Story at a glance:
- Participants across 110 schools joined a walkout against racism and police brutality.
- Some teachers joined the protest and some endorsed the walkout itself.
- The walkout was managed by high school students using Instagram.
More than a hundred students from neighboring Saint Paul, Minn., schools gathered Monday at the state capitol to confront lawmakers, some of whom appeared to be afraid as they peeked through their curtained windows.
The national guard soldiers deployed in Minnesota faced a significant challenge, dealing with the high school walkouts against racial injustice and police brutality, The Guardian reported.
High school students chanted “National Guard, go home!” in downtown Minneapolis in the freezing snow.
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With some waiting for the verdict in Derek Chauvin’s murder trial and others grieving the loss of 20-year-old Daunte Wright, the Instagram-organized protest brought out students from 118 Minnesota schools protest.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune estimated there were about 250 students.
A group called Minnesota Teen Activists was created in response to racism in schools and the police killing of George Floyd. Its founder Gabby Hou, a sophomore at Champlin Park High School in Brooklyn Park, lead a chant around the US Bank Stadium, The New York Times reported.
At 1:47 p.m., the exact time Daunte Wright was shot eight days before, the teenaged protesters sat on the ground for a moment of silence that lasted for three minutes.
The school administrators supported Helen Tefera, a senior at St. Louis Park High School just west of Minneapolis, who helped organize the walkout at her school. She believes that her several hundred students walked out of class in a show of support for Wright and a stand against racism in general.
“We were outside at a time when we were supposed to be eating lunch, we were outside at a time when we were supposed to be in class,” she said. “We’re walking out for something that shouldn’t exist in the first place: racism.”
The protest was so convincing that even some teachers joined the walkout, albeit in the back.
“I think they’re able to stand up and lead and we need to give them that space,” math teacher Christina Efteland of Upper Mississippi Academy said. “They have plenty of power on their own.”
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