High school students protest gun violence with walkout
SPARTA. Students at Sparta High School joined others in a national demonstration at noon April 5.
Sparta /
| 07 Apr 2023 | 01:15
Sparta High School students join the national walkout to protest gun violence at noon Wednesday, April 5. (Photos by Ava Lamorte)
From left, seniors Annika Noel, Michael Rocco O’Krepky and Julia Juan read the names of victims of gun violence and cited statistics.
From left, sophomores Adam Teixeira, Sean Kettle and Chris Verney hold a sign that says, ‘Say No To School Shooting.’
From left, Stacey Heredia and Patty Rivas of Sussex County Moms Demand Action support the students’ walkout.
Ronnie Nochimson, a substitute teacher, said she was delighted to see the pro-active spirit of the students.
Students at Sparta High School joined others in a national walkout to protest gun violence at noon Wednesday, April 5.
Michael Rocco O’Krepky spearheaded the walkout with the assistance of the Student Council and his peers.
The students requested the administration’s permission to protest peacefully outside the school.
They entered the baseball field, where teachers and police officers seemed to join in support of this public health concern. Also present were Patty Rivas, leader of Sussex County Moms Demand Action, and Stacey Heredia, a local member of the nonpartisan, national movement of Americans demanding reasonable solutions to address gun violence.
Surrounded by their peers, O’Krepky, Julia Juan and Annika Noel used a bullhorn to read the names of victims of the gun violence, then cited these statistics:
• Guns are the leading cause of death among American children and teens. One in 10 guns deaths are those age 19 or younger.
• 54 percent, or 24,292, of gun-related deaths were suicides in 2020 and 43 percent, or 19,384, were murders.
• Nearly eight in 10 murders in the United States were gun-related in 2020.
• Each day, 12 children die from gun violence in the U.S. and another 32 are shot and injured.
• The 45,222 gun deaths in 2020 were by far the most reported, representing more than two tines the number from a decade earlier.
• Since the shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado in 1999, more than 338,000 students in the U.S. have experienced gun violence at school.
• There were more school shootings in 2022 than in any year since Columbine.
• Nearly half of all parents with a weapon in the home wrongly believe that their children don’t know where the gun is stored.
• An estimated 4.6 million American children live in a home where at least one gun is kept loaded and unlocked. These improperly stored weapons have contributed to school shootings, suicides and the deaths of family members, including infants.
• In four of every five shootings, as least one other person had knowledge of the attacker’s plan but failed to report it.
Ronnie Nochimson, a substitute teacher, was among the crowd. The retired Passaic County Clerk said she was delighted to see the pro-active spirit of the students.
The protest ended at 12:30 p.m. with the teens walking peacefully back into the school as planned.