“Kids may be only 25 percent of the population, but they’re 100 percent of the future,” Eder said.

One day after the March for Our Lives that occurred in cities across the country, more than 40 students from all over Wisconsin gathered in Madison to begin marching the 50 miles to Janesville. They chose this destination because it is the hometown of Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan. The intention was to challenge him to act on gun reform.

Zaria Witticker is terrified of the threats facing young people in schools across the country.

“It’s a really important thing and change needs to happen,” said Witticker, a marcher from Eau Claire. “We have the awesome young voices from all across Wisconsin saying that we need to change so hopefully that will really inspire people.”

Eder had help organizing the march from several of her peers at Shorewood High School. They were inspired by the survivors of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida.

“It’s scary but it takes a lot of strength for the young people that are stepping up and marching, especially marching 50 miles,” Eder said. “It takes a lot of strength in the face of all that fear to stand up and say, ‘I’m going to do something about this, and I have the power to do something about this.”

Several students from Shorewood gathered in Eder’s mother’s basement to plan logistics.

“We are very proud of Katie,” her mother, Laura Parachio, said. “We told our children to use their powers for good, and Katie has definitely used her powers for good.”

Eder and her fellow classmates organized the walk with the help from the activist organization MarchOn, which planned the Women’s March, and Urban Underground in Milwaukee. MarchOn strives to make change in politics at the federal, state and local levels by advocating for legislation and political candidates.

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“We have a lot of synergies between the two organizations,” Eder said.

The two share the same goal: to continue coverage of a major issue and not let it fade out of the media.

“How can we move forward? How can we keep the momentum going?” Eder said.

Eder is coordinating a launch of #50States along with the hashtag #50MilesMore, encouraging students from around the country to march 50 miles to the hometown of their representative and demand changes in gun control.

A dozen students marchers spoke at the rally in Traxler Park, calling out Paul Ryan in spoken poems and open letters. It was here where they made their requests known.

“These are demands that we believe are sensible and will surely decrease the number of deaths this issue causes,” 17-year-old Shorewood High School student Brenden Fardella said.

The march was four days long, with the students traveling 13 miles a day. Adult allies provided meals and snacks, and shuttled them back and forth for bathroom breaks along the way. They slept in high school gyms with sleeping bags.

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“Schools are really, really kind about it,” said Eder. “It’s during Spring Break and so the schools aren’t being used and so they kind of opened their doors and said ‘come stay, we’d be happy to have you.'”

The students from Shorewood High say they were inspired by the 54-mile march to Montgomery that occurred in 1965.

“The Civil Rights Movement was a time when people looked at the issue of equality for black Americans as something that was never going to happen and that was impossible,” Eder said. “That’s a word that was used a lot and is being used a lot now, that gun reform will never happen and that it’s an impossible cause.”

However, they’re not going to let that one word stop them from fighting for their goal.

“We’re trying to make the impossible possible and I truly believe that this is the time that it’s going to happen,” Eder said. “The young people are ready for change and we’re ready to fight to make it happen.”

While more than 40 students marched from Madison to Janesville, Eder was welcomed by around 1,000 people at the final destination: Traxler Park in Paul Ryan’s hometown.

The first of their three demands was a ban on all military-style weapons. Their second demand was a ban on accessories that turn semi-automatic weapons into automatic weapons. The third is a background check at any arms dealer, and an increase in age restrictions.

“It was really powerful. I’ve imagined this moment for the last month and a half and it was finally here and it finally happened,” Eder said. “It almost feels like a dream. It was everything I could have expected and more.”

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“We don’t teach this to scare you, but to prepare you. Just in case,” said Rafferty told the crowd in room 191 in the Architecture and Urban Planning building one week after the shooting in Parkland Fl. “It doesn’t matter where you’re at, where you’ve been, your training, or your education. Don’t be naïve to the fact that this can happen to you.”

Each training session is around an hour long and highlights three main components: Avoid, Deny, Defend.

“You have to think, ‘Survivor mindset, avoid, deny, defend, what am I doing?” Rafferty said.

The avoid step involves staying as far away from the shooter as possible. With the Deny technique you would barricade all entrances and exits, denying the shooter from coming near you.

Rafferty urges all to only defend yourself if the first two steps are unsuccessful or impossible, unless you are properly trained in combat.

Officer Noel Ybarra of the UWM Police Department shared a description of the kinds of training they now undergo as new recruits.

“When we get hired, we all have to go through this exact same training. I’ve been through the Alert Training, it’s part of what we teach you, its hosted by the FBI and the University of Texas,” Ybarra said. “I’ve also been to Rescue Taskforce training, which prepares you for what to do after an active shooter event.”

“We go through training like this three, maybe four times annually,” Rafferty said.

This method is only one of many known training procedures and is very similar to the previously used technique: Run, Hide, Fight. The difference is the thought process involved from an individual standpoint. There are many other strategies to survive an active shooter situation, but Rafferty urges all to use whichever training they believe will keep them alive.

If there’s one thing Rafferty stressed more than anything, it’s that what you do is up to you.

“So many times we give you crime-prevention tips, we’re used to telling you what to do,” said Rafferty. “In this, I can’t tell you what to do.”

Rafferty recommends that students attend the Active Shooter Training, as well as the self-defense, and CPR courses offered on campus.

“You have to be prepared mentally and physically to deal with an active shooter and you tell yourself with a survivor mentality, ‘I will survive this incident’,” Rafferty said.

In addition to a detailed PowerPoint presentation, Officer Rafferty also played a Civilian Response to an Active
Shooter video during this training session. You can view the video here.

This training is aptly timed as gun violence is a major controversy in the US recently, with good cause.
“You see it on the news like I do people, this stuff is real,” Rafferty said.

According to a study by the Citizens Crime Commission of New York City, shootings on college campuses have become more and more common. The research states that during just the 2015-2016 school year there were 30 shootings on college campuses. This is a rather large increase from only 12 during 2010-2011.

Although this seems like a tough subject to educate young people, Rafferty doesn’t mind at all.

“I like giving the information,” Rafferty said. “My main goal is first-of-all making sure everybody here at UWM is safe, and especially for the students making sure that they’re successful while they’re here. This is the best part about my job, giving this information and hoping that they retain it.”

Alyssa Josephs, a student attending the Active Shooter Training program said that the training increases her chances of surviving an active shooter situation.

“I feel like I will remain calmer in a situation, as calm as you can be whenever there is an active shooter present,” Josephs said.

The UWM Police Department now considers itself prepared for an active situation in comparison to only four years ago, when they received media attention for lack-of-lockdown drills, automatic text alerts, or even a public-address system.

UWM’s PantherVision team in 2014 was surprised to find out that UWM didn’t have adequate training for an active shooter after a man with a gun was seen entering Milwaukee Area Technical College, causing the campus to go into lockdown.

This raised questions about UWM’s lack of lockdown procedure, but that was how students were trained at the time. Officer Rafferty was quoted in an active shooter training in 2014 saying “If you lock down an active shooter, he’s locked down with you. He’s locked in the building with you. How are you going to run? How are you going to escape if the building is on lockdown?”

Although you can never fully prepare yourself for an active shooter situation, attending a training, and coming up with a plan can help.

You can find more information about these courses here.

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