‘My Life Is Not Normal. It Will Never Be Like Before’: A Year After Parkland, A Community Still Mourns
Students, teachers, law enforcement, activists and parents talk about the year following the Parkland mass shooting -- how they've grieved, how they haven't, how they've learned to live with fear and panic attacks, how they remember those they've lost and how they search for closure. "We don't need (the anniversary) to remind us what happened. We live with it every day," said businessman Andrew Pollack, whose 18-year-old daughter Meadow died in the attack.
The New York Times:
Parkland: A Year After The School Shooting That Was Supposed To Change Everything
The name “Parkland” has become a shorthand for the tragedy that many hoped would mark the beginning of the end of school massacres. But ask the survivors of the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in more quiet moments about the awful year since last Feb. 14, and they tell you a different, more personal story. About innocence lost. Dreams undone. Grief delayed. (Mazzei, 2/13)
The Associated Press:
School Massacre 1 Year Later: A Time To Remember The Victims
The Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School massacre a year ago renewed the national debate on guns and school safety, turned some victims' parents and surviving students into political activists and at least temporarily ended the local sheriff's career. But Thursday's anniversary will primarily be about remembering the 14 students and three staff members who died in the third high-profile mass shooting in Florida since 2016. (Spencer, 2/14)
Politico:
A Year After Parkland, A Family Searches For Closure
For a few weeks after their daughter Carmen was murdered at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on February 14, 2018, a week shy of her 17th birthday, April and Phil Schentrup could barely leave the house. They didn’t go to the vigils; they didn’t watch the CNN town hall on U.S. gun policy; they couldn’t even go to work. “We were just trying to get through a normal day, trying to get out of bed,” April told me when I spoke to her over the phone in January. (Deutch, 2/13)
USA Today:
Parkland Year After Shooting: Grieving Mother Fights For School Safety
In the despair after the Parkland school shooting, a single devastating moment shook so many Americans – when grieving mom Lori Alhadeff took a reporter’s microphone, looked at the camera and shared her pain with the world. “The gunman, a crazy person, just walks into the school, knocks down the window of my child’s door and starts shooting, shooting her and killing her,” Alhadeff said, her outrage growing with each word. (Adely, 2/13)
The Wall Street Journal:
A Year After Parkland Shooting, Communities Reflect
Events on Thursday, including art displays, tree plantings and candlelight vigils, will honor those who died. In Broward County, schools plan to observe a moment of silence at 10:17 a.m., the 17 representing the victims who were killed and the additional 17 people wounded. Some cities in the area plan the moment of silence at 2:21 p.m., the time the gunman first fired bullets in the rampage. Members of March For Our Lives, the student-led group that organized demonstrations after the shooting, said they planned to go dark—online and offline—for four days starting Thursday. “Like many in the Parkland community, March For Our Lives will be spending time with friends and family, remembering those we lost,” the group said in a statement. (Campo-Flores, 2/14)
The Washington Post:
The Parkland School Shooting Is Bringing New Surveillance Tech To Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. But Will It Work?
Kimberly Krawczyk says she would do anything to keep her students safe. A year ago Thursday, the Parkland, Fla., high school math teacher barricaded students behind her classroom door during one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history. But one of the unconventional responses that Broward County Public Schools said could stop another tragedy has left her deeply unnerved: an experimental artificial-intelligence system that would surveil her students closer than ever before. (Harwell, 2/13)
The Associated Press:
Parkland Massacre Reshapes K-12 In Florida
Some students have difficulty trusting classmates outside their circle. Parents say interactions with school staff are more impersonal. Teachers worry that added security detracts from learning. The Parkland massacre a year ago upended school life in Florida. In the year since a gunman fatally shot 14 students and three school staffers, the state's districts have reshaped the K-12 experience, adopting new rules for entering campus, hiring more police and holding frequent safety drills. Some schools trained teams of armed employees to confront attackers. (Gomez Licon, 2/14)