Gun Violence

Gun violence affecting my students deserves national attention, too

Chris Fisk is a teacher at Miami Northwestern Senior High School. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own.

(CNN)“Raise your hand if you or someone you know has been the victim of gun violence.”

As a high school teacher, this is not how I want to start my classes. After Sunday’s deadly shooting in the Miami neighborhood of Liberty City, I’ve watched as every single hand, in every one of my classes, has been raised. That’s more than 100 ninth-graders — 14- and 15-year-olds. Gun violence is a reality that my students at Miami Northwestern Senior High School know too well.  A few of the ZIP codes in this community account for close to a third of the shootings that injured or killed children between 2012 and 2015 in Miami-Dade County. Two years ago, Liberty City, along with two other neighborhoods within an area of roughly 4 square miles, recorded and reported 8,280 individual gunshots— an average of 22 bullets a day. And just last week, the same senselessness claimed a 4-year-old girl in the community.
Read the entire article here.

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