I often wonder what would happen if I went to a different school. Would I have a regular high school life like all my other friends have? Would I actually want to go to school? Would my school not have to lie to the parents about a tragic event that happened? I’m not surprised as to what happened; I saw it coming. I even said to some of my friends it was going to happen. It all started with a picture of what looked like a gun in someone’s bag. But this was only the beginning.

After this photo circulated on social media, our school was placed on lockdown during 7th period. I was in the cafeteria when all of this unfolded. The faculty got everyone out of sight. Then all of a sudden, I saw around 5-10 NYPD police officers come into the lunch room. I started getting scared. I started to have a panic attack. They started to search for one guy and I saw a silver handgun. Everyone around him jolted up and went to the other side of the lunchroom. He was then taken to the Dean's office for another search. We were still on lockdown and we had no clue what was going on. After they took the first person out of the lunch room we had about a half hour where the police didn’t come in. Then, they came in again and searched around for another student. They found him and took him to the Dean’s office where he was properly searched.

After the whole event was over, we were let out floor by floor. When all of it was over, our principal called an emergency parent meeting. I went to the meeting with my dad because I wanted to see what they were saying. When my principal was explaining the event from her perspective, I was shocked. There was no mention of the silver handgun.

Then, she opened it up to questions and comments. One comment that came up repeatedly was that we need metal detectors every day. The parents all want it. But apparently, my high school doesn’t qualify for it. I thought the slashing was enough, but no. Basically what my principal said is that someone needs to get killed or have a mass shooting to get metal detectors in the school. This policy is extremely troubling to me because why does an incident have to happen for additional precaution. The principal even said, “I am responsible for your children’s safety in the school.” I don’t agree with her decision to not fight for this in our schools because I believe we need these to be safe. I’m going to voice my opinion to my school and share that I don’t feel safe unless we have the metal detectors. We have a right as students to feel safe going to school and action must be taken.