News Local/State

Images From C-U ‘March For Our Lives’

 
People marching at Douglass Park in Champaign to advocate for stronger gun control laws.

People marching at Douglass Park in Champaign to advocate for stronger gun control laws. @gooddoggoodlife/Twitter

Organizers say more than 700 people came to Douglass Park in Champaign to push for stronger gun control laws, despite winter weather warnings that included snow, sleet, and high winds.

Champaign Central high school student Jasmine Chahal was one of the march organizers. She said she was inspired by the Parkland, Florida students and how they responded to last month's mass shooting at their high school that killed 17 people.

"Students were obviously affected. They’re our age, and I feel like we have 100 percent the absolute right to stand up for what happened, and to make sure things change so that students in the future don’t have to go through the same thing,” Chahal said.

Centennial high school English teacher Lindsay Aikman worked with students to organize the Champaign march. She said it was rewarding to watch the skills being taught to her students every day come to life.

"All the group projects we put together in algebra class, or history class, have now come to life," Aikman said. "The ways that they organize, communicate, work well together and negotiate, respectfully disagree, that came alive in this process.”

WILL video producer DJ Roach was at Saturday's event, and put together this video for Illinois Newsroom.

 

Several protesters braving the snow at the C-U 'March for Our Lives' at Douglass Park in Champaign.

Photo Credit: Bev Thomas

People marching through Douglass Park in Champaign on Saturday afternoon.

Photo Credit: Mary Rivers/Facebook