Schools Across the Country Stand with Parkland

A walkout dedicated to the victims of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas school shooting took place on March 14th, but students across the country said that it was more than just a walkout.

On Valentine’s Day of this year, 17 lives were lost during the mass shooting that took place in Parkland, FL at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. The shooter took the lives of some, but the innocence of all. As representatives in Washington, DC started to discuss how to deal with this tragedy, teens began to weigh in on the conversation by sharing their stories to ensure that school shootings would happen “never again.”

Through peaceful press conferences and Twitter threads, the “Parkland teens” started a movement through walkouts. The walkouts were, at first, disregarded as a way to get out of class, but the students at Parkland weren’t letting up.

First, the state of Florida was on board. Then, it was the entire Southern region of the United States, and finally, it reached the national scale where seemingly every school joined in on the movement. Penn High School was no exception.

The walkout at Penn was organized by senior Matt Forsey. When asked why Penn was participating, he stated, “The walkout is about saying enough is enough. We keep seeing acts of gun violence in schools, communities, churches, everywhere. We’re saying that Congress, and the government in general, needs to take action.”

So, on March 14th at 10 AM, Penn High School joined the nation for the walkout. For 17 minutes, you could hear a pin drop throughout the country. Each life lost represented one minute of silence in respect to the victims of the tragedy in Parkland.

Places that used to be safe havens are no longer safe. Keeping this in mind, Forsey, along with 2,000 others, were marching for change around the country and in our community. While the nation was grieving along with Marjory Stoneman Douglas, they were also demanding change.

“Be a nuisance when it counts. Do your part to inform and stimulate the public to join your action. Be depressed, discouraged, & disappointed at failure & the disheartening effects of ignorance, greed, corruption & bad politics – but never give up.” -Marjory Stoneman Douglas