Hundreds of students left classes at RM on Friday, June 3, in commemoration of the 21 victims of the school shooting at Uvalde Elementary School, TX, and in protest at current US gun laws. The victims of the May 24 Ubaldo shooting included 19 students and two teachers, but they were not the only subjects of mourning. A panel of student speakers led the crowd in chants, also citing the gun violence at Tulsa hospital and in Buffalo, and read out the names and held a moment of silence for the victims.

Speakers included schoolwide SGA president Sami Saeed, and wore orange to show support for the gun control movement. In Montgomery County, recent gun control legislation banning the import of “ghost guns” went into effect this week, a movement largely pushed by community outrage following the involvement of a “ghost” weapon at a shooting at Magruder High School earlier in the year. The movement, while labeled a “walkout,” was largely supported by school administrators, who informed students of the event and offered opportunities to leave class. On June 11, a national “March for our Lives” event will take place in Washington DC, in a reprise of the same march that took place in 2018 where 1.2 to 2 million people took to the streets, according to the Washington Post, in one of the largest demonstrations in American history. While Maryland is at the forefront of progressive gun control, speakers urged the crowd to reach out to lawmakers- locally or nationally- to demand reform.