Columbine Remembered

Thousands of students around the country are expected to walk out of their classrooms on Friday morning to protest school violence on the 19th anniversary of the mass shooting at Columbine High School.

The April 20, 1999, shooting in Littleton, Colorado, claimed 13 victims. It was the deadliest high school shooting in U.S. history until this past February, when 17 people were fatally shot at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

Since the Parkland shooting, students from that school have rallied young people nationwide to protest gun violence and demand action from lawmakers to tighten gun laws. Last month, Parkland students led a school walkout and staged marches in Washington, D.C., and other cities that drew hundreds of thousands of people.

Sixteen-year-old Lane Murdock—a student at Ridgefield High School in Connecticut—started planning Friday’s event right after the Parkland shooting. Unlike the March 14 walkout, which lasted 17 minutes, most of Friday’s protests will start at 10 a.m. (in each time zone) and last through the end of the school day.

“People ask me, ‘Why? Why all day?’” Murdock told National Public Radio. Her response: “This is a topic that deserves more than 17 minutes.”

The day will begin with 13 seconds of silence for the Columbine victims—but students in Littleton won’t be participating in the walkout. Columbine students traditionally mark the April 20 anniversary with a day of volunteer work in the community.

“Please consider planning service projects, an activity that will somehow build up your school . . . as opposed to a walkout,” Columbine principal Scott Christy and Frank DeAngelis, the principal at the time of the shooting, wrote in a letter to students.

Columbine sophomore Rachel Hill says walking out on the anniversary would be “disrespectful” to the families of those who died in the 1999 shooting.

“There’s a time for protest, but it’s not that day,” she told The Washington Post. 

Students at more than 2,500 schools around the country are expected to walk out. Organizers have suggested that participants use the day to contact lawmakers, register new voters, and flood social media with calls for reform.

Many students have worked with their local school officials to plan for the event. (Even actor Robert DeNiro has gotten involved, releasing a letter bearing his signature that asks principals to excuse students from classes.) However, in some areas, students are in the middle of required state testing. In Knox County, Tennessee, Friday’s state testing was suspended in advance for fear students might miss it. Some students in Manatee County, Florida, meanwhile, decided to hold an after-school demonstration instead.

Students have a First Amendment right to protest, but schools can punish those who miss class to participate, notes the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). However, schools cannot “discipline you more harshly because of the political nature of or the message behind your action,” the ACLU states.

In Frisco County, Texas, walkouts will be treated as unexcused absences. But that won’t stop Frisco High School senior Madelyn Hicks from leaving class along with other students. "There's power in numbers," she told The Dallas Morning News. “We want change to come from this, and we believe it will."

For more on student activism in the aftermath of the Stoneman Douglas shooting and related resources, click here.

Discussion Questions

1. Why is the walkout being held on April 20? 

2. What are some differences between this walkout and the March 14 student walkout?

3. How are Columbine High School students spending April 20? Why?

4. What are some ways that school districts around the country are handling the walkout?

5. Do you think the walkout should have been scheduled for a different day? Explain your answer, using facts from the text.