Hundreds of Georgia students walked out of class Friday morning to hold moments of silence for the victims of the Apalachee High School shooting and to pressure state leaders to do more to curb gun violence in the state.
Walkout organizers said students from more than 30 schools participated. Students briefly left their classes at schools in Atlanta, Cobb County, Decatur and Marietta.
The walkouts come less than three weeks after police say a 14-year-old Apalachee High student shot and killed two students and two teachers at the Barrow County school. Apalachee High students are scheduled to return to class for the first time next week.
Students want state leaders to pass legislation such as the Pediatric Health Safe Storage Act, which would penalize those who make guns accessible to children. State Rep. Michelle Au, D-Johns Creek, introduced the legislation in 2023, but it never received a vote.
Yana Batra, a Georgia Tech student who is a member of the Georgia Youth Justice Coalition, which helped organized Friday’s walkout, said the legislation would “save lives here in Georgia.”
“We’re calling on Gov. Brian Kemp and Lt. Gov. Burt Jones to support that bill and to take the action that our students and communities deserve,” Batra said on The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Politically Georgia podcast Friday.
State House Speaker Jon Burns, R-Newington, has endorsed efforts to expand mental health care access, offer incentives for gun safety purchases and toughen penalties against people who make terroristic threats.
Apalachee High junior Sasha Contreras was among those who gathered Friday at J.B. Williams Park in Gwinnett County for a rally after the walkouts. Sasha’s mother was substitute teaching in a different part of Apalachee High when the shooting began on Sept. 4. It wasn’t until Sasha reunited with her mother on the football field that she recovered enough to cry.
”That could have been her classroom,” Sasha told the AJC.
Earlier that day, Sasha had been in an Advanced Placement English class with a teacher who shared Cristina Irimie’s classroom. Sasha remembered Irimie helping with their lesson. Irimie was one of the teachers killed.
Her mouth full of braces, Sasha was one of several speakers at the rally. She joined youth activists and state legislators there in calling for gun control laws and school safety improvements. Sasha knows she has to go back to school, but she has not heard of any measures being implemented that she believes would prevent another shooting.
“I’m concerned not only about my safety, but about my courses that can impact my future immensely, although I cannot hope to see that future or the possibility of that future if tragedies like this happen again,” she said.
Olivia Bowdoin
Olivia Bowdoin
Friday’s action was similar to a walkout organized by Georgia students that took place shortly after the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, that killed 17 people.
Organizers said school administrators intimidated some students from participating in Friday’s walkouts by threatening disciplinary action. Some schools advised students about how they can voice their concerns, such as contacting state lawmakers.
Maynard Jackson High School freshman Maya Flowers-Glass teamed with her school’s government association to plan the school’s walkout Friday. Scores of students walked along the school’s entrance shortly after 10 a.m. when the walkout was scheduled to begin.
“The students at Maynard … know how terrible it has been living through the last couple of weeks, and everybody is very ready to take action,” she said.
Maya pointed out that when violent incidents occur in schools, officials typically respond by installing metal detectors and assigning more officers to patrol school campuses. To her, that’s not a solution.
“We’re here to say that more police officers and more metal detectors will never be enough to stop school shootings,” she said. “We need gun policy reform.”
Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Specifically, she thinks gun owners should be required by law to safely store their weapons. She is also distressed by the recent threats some metro Atlanta school districts, including hers, have received.
“I just think (school shootings are) something that a teenager should never have to reckon with,” she said. “I should never have to double-check that I said goodbye to my parents every morning and said I love them because of the fears I might not return from school.”
In the wake of the shooting, Sasha’s older sister, Layla Renee Contreras, a 2019 alumna of Apalachee High School, helped organized Change for Chee. The group is calling for a delayed return to school and a clear bag policy, among other demands concerning safety, mental health and instruction.
Danielle Watson watched the speakers at J.B. Williams Park with her two daughters, ages 8 and 3. Watson cried as Contreras described her panic the day of the shooting.
”It’s easy to see myself in the same shoes,” Watson said.
Olivia Bowdoin
Olivia Bowdoin
Watson said she planned on asking the Gwinnett County Board of Education for more mental health professionals in schools.
Watson grew up in a family of hunters, with a father in the military. But she is also thinking about gun control.
”We banned certain fireworks because people were getting hurt ... How many kids have to die before we say, ‘No more guns?’”
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
