It’s the battlefield of a generation. The high school shooting in Parkland, Florida, the nation’s third-deadliest school shooting, ignited a movement that brought hundreds of thousands of people to the streets of Washington, D.C. and to protests throughout the country. The survivors of Sandy Hook Elementary were too young to lead the movement. The teenagers of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High have a voice and the social media savvy to amplify it. A group of diverse journalism students from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee set out on a three-state journey to capture the sights, sounds, issues, and people behind what a Reuters reporter at a National Press Club gun policy discussion called “Generation Lockdown.”
Twelve journalism students headed to D.C. for the March for Our Lives. They spoke to Parkland students making posters outside the White House. They went to the homes of residents who took in strangers, and attended a spoken-word event. During the march, they spread out, giving voice to Black Lives Matter protesters, veterans, youths, counter-protesters, and the older people. They explored the racial disparity in media coverage of gun violence. A trio of students then headed to nearby Virginia, where they visited an Arlington gun store and a Manassas gun show happening the same day as the march. They explored the deeper history of America’s bloody and long history with guns. Another group of students covered the marches in Milwaukee and Madison, Wisconsin, and a 50-mile walk to the Janesville home of House Speaker Paul Ryan organized by Wisconsin high-schoolers.
Click the menu in the upper right to explore the students’ reporting via video, print, audio, photos and a documentary.