TigerShark Times
The
SPRING 2018
WILDE LAKE MIDDLE SCHOOL
VOLUME 01 ISSUE 01
Student Leaders Speak Out Against Gun Violence
By The News Crew
Almost a month to the day of the May 18th school shooting at Santa Fe High School in Texas, student activists across the country called for a nationwide walkout. According to #NationalSchoolWalkOut, a website created by the walkout organizers, “The National Student Walkout is a nationwide protest of our leaders’ failure to pass laws that protect us from gun violence.” This view is shared by student leaders of Wilde Lake Middle School. They organized two walkouts, one on March 14th, anniversary of the Parkland Florida school shooting, and the other on April 20th, the 19th anniversary of the shooting at Columbine High School.
Student speakers call for action.
Both walkouts were marked by passionate speeches on the need for gun control and taking action beyond sending “thoughts and prayers.” Some students stood, almost apathetically, taking it all in. Some students talked. Some students cried. When asked how he felt our nation was handling this issue, Patrick Gray, one of the walkout organizers, said, “I think that we are handling it INSIDE
Students hold up #ENOUGH signs during walkout. April 20, 2018.
well, except you can’t do much es were vetted, the signs were more to handle it. The walkouts vetted, the route for the prohelp, but eventually it’s going to test was predetermined. “It was be up to the people making the very organized,” Patrick said. laws. They need to listen to us.” “I’m not sure if that took away Josh Molinari, a student from the point, though.” who spoke during the walkLooking up from her place out, concurs that in the crowd during lawmakers need to “It wasn’t really the April 20th walklisten to those who out, Mrs. Gallagher, a speak out. Though a walkout until Social Studies teachterrified of stand- we protested er here at Wilde Lake, ing on the risers to made the comment, against the “I don’t see how we make a speech to his peers, he did it for teachers” can have civil disobethe cause. dience without a little “I feel like it’s important disobedience.” that people know the imporNyah Lampasone, another tance of doing that [speaking organizer, certainly didn’t shy out] and that those types of away from a little disobediguns are meant for killing and ence. “Honestly, I was against not hunting like they say.” The the teachers helping in the first walkout, for Josh, was a mo- walkout,” Nyah said. ment for student unity and for Though she understood making student voices heard. the need for organization and Overall, though, some safety, the walkout wasn’t supstudents thought the walkouts posed to be about what the were too sanitary. The speech- teachers wanted. “It wasn’t re-
ally a walkout until we protested against the teachers because it was supposed to be a student walkout. It’s us standing up for what we think is right,” Nyah said. More and more students are beginning to feel a personal responsibility for ensuring that America’s mass shooting problem is resolved. The lack of objective data on this issue, though, may be working against them. In our research, we discovered something known as the “Dickey Amendment,” so called because of the man who proposed it, Arkansas congressman Jay Dickey. The Dickey Amendment was an amendment to a spending bill that Congress passed in 1996. It prohibits the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) from using money to “advocate or promote gun control.”
According to the American Psychological Association (APA), it was the lobbying arm of the National Rifle Association (NRA) that led to the passing of this amendment. Though the amendment doesn’t explicitly state that the CDC can’t research gun violence and mass shootings, at the time the amendment was passed, Congress also lowered the CDC’s budget by the amount that they typically put toward conducting such research. In addition to the lack of objective statistics, the definition of ‘mass shooting’ is also not regulated. These are just additional issues in this controversy that need to be addressed.
Crowd of students listen to speeches.
To be addressed, too, are those on the other side. People who are afraid of losing their rights as enumerated in our nation’s Bill of Rights. They are afraid of government overreach, being left unprotected, and having their way of life stripped away from them. No matter which side of the argument a person stands on, though, everyone seems interested in the protection of the youth and the preservation of school safety. Now, how do we proceed?
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