Busloads of students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School headed for the Florida capital on Tuesday with one goal in mind: Make change.
Less than a week after a shooting took the lives of 17 classmates and teachers, students and chaperoning parents began the seven-hour trip from their homes in Parkland to Tallahassee.
Once there they plan to meet with elected officials, including Gov. Rick Scott, and push for gun control, mental health funding and other changes that they believe will end the scourge of school shootings.
CNN is on board one of the buses in the caravan and spoke to several students about why they decided to make the trip.
Chris Grady, 19
Grady, a senior at Stoneman Douglas, said he and his classmates are going to pressure lawmakers.
“If you’re not with us, you’re against us and you’re against saving the lives of innocent children. And we’re going to be voting you out,” he said.
Tyra Hemans, 19
A student at Stoneman Douglas, Hemans held a sign saying “Enough” and “#GunReformNow” as she waited for her classmates.
“I’m going to Tallahassee to get justice,” she said.
Demitri Hoth
“The main focus of all of us is to go and speak to our elected officials … and hopefully create change so that this won’t ever happen again to any other student, to any other family,” said Hoth, a senior.
“No one should ever have to go through this type of experience again. No one should have their lives taken this way when it can be something that’s easily preventable through common-sense gun control and mental health care that’s essential to everybody.”
Kai Koerber, 16
“We think that we’re going to be able to start a conversation. People need to get talking about this. This is not an issue that needs to recur. It needs to stop with us. It’s unfortunate that it even had to happen to us in the first place, and it’s our mission … to affect change and put a stop to this. Our movement is called the ‘Never Again’ movement for good reason: Never again will this happen to anyone,” Koerber said.
“We’re all here because we need to strive for change, and the legislation needs to change because we’ve fallen victim to lazy legislation for far too long,” he added.