Taking the kids back to school shopping soon? Here's one more item you can add to your "to buy" list: a bulletproof backpack.

The brainchild of this one-of-a-kind book-bag (that looks just like a regular backpack like the ones pictured) came about after the shooting rampage at Colorado's Columbine High School prompted a couple of Boston-area fathers to come up with a way to protect their kids if a gunman ever attacked their school. The result was a $175 (US) schoolbag with a bulletproof lining.

It's lighter than a standard police vest and marketed as being capable of withstanding a wide range of bullets, including nine-millimeter hollow-points.

And this is no high tech device. All you have to do is put it on and the bag's straps act as a handle that allow the pack to be used as a shield.

Joe Curran, a co-founder of "My Child's Pack", said the majority of school shootings involve handgun calibre bullets, fired from a distance of between one and three metres. He says he can't fix the world's problems, but his bulletproof book-bag can keep his children safe.

Picture of backpacks offered to immigrants in a store in Sonora, Mexico on April 4, 2006. (Omar Torres/AFP/Getty Images)