Anne Arundel Students Disciplined For Gun Protest Walkout

ANNAPOLIS, MD — In spite of warnings that they faced punishment if they walked out of classes on April 20 to protest gun violence, some Anne Arundel County student did just that, and school officials followed through on their warning. At least 15 students from several schools left classes Friday in what was billed as a national walkout that was sparked by the Valentine's Day mass shooting at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, that killed 17 people.

In a letter sent to parents, Superintendent George Arlotto said principals at the county's high schools were told not to deviate from regular class schedules on Friday. He said he feels that students made their voices heard on the issue on March 14, when high schoolers in Anne Arundel and across the country walked out of class to protest the mass shooting a month earlier in Florida and a shooting in a St. Mary's County school.

But ten students from Corkran Middle School in Glen Burnie, four high school students from Annapolis and Broadneck high schools, and one middle school student from Monarch Global Academy left classes, district spokesman Bob Mosier told The Capital-Gazette. Officials didn't say what punishment was given to students.

Patch readers were divided on whether the students should face punishment. Many said the teens needed to be in class, and that stricter gun laws won't keep someone determined to do harm from using a gun, knife vehicle or other method to attack.

But commenter paulsack urged students to "Walk out anyway, it's an American tradition of civil disobedience. Have the schools done anything to keep schools safer, or have they just talked about it. As students, the ones under fire, it's your responsibility to make the school board do something. your punishment, maybe a couple of days suspension. I was suspended in Jr high, and that one mark on my (fake) permanent record has never come back to haunt me. The only ones that will change this are the students, so do it, make them notice, make them do their job."

The student protests on Friday also noted the 19th anniversary of the massacre at Columbine High School in Colorado. Fifteen people died in the mass shooting, including 12 students, a teacher and the two shooters, a pair of students who committed suicide.

Students from Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C., held a vigil outside the White House Friay and then marched on Capitol Hill to push for changes to gun laws.

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