State Rep. Karl Bohnak on Wednesday spearheaded the passage of a plan to offer firearm safety programs in schools.

“Hunting heritage runs deep in the Upper Peninsula,” said Bohnak, R-Deerton. “However, in recent years, fewer and fewer people have taken up the tradition and become hunters. If we can equip students with the training they need to be hunters, maybe we can reignite a love of the outdoors in kids throughout the U.P. and across Michigan.”

House Bill 4285 would create an elective firearm safety program that would be accessible to all schools. The program would be developed by the Michigan Department of Education and the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR). Course materials would include proper usage and handling of firearms, safe cleaning and maintenance of firearms, and different types of firearms and safe hunting practices.

“Every hunter in Michigan is required to have undergone one of these courses,” Bohnak said. “It’s important that people understand the basics of handling a firearm before going out into the woods. However, it’s also important that we make these courses easily accessible for would-be-hunters. By putting these classes in schools, we’re clearing a path for thousands of future hunters who may never have become one otherwise.”

Instruction under the program would need to comply with the requirements of the DNR’s safe firearm handling and would have to be taught by a DNR certified hunter-education instructor.

Local school boards would have the option of offering the course as part of their physical education classes or as an optional extracurricular class. Anyone can opt out of the firearm safety instruction without penalty or loss of academic credit.

If the bill is passed by the Senate and signed into law by the governor, hunter’s safety programming in schools could begin this fall.

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