ORLANDO, Fla. — It was just before noon when the gunshots echoed through the hallways on May 24th, 2022. Not long before summer break, Robb Elementary students, in Uvalde, Texas, were now at the center of a nightmare – a gunman, equipped with an assault rifle, entered their classroom and opened fire, ending with one of the deadliest school shootings in the history of the United States.
Nineteen children and two teachers were killed. The shooter, Salvador Ramos, was also killed by law enforcement.
The Uvalde School Shooting was just one of the 644 mass shootings recorded by the Gun Violence Archive in 2022. The database defines a mass shooting as an incident where four or more victims are shot or killed, not including the shooter. This sobering figure, which amounts to nearly two mass shootings each day, reflects a grim reality since 2020 – the number of mass shootings in the U.S. consistently exceeds the number of days in the year.
According to the K-12 School Shooting Database, there has been a sharp rise in the number of mass casualty incidents at schools in America since Sandy Hook in 2012, with 2023 becoming the deadliest year ever. A staggering 349 school shootings were reported nationwide. “There are only 180 school days. So, we’re looking at two shootings a day. Just about every day,” said Monty Clark, the CEO of a Florida company that makes personal body armor for children. “We’ve got to do something about this.”
Despite the increasing death toll and growing fear among students, teachers, and parents, meaningful legislative action remains hard to achieve. Gun control debates continue to divide Congress, with efforts to ban assault weapons or implement universal background checks often stalling due to partisan deadlock.
Meanwhile, schools are left to implement their own safety measures – from active shooter drills and security vestibules to armed resource officers and, controversially, bulletproof backpacks. But for many, these measures feel more like a Band-Aid than a real fix.
“Gun violence is still one of the most important issues facing our country. We still have an ongoing epidemic,” said Nicole Hockley, the CEO of Sandy Hook Promise, a gun violence prevention group founded after the Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting in 2012 in Connecticut. The incident ended with six adults and 20 children – including her son – dead.
Public opinion surveys consistently show that a majority of Americans support stricter gun laws, particularly regarding high-capacity weapons and access to firearms by individuals with violent histories. Still, the political landscape remains fractured, with lobbying power from gun rights organizations complicating reform efforts. “I think it should affect everybody, right?
The number one killer of children and teens in America today is not car accidents or illness, it’s guns. More kids are killed by guns in America than by any other means,” said Clark, whose company developed t-shirts with bullet-resistant panels for school-aged kids.
“Nothing’s going to stop an AR-15 military assault rifle, but the vast majority of school shootings are with a handgun, and of that, the vast majority are with a nine-millimeter, and the Ricochet t-shirt can stop a nine-millimeter.”
As a new school year begins, parents across the country brace themselves again, hoping their child’s classroom won’t become the next headline. The shadow of Uvalde—and Sandy Hook, Parkland, and Nashville—looms large, symbolizing a nation still searching for answers amid an epidemic that shows no signs of slowing down.
“I wish our children didn’t have to protect themselves from shooters, but they do,” said Clark. “I have no problem with the Second Amendment, okay, but this cannot be what the Founding Fathers had in mind. In an ideal future, we wouldn’t need this product.”
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