders from about 35 NRA-certified instructors as part of the weekend camp.
The teens spent much of the day going to eight different stations set up for activities where they got one-on-one instruction with the firearms, as well as trying their hand at archery, fly tying, fly fishing and cutting loose a little by firing paintball guns at buckets in an obstacle course. And on Friday and Saturday night, the teens camped out.
Michael Barrett, the camp’s chairman, said the teens at the camp are having a good time, but are gaining valuable lessons in the process.
“The important thing, I think, is that I think they learn skills, and learn how to do things better just by doing it,” Barrett said. “And it’s a blast.”
He said the teens associate themselves with strong leaders.
“It’s sort of that adult-association learning skills, and of course, it’s about having fun, so that’s what we’re all about,” Barrett said.
At a skeet shooting station, instructors showed boys and girls alike how to fire a shotgun to hit a clay pigeon.
“It’s not a skill that you learn,” said instructor Wes Moyer. “It’s a discipline.”
Moyer, like the other instructors, demonstrated patience in teaching the group – some with weapons experience and others without.
“Most of these kids probably never, ever shot at a clay pigeon, you know, shot skeet,” Barrett said. “They never, ever have, and maybe never, ever will again.”
Barrett and the other instructors said they appreciated the NRA’s involvement in youth activities.
“All you hear about on the news and across the world are all the bad things about firearms,” Barrett said. “You don’t hear about the 99 percent of the rest of the time when they’re used for sport, and they’re used for good reasons. And that’s what we try to teach here is the safe use [of firearms].”
Before any of the teens fired a gun, they went through a one-hour, mandatory safety briefing. The safety lessons were reiterated at each station. Instructor Tom Teerlink, before a group of teens tackled the paintball obstacle course, gave such a lesson.
“Understand that at any time you approach a firearm, you assume that it’s loaded and ready to shoot,” Teerlink said. “If kids that are pulling daddy’s pistol out of the sock drawer approached it that way, you wouldn’t have all these accidental shootings. They need to be taught how to handle a firearm safely. Unfortunately, the parents didn’t get taught too well, or there wouldn’t be an unloaded pistol in the sock drawer.”
Some of the teens learned Teerlink’s lesson during the paintball obstacle course, when they combined for the fastest time of the day, but lost out on winning a prize after being disqualified for mishandling the paintball gun.
However, the teens were in good spirits, picking up on the instruction and gaining confidence throughout their camp experience, and getting some prizes too.
“They’ll start hitting clay pigeons, and they’ll be thrilled,” Barrett said. “It’s something that they’ve never done, and suddenly they’re enabled.”