A Maine high school staged a silent protest to advocate for gun control after Wednesday’s horrific mass shooting in Parkland, Fla.
Mount Desert Island High School in Bar Harbor was scheduled to have an active shooter drill Thursday, but school administrators rescheduled the practice for a later date after the tragic scene unfolded at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida on Wednesday. The Maine high school students didn’t know that the drill had been postponed, but collectively staged a silent protest to express support for gun control as a solution to gun violence in American schools, according to News Center Maine.
The protest comes after Nikolas Cruz, 19, took an Uber to his former Florida high school around 2:21 p.m. on Wednesday before pulling the fire alarm and shooting and killing 17 students and faculty, and injuring at least 14.
Maine students Dawson Burnett and MacKenzie Miller organized the protest in their school. Involved students walked silently across the gym, carrying signs that read, “The Second Amendment Must Be Amended,” “Put Senate in Lockdown until Students are safe,” and “Our Right to a Safe environment far exceeds your right to guns.”
“Enough is enough,” Miller, 17, said. “We’re sick of seeing it – it’s high school students. It’s scary to see that it can happen anywhere at anytime.” The protest started with about 20 students and grew to roughly 100 by the protest’s end, according to Miller.
“We as high schoolers are scared, and we’d like to see change,” Miller added, recounting that the protest was inspiring and empowering. “It shows how strongly we feel that there needs to be change,” she said.
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“I’m so proud of them for standing up for what they believe in,” math teacher Sara Greene said. “We must teach young people to use their voices.”
The Mount Desert protest follows Thursday night’s vigil in Florida to mourn those who lost their lives in the Parkland shooting. The crowd of people, many of them holding candles, repeated “No more guns,” reported The Hill. Thousands of people were reportedly there to honor the 17 people who lost their lives during Wednesday’s mass shooting.
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