Brooklyn Students Leave Class To Protest Gun Violence

DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN, NY — Hundreds of students left the classroom and took to the steps of Brooklyn Borough Hall on Wednesday to join a nationwide call for stricter gun control laws a month after a shooter killed 17 people in a Parkland, Florida school.

Students from several schools around the borough joined local elected officials in Downtown Brooklyn at 10 a.m. to call for federal lawmakers to pass for new gun legislation — including banning the sale of assault weapons — as part of a walkout in schools across the country.

"I don’t want to be 21-years-old and still be talking about this, and I don’t want to die in the next year," said Chi Phifer, an 11th grader at Brooklyn Heights' Saint Ann's school. "I just want this to be over."

Borough President Eric Adams, who was organizing an after-school rally in Prospect Park to register students to vote, called on them to continue pressuring lawmakers for change and pointed to past student led movements as inspiration.

"This is your civil rights moment," said Adams. "This is the moment that you are saying our country is the U.S.A., not the N.R.A.

"Let the N.R.A. know that we are going to make sure that gun violence ends in this generation," Adams added.

The event featured students speakers from schools like Brooklyn Tech and Brooklyn Friends School along with elected officials including Comptroller Scott Stringer and Public Advocate Letitia James.

Thousands of students across the city left their classrooms Wednesday morning to join the nationwide protest, with help from Women's March organizers, a month after Nikolas Cruz walked into Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and killed 17 people. Classmates at the school sparked a new push for gun control after the tragedy.

"I definitely don’t think that military grades should be in the hands of people, especially people that are 18-years-old," said Phifer.

"Our brains don’t stop developing until were 25, and for an 18-year-old that has a partially developed brain to be owning a military grade weapon and be able to kill people is insane to me."

The Brooklyn rally began with reading the name of every student killed in Parkland followed by a moment of silence to remember the victims.

"I am appalled at the fact that the shooter of Parkland, Florida was 19-years-old and he was able to purchase a gun," said Lilly Boyd, and 8th grader at Brooklyn Friends School, at the rally. "How is it that gun can change so much, change to do more harm, but the laws were not changed with them?"

Images: Nicholas Rizzi/Patch