A student-organized March for Our Lives occurred during tutorial on March 14 exactly one year after the walk out sparked by the shooting at Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla.
One of the co-organizers, freshman Kaaya Minocha, said she was “impressed by the turnout” of between 50 to 60 students, despite announcing the event just days prior.
The event consisted of two sections, the first being a student speaker section held in the Large Gym and the second being the actual walkout, which occurred during tutorial and didn’t cut into any class time. The student speakers included freshman co-organizer Anouk Yeh, Kate Dinuchi and Minocha herself; junior Surbhi Bhat and seniors Ria Jobalia and Simran Malik. Each speaker covered a different facet of gun control ranging from ageism in the conversation to legislative action to combatting fear in schools.
For Bhat, the motivation for speaking and participating was in part because of the lack of real action in the more than year since the shooting.
“All that we’ve gotten is ‘thoughts and prayers,’” Bhat said. “We need to do something about guns — peanut butter is more regulated in schools than guns.”
The participants exited through the front of the the school, marching down Herriman and Saratoga Sunnyvale before looping back around to the softball field. During the march, participants chanted slogans like “enough is enough.”
They also fundraised for the cause by selling clothing and merchandise, raising around $80 in one lunch period. The money will go to the larger March for Our Lives organization, which will be hosting a larger commemorative march of the same name on March 30.
While the event was relatively small compared to last year, the organizers still saw it as a success in helping to raise awareness on the issue.
“We just don’t want to live in fear that gun shootings can happen at our schools too,” Minocha said. “Everybody still needs to address gun control as an issue.”