Students March for the #NeverAgain Movement

Students march for the #NeverAgain movement

Following the Parkland school shooting, many people have been feeling helpless and are trying to get involved. The students at Stoneman Douglas High School fully took charge and are motivating other teenagers all over the United States to stand with them. If you want to stand with the students of Stoneman Douglas, there are many options!

Students at Countryside high school have already taken their own stand, participating in a walk out on February 21. Students filled the concourse for 17 minutes to honor the 17 students that were killed. Silence has never been so loud as students stood in silence to speak out on gun violence and the #NeverAgain movement. The Never Again movement is meant to recognize that we will never let the violence that occured at Parkland happen ever again.

In the weeks after the shooting, students in Pinellas County were motivated and decided to start their own movement. Different

representatives from schools all over the county met up and have been trying to organize ways to bring awareness to the cause. According to their Instagram bio, Pinellas 4 Parkland is “organizing and bringing awareness to gun reform in the wake of the tragedy at Parkland.” This group of students has coordinated with the city of St. Pete in order to start a march closer to home that teenagers can participate in. On March 24th, there will be marches in Tampa and in St. Pete so students in Florida can march along with the students traveling to Washington DC. The St. Pete march will be taking place at Poynter Park at 11 AM. The Tampa march will take place at 400 N Ashley Dr, Tampa, Florida 33602 at 10 AM. The students at Stoneman Douglas have decided to wear orange during these protests, following the ‘We Are Orange’ organization created to honor 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton, who was shot in 2013 two weeks after performing at Obama’s inauguration. The color orange was chosen because it is typically the color that hunters wear in the woods as protection, and is a

bold color that demands to be seen. If you are afraid to participate in walkouts or protests because of the possible repercussions, turn to ACLU. On the American Civil Liberties Union’s official website, it is stated that though your school can punish you for missing class, they can not give you a harsher punishment than you would normally receive for just being absent. Also, if a punishment ends up on your permanent record, colleges such as MIT, the University of Massachusetts, Trinity College in Connecticut, and the California Institute of Technology have said that they encourage students to take a stand for their beliefs and that possible disciplines will not have negative consequences on applications. For any other information, you can go to Pinellas 4 Parkland’s Instagram @pinellas4parkland or their Twitter, @pcspgv. If you are interested in the march in Tampa, you can go to the Facebook page March For Our Lives Tampa. If you believe in the cause, do not be afraid to join the march for our lives!

Countryside High School students stand in silence to honor the victims of the Majory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting.