Students organized a sister march to the national March for Our Lives, organized as a reaction to the Parkland shooting
The front of Lindsey Graham’s office was decorated with an array of vibrant signs pleading for gun control after a student led March for Our Lives event took place on Saturday.
Student organized and student lead, the march was an official sister march of the March for Our Lives in Washington D.C., led by students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. The protest commenced on Campus Green at 10A.M. with three student speakers. There were also people from the York County Democratic Party in attendance, handing out voter registration forms.
The group of protesters then walked to the front of campus and down Oakland Avenue, until they stopped at Lindsey Graham’s office, where a few more people volunteered to speak, and the group chanted phrases including ‘enough is enough,’ and left pictures of the victims of the shooting as well as posters encouraging people to vote, outside of his office.
There were many students in attendance, including Laura Munson, a sophomore Integrated Marketing Communications major.
“I am tired of money and shiny guns being prioritized over the lives of our students, and I am tired of hearing all of these stupid excuses for why there hasn’t been change.” Munson said.
Shelby Peek, a sophomore middle level education major, was also in attendance, and brought in the perspective of a future educator. 
“As a future educator, I really want to change the lives of children and be able to protect them from school shootings and also every citizens from guns because most of us agree that they should be controlled,” Peek said.
Professors also came out to campus on their day off to join the march. Karen Stock, a professor of fine arts was in attendance, and said that she was excited to have the opportunity to voice her opinion.
“The course that our country is taken seems to be clearly self destructive, and I was very happy to have the opportunity to make my opinion visible with others from the community in a local way rather than just emails or phone calls. So I am glad that we can speak out and express the opinion that you can be American, you can be patriotic, and also expect gun regulation,” Stock said.
Another group that showed up was the local Moms Demand Action group. Donning bright red shirts, the moms were hard to miss. One of the moms, Heather Litzinger, is a Winthrop alumni and she said that she and the rest of the group was excited to support the protest, especially since it was lead by students.
“We are excited about this student movement for gun violence prevention, I am a mom of young kids and I got involved after sandy hook, We got involved since then and we are so excited about the energy that students are bringing to this movement, so we are here to support students,” Litzinger said.
Litzinger also noted that she is a mother of two, and has been involved in Moms Demand Action working towards gun control laws since the shooting at Sandy Hook, and that she has noticed a difference between the reaction to the Sandy Hook shooting and the Parkland shooting.
“It is giving me a whole lot of hope, and what seems different is that these students are on the verge of being voters, they are very active on social media, and they are showing the world what it is like to be on a lockdown, to see bodies in the hallway, and how that is going to impact them for the rest of their lives. I think that message is critical and that the whole country needs to hear it and take action,” said Litzinger.
Juliet Isaacs, the head organizer of the march said that she was pleased with the turnout, and that “the time is now” for changes to gun control laws.
