LEXINGTON, N.C. — Sadly, it's a sign of the times. Better to be prepared, than not.
Lexington dad Jerry Ghent took his 10-year-old son Trevor, 12-year-old daughter Grace and his niece to an active shooter defense training in the Winston-Salem area on Saturday.
"It was a four-hour class about being an unarmed person in an active shooter situation, it's for family members like if they were in school or anywhere."
It's called Apex Defense Group, and it was an active shooter/unarmed defense training session.
"With them being in those situations, the only options they’re going to have is them being unarmed, so they’re going to have to run and hide as best as they can," Ghent said.
The training so happened to be the same day investigators say a teenage student posted a threat of mass of violence against Central Davidson High School on Snapchat. That teen has since been charged.
"It's always good to have some sort of plan, because you just never know as we saw the other day with that one threat," Ghent stated.
The kids took an educational class about 'run, hide, fight' and then got on the mat for defense practice.
"It’s a changing world, it's not getting any saner so it's best to have a backup plan anywhere you go."
Ghent's daughter Grace says the training made her feel prepared.
"We learned 'run, hide fight' and lots of self defense techniques," she said.
Even at 12-years-old, Grace said she heard about the recent Central Davidson High social media threat.
WFMY News 2's Jess Winters asked, "do you know about the social media threat made over the weekend?"
"Yeah," Grace said
"How does that make you feel?"
"More nervous for lots of kids that go to that school, it's really scary."