Brookings high schoolers joined their counterparts around the country in a walkout to take a stand against gun violence Wednesday.
A student-led assembly at BHS at 10 a.m. and the walkout that followed came one month after the Feb. 14 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
The Brookings events were organized by four students: Anna Ayres, Rebecca Marshall, Oscar Kavanagh and Casey Pedersen.
The assembly featured about 10 speakers talking about violence, being kinder to their peers, and gun control.
Following the assembly, more than 100 BHS students, carrying signs and chanting anti-violence messages, walked from the school to the Brookings City & County Government Center. Above, the group is shown in front of the government center, and below the group is walking along Third Street.
“The goal is to show our town, our state and our country that we are the future, and we have a say in our safety,” Marshall said.
“And that there is something we can do and want it done. We deserve to go to school and know that we are going to be safe. We don’t want to sit in class, looking out the door and constantly wondering if a shooter is going to show up,” Ayres added. “We want to show the town and people around us that as students, the people who are most often affected by this kind of atrocious violence, that we care and we want something done.”
“Activism works,” Marshall added.
