Antioch High School Students organize walk-out instead of returning to school
Students explain why they were walking out and what it means to them.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WSMV) - Tuesday was supposed to be the first day Antioch High School students returned to class after two students were shot and killed in the cafeteria.
The day before students were set to return, some shared that most of them were not actually going to go to class.
Students said they were going to school Tuesday morning but wouldn’t be attending class. Instead, dozens planned to stand outside Antioch High School with signs and megaphones.
When Antioch High School student Zahra Niazi thinks back to what happened on Jan. 22nd, she says that day will haunt her for years.
“We’re all left traumatized now,” Niazi said.
Traumatized by a shooting Niazi said happened in a place she and so many other students thought they would be safe in.
“Pure fear,” Niazi said. “You never know, it just taught me that you can never know when your last moment could be.”
Just moments after Niazi said she left the Antioch High School cafeteria and was walking back to her class, students came running up behind her, screaming that someone was shooting.
When the students told her who was in the cafeteria firing off bullets her mouth dropped.
“I actually knew the shooter,” Niazi said.
Police said 17-year-old Solomon Henderson shot and killed 16-year-old Josselin Corea Escalante, grazed another student with a bullet, and then turned the gun on himself.
“Nobody wants to go back,” Niazi said when asked about returning to school.
When Niazi and her siblings were told they had to return to school six days after the shooting, they organized a walkout.
“We’re actually going to just go to school but, we’re not going to walk in,” Rafi Niazi said.
Niazi’s sister Sana Niazi said their walk-out was an outcry for help.
“We want better protection for our schools, this shouldn’t have happened in the first place,” Sana said.
While students demanded more safety and security, the Metro Nashville Public School district installed a borrowed weapons detection system in Antioch High School.
“These detectors should have been in place before the incident happened it could have prevented it,” Rafi Niazi said.
Metro Nashville Police said they also assigned a third school resource officer to the school to help.
“We just want to be heard; we want to be seen. We need 100% effectiveness in our schools and safety in our schools,” Niazi said.
Mount Gilead Missionary Baptist Church in Hermitage planned to hold a healing vigil on Tuesday at 7 p.m. to help students, families, and the community move through the tragedy.
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