What Drives Young Students to Became Gun Control Activists

President Joe Biden has recently signed the landmark gun reform legislation in decades. The move came a month after a gunman in Uvalde, Texas, killed 19 elementary school students and teachers.

Unknown to many, students around the country have been pushing for the legislation for years. In 2018, students nationwide took to the street and started the March for Our Lives and Students Demand Action. The two organizations are now major forces in the gun control movement. Earlier this month, thousands of young people gathered at the Washington Monument for the first March for Our Lives Rally since 2018.

What drove these student leaders to become gun-control activists? NPR interviewed some of the students, and these are their responses.

Shooting at their school that cost her classmate's/loved one's lives

According to Zoe Touray, 18, a school shooting happened in their school on a Tuesday after Thanksgiving break. She was lucky enough to jump out of the window to safety. However, some of her classmates were not fortunate. A 15-year-old student killed four students in the school. The shooting also injured six students and a teacher.

Touray admitted that after the shooting, she did not know how to heal. When March For Our Lives found its way to her through Twitter to talk to lawmakers through an upcoming rally in Lansing, she decided to try it.

She was doubtful at first, but her parents encouraged her. Lobbying in Lansing for secure firearm storage and increased mental health resources energized her and made her feel like she was making an impact; hence, she kept moving. Since then, she finished high school and started advocacy work for gun-violence legislation and, more recently, traveled to Washington, D.C., to participate in the 2022 March For Our Lives. She wore the names of her lost classmates on a gray custom T-shirt as she marched. When Uvalde happened, it encouraged her to continue what she was doing and urged more students to get involved.

Lie-in protest that spurred a movement

Eliyah Cohen, 20, was in sophomore high school in Los Angeles when the Parkland shooting happened. When Uvalde happened, he found it difficult to process. Then he joined a 337-second lie-in at UCLA. It was a demonstration where students lay in silence to honor the 337 children, victims of school gun violence who have died since the Columbine High School shooting in 1999 and protest gun deaths, per Daily Bruin. The lie-in eventually became a movement that aimed to turn students' anger and pain into policy demands.

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Gun Violence at home

Tiana Patterson was at home with her three-year-old sister when her mother's ex-boyfriend, who had a gun, demanded to be let inside the house. She was only 15, but she instinctively gathered her three-year-old sister and hid under the bed. No shots were fired that day, but it impacted the young girl, who lived in a neighborhood where gang violence was common.

With the help of Moms Demand Action, she organized Students Demand Action, a national, grassroots group of college and high school students that educates communities about gun safety and advocates for changes to federal and local gun policies. She often speaks with other survivors of gun violence through online webinars. As per its website studentsdemandaction.org, the group aims to end gun violence in their communities.

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