This article has been updated to clarify details.

A gun incident occurred on Monday, Feb. 9 near the RM community in the halls of Thomas S. Wootton High School, in which a student shot and injured another student, sparking a lockdown that lasted for several hours. Though the suspect was later apprehended and police presence increased at the site of the school, conflicting messaging during the incident over the location of parent-student reunification, a delayed press conference and other issues sparked backlash from the Wootton community, with many students and families expressing frustration toward classmates, administrators, and law enforcement.

Students from the community expressed the feeling that their voices had been ignored in the aftermath of the incident, leading them to question longstanding MCPS policies and wondering whether the tragedy will spark real change within how the system deals with such events.

For many students, the issue goes beyond policy changes and safety precautions, with their shattered sense of safety during and after the incident at the forefront. “I don’t know if I’m completely in support of the way the county is handling the situation,” junior Alena Pascal said. “Making kids go back to school the day after having SWAT [teams] in their classrooms with [AR-style rifles] pointed at them is insane.” 

Pascal also went on to describe how the suspect had previously shown the weapon to friends. The Rockville City Police Department said on Tuesday that the suspect had “aimed a gun at a female student earlier in the day.” 

Junior Nari Garnett expressed her feelings about the student-parent reunification process and how she shared a class with the alleged shooter. “You don’t understand, I got home around 9 p.m. because they were taking forever for the parent reunion thing,” she said. “The shooter had a gun on him the whole time, and I had a class with him; it’s just kinda crazy because it’s supposed to be a safe place, but he was able to come in the school with a gun.”

While many students are processing the incident from a distance, others experienced it far more directly. 

Junior Max Gomez was one of the first students to encounter the scene as police arrived. “When I first saw what was happening, it was with the cop when he took a picture of what had happened,” he said. “I think I was in it. All I could do was run back to my class. I was scared. What else would I do?”

For many students, sharing their opinions was only the beginning, with deeper concerns about accountability, communication, and school safety following in the aftermath.

“I feel as if the school tried to handle the situation the best they could with the information they had, but what was worse was how they handled the situation afterward, like having us go back to school even though some of us got back home as late as 9 p.m.; they still made us return to school immediately, which was definitely uncalled for,” junior Ronke Agbemabiese said. “You’d think with all those drills they make us practice, we would be better at it. I feel when they made the parent reunion thing, they weren’t ever serious about it.”

MCPS Superintendent Dr. Thomas W. Taylor said that student absences on Tuesday and Wednesday would be excused.

Agbemabiese’s experience reflects a broader concern shared by students about how the process was handled. Junior Rama Moumneh said students were never given clear information by the school about what actually happened, and how they had to figure everything out on their own. “We were not told why we were in lockdown, and if you didn’t have a phone, which they enforce, you were completely clueless,” she said.

For now, students continue returning to classrooms while still processing the fear and frustration of Monday’s incident. Though any potential changes to current security procedures remain uncertain, many students feel that they are necessary. “My sense of safety at his school is now ruined. Knowing that someone was able to bring a gun into the school day after day without anyone noticing makes me feel unsafe,” Moumneh said. “I’d never think to say it, but maybe we need more security.”