Organized by two Paschal High School juniors, the Fort Worth March for our Lives took place at 10:00 a.m. on Saturday, March 24, as hundreds of thousands of students, and adults, marched across the nation and the world. Estimates in Fort Worth say 8,000 attended the rally at the Tarrant County Courthouse in downtown Fort Worth to protest gun laws and ask for action.

Photo editor Sophie Moten ’19 attended both the Fort Worth and Dallas marches, the latter taking place at 1:00 p.m.

“I was struck by the student focus of both of the marches,” Moten said. “There was very little involvement by adults.”

Students at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School, the originators of the march and the survivors of the shooting on February 14 that left 17 students and teachers dead, have asked for supporters and marchers to sign a petition which calls for three steps to be carried out by legislators:

1. Passing a law to ban the sale of assault weapons like the ones used in Las Vegas, Orlando, Sutherland Springs, Aurora, Sandy Hook and, most recently, to kill 17 innocent people and injure more than a dozen others at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.
2. Prohibiting the sale of high-capacity magazines such as the ones the shooter at our school—and so many other recent mass shootings used
3. Closing the loophole in our background check law that allows dangerous people who shouldn’t be allowed to purchase firearms to slip through the cracks and buy guns online or at gun shows.

Watch the slideshow above which captured the heart of North Texas student activism. All photos by Sophie Moten ’19.