Gun control has become an increasingly contentious debate in recent years as mass shootings have been on the rise. As of June, 948 school shootings have taken place since the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in December, 2012, according to Sandy Hook Promise, a nonprofit organization aiming to prevent gun violence. The recent shootings, including the May 24 Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, Texas and the May 14 shooting at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, have further entrenched these debates.
After the Uvalde shooting, Gisela Rivera, a UO rising sophomore with a major in psychology, made a poster in memory of the victims and put it in front of the EMU. In the weeks following, she saw people place flowers and candles by it.
“I knew that there was a community within our school that [does] feel emotions for this and do want that community. And I just think [the response to Uvalde] was really the start of [me] wanting to make the community on campus,” Rivera said.
Rivera is a founding member and group leader of the UO branch of Students Demand Action, a national nonprofit organization that aims to prevent gun violence. The organization is aimed at high school and college students who want to enact change in their communities. The UO branch is not yet an official club, but it anticipates approval before fall term.
In 2012, UO enacted policy IV.05.05, which bans all firearms on campus with few exceptions such as for the UOPD and research purposes.
While shootings at colleges are not unheard of, K-12 schools are more likely to get attacked. The 4J School Board decided on June 22 to enact the KGBB policy. The policy institutes a ban on firearms on all school grounds with the exception of when they are unloaded and placed securely in a locked vehicle.
“Earlier this year the [Oregon] legislature passed a law that allowed school districts to now disallow concealed carry from being permitted on school grounds. And almost like dominoes, districts across the state enacted policy that prohibited concealed carry. We weren’t necessarily close to amongst the first, there were quite a few ahead of us. Portland, Beaverton, folks like that,” Maya Rabasa, 4J School Board Chair said. “In between that happening and us passing [the policy] there was the tragic – I have no better word for it – massacre that happened in Uvalde, Texas, but it wasn’t a decision or a motion that started because or in reaction to that. It was something that was already in the works.”
The policy was first proposed at a school board meeting on May 18. According to Rabasaa, at that meeting there was a disruption due to a lack of knowledge about the public input process. To ensure that community members had time to voice their opinions, the decision was delayed a month.
Rabasa moved to the Eugene area in the 1990s, a few years before the 1998 shooting at Thurston High School in Springfield which killed two students and injured 25. She saw the impact of that event on the local community and still sees it today; the students who were in the cafeteria at Thurston are now parents with students in public schools.
Rivera’s mom works as a school counselor, which has informed a lot of Rivera’s life. She hopes to use her degree in psychology to help students who may be more vulnerable to gun violence and to provide resources for those who are struggling.
“This is definitely something in the realm of prevention and a desire to mitigate any potential risk… with guns there’s multiple varieties of risk involved. There’s intentional harm and there’s also accidental harm. When you remove the medium by which accidental harm even is inflicted, then you raise the possibility for a safer environment,” Rabasa said.
Rivera suggested following these organizations on Instagram for more information about gun violence prevention: @studentsdemand,@marchforourlives, and @everytown.
For more information about the UO branch, visit their Instagram @studentsdemanduo.
