When will National Murdered Student & Youth Remembrance Day be celebrated? March 1st of each calendar year.
What is National Murdered Student & Youth Remembrance Day? This National Day will pay honor to all the young people who have been lost due to violence/ gun violence. I choose 3/1 because it is in the middle of the school year, and schools should honor it. March signifies spring and 1 signifies new beginnings. This date represents young people to me because they were just experiencing the spring of their lives before their lives were brutally interrupted. This day will raise awareness to the epidemic of violence amongst people in this country as well as draw attention to the quantity of children/young adults/students that we have lost in this country.
How should National Murdered Student & Youth Remembrance Day be celebrated or observed? This day should be celebrated by every school, family, city, state, and the whole country displaying pictures of all youth/students who have been victims of violence/ gun violence. Schools should teach lessons on mental health awareness. People should hold remembrance ceremonies for all the young adults and children we have lost. I would like to organize a march on this day, a march in remembrance of all the young lives lost, a march where the community comes together, lights candles, and creates posters with pictures honoring and remembering all of the children and young people.
Why was National Murdered Student & Youth Remembrance Day created? I am creating this day because I am a recently resigned school counselor from San Antonio, Texas, and I volunteered in Uvalde after the massacre, and I really would like to raise awareness to the quantity of young people we have lost due to guns/violence. I feel that each massacre is remembered on its own day, but I believe we need to come together collectively as a country and pay honor each year to all of the youth and families whose lives were shattered due to violence. I feel that gun massacres in schools tend to be looked over as though we cared in the moment, but we are not going to think about them everyday, and each community remembers its victims, but the country as a whole really needs to stop, pay tribute, and think about the impact gun violence/violence has had on our children/ students. My own student, Vianeth Ramos was pregnant and murdered her senior year. I remember an 8th grader in our middle school was asked by a girl to go for a walk, and she set him up to be murdered. I counseled so many students who struggled with the grief of losing their classmates, and they are desperate for their friends to be remembered. I include “students” because I want schools to pay attention, and I want college students to be included as well. I include “youth” because not all murdered young people are in school; they may have recently dropped out, and their friends still struggle with their deaths. I want to give the kids who are still living a chance to acknowledge this grief. As I write this, I just remembered when I was 15, my 17 year old cousin was murdered at a party. He had just scored 1200 on his SAT’s. My family was never ever the same. I couldn’t save each kid, but I want to try to bring them justice, and if we create a day in remembrance of all of them, I think the world may decide we can come together and take real action.
Who created this day? This day was created by Christina Montoya in 2024.