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A Little Too Close to Home

The Shooting in Highlands Ranch

By Dani AshPublished 5 years ago 3 min read
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As I was walking into the building of the high school I teach at, I got a text from my mother. "Your brother is okay. His school is on lockdown due to a shooting at STEM." I nearly couldn't believe what I was reading. The anxiety of how close it was to everything I knew, the grief for STEM. I worked at a swim school not even three blocks away, a two minute walk, on the same street for nearly two years. Students from STEM would come by to swim at our school, both after school, and during for PE. The STEM parking lot is where my dad taught me how to drive, and where my dad and I taught my brother to drive. My old high school, where my brother currently attends, was on a lock out due to the situation, because we didn't know what was going to happen next. My old high school, in fact, was a seven minute drive. And a five minute drive from the home my brother and I grew up in.

Still recovering from the crazy woman who flew in from another state to shoot up our schools, Colorado is already on edge about school shootings. Teachers are working during their off periods to patrol the schools and have extra security. As a student teacher, at age 22, I have accepted that I may get shot in my profession. That is unacceptable. When I was younger, I wanted to be a police officer. In that profession, that's something you'd expect a little more. But teaching? Never should I ever have to accept that. Most of my fellow student teachers feel the same way. Teachers who have been in this profession for ten or more years have cried during our meetings because of the fear they feel. My students are anxious as well. The day we went on lock out because of the threat of Sol Pais, I tried distracting my students. But instead, they ended up wanting to talk to me about how they feel. In the place they should feel safest as they learn and grow, they feel nothing but fear. Sometimes they wonder if they'll be next.

Who will be next? Every time this happens, it feels like it gets closer and closer to home. Will it be MY school next? Where I teach and support my students as they learn? Will it be my BROTHER's high school? Will it be somewhere in the US, far away, but just as devastating? When will it end?

Malls, places of worship, schools, and movie theaters all shot up and leaving people scared.

This was too close to home.

In the above picture, those are brand new homes built across the street from STEM. Some are still being built, whereas others are only two years old. New homes that now face this tragedy. Highlands Ranch is a developing suburb with new restaurants, companies, homes, and schools. And now we all live carrying this tragedy with us. STEM is a K-12 school; ages 5-18 were there. The two suspects are students of the school. So what next?

Do we debate? Do we scream at each other? Do we continue to not get things done? When New Zealand had its shooting, within that week they had done something about guns and implemented a buyback plan. Our inaction is an injustice. Every life lost in our schools is another life lost because of money.

This was too close to home.

It seems too late, but it's still time for us to do something about it before we lose more. Before we lose more lives, lose more loved ones, lose our trust in the places we should feel safe.

education
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About the Creator

Dani Ash

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