RHS students participate in nation-wide walkout
March 20, 2018
At 10:00 AM on March 14th, 2018, many students at Renton High School participated in a nation-wide, student-led walkout in remembrance of the lives lost at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. The walkout took place exactly a month after the deadly shooting.
The students stood for 17 minutes and held a moment of silence to honor the 17 victims who lost their lives. Some students linked arms, raised protest signs, bowed their heads in respect, and comforted each other with hugs.
Renton’s walkout occurred simultaneously with protests and rallies at colleges, universities, high schools, middle schools, and even elementary schools across the nation. With a few minutes remaining, student body president, Isaiah Scott, read the names of the victims in the deadly school shooting.
Scott commented, “I’m not going to take credit for this walkout, I was just a participant, but I was honored to be a leader in representing our student body at RHS in demonstrating our condolences for the students who lost their lives at Douglas High School.”
When asked why she decided to participate, sophomore Helen Ta said, “You know you wake up in the morning, and you don’t expect something like this to happen. You don’t expect your life to be taken away that day. These seventeen [students and staff] had whole lives ahead of them, and they were just taken away then and there.”
It is devastating, yet heartening, to see how such tragic events can cause youth across the United States to rally together in support of a common goal- the ability to access their education safely, and to grow up in a nation where safety is a priority. Events like these show there is hope in the future of our country, so long as we remember the power in our voices, especially when they are heard together in unison.
Scott’s final remarks state, “What we [the students] did at RHS is important because we, as young adults, are the future of this nation, and we have to be able to stand up.”
Pictures from Diana Caoagdan & Khalila Firestone
