Andie Carroll, Media Editor
@acarrollCourant
On February 28, administration and faculty met with Student Coalition, as well as other students involved, to clarify the progressive plan and idea for the National School Walkout. Junior Emily Shizari, one of the co-organizers with junior Emily Dowdle of the upcoming walkout, which is set to take place on March 14 at 10 am, said it is designed “to show our solidarity to the 17 victims of the Parkland Shooting and all the other victims in school shootings, to show our desire for school safety and to inspire change.”
Emily Shizari said the meeting was about clarifying as a group how the idea of the walkout would proceed. “We discussed what the main purpose of the walkout was because some people were confused whether it had to do with the Women’s March Organization and other stuff like that,” she said. At 10 o’clock, students will leave classes and walk out to the flagpole where speakers will discuss their concerns about school safety, according to Emily Shizari.
Principal William Egan, who called the February 28 meeting said, “My purpose was to understand what the student purpose of the walkout was and if there was a way to make sure that there was a unified approach. They shared with me that their purpose was about keeping students at school safe and having solidarity with the students from Parkland.”
Although the walkout was started through the Women’s March Organization as a social media campaign, the walkout at NCHS is not connected to the organization’s platform, according to Emily Shizari. “People are talking about how if it says Women’s March people would have to support everything that the Women’s March supports, but that’s not it,” Emily said.
She also explained that the walkout leaders will meet a few more times to continue to develop ideas on how to use that 17 minutes effectively. “As of now, we definitely want to have some speakers and we also want to have something to honor the 17 victims and other victims,” she said. “We were discussing different ways to do that and we got 254 pinwheels to represent the 254 people killed in school shootings since Columbine to really just show how big it is and how many kids it is.”
According to Mr. Egan, this walkout is completely student-run; administration wants to ensure that respect is given to other students who choose to participate and those who don’t, and that the students are safe. “It’s a student deal, but I may check in with them to just hear what their plans are,” he said. “I want to keep it safe, that is my number one goal. Secondarily, student voices need to be heard. I want to make sure they do things in a respectful manner to themselves and to each other.”
Emily Shizari and the other leaders of the walkout do not think that student action should stop here. They want student voices to be heard now and continue to be heard in the future. “We think that one thing that everyone should agree on no matter what political party or where they come from is that people should feel safe in their school and these tragedies shouldn’t happen,” she said. “So we want to continue to take action after this by doing whatever we can to make sure it won’t happen again.”
