Sandy Hook shooting survivors graduate high school without 20 of their slain classmates 12 years later
Sandy Hook shooting survivors graduated from Newtown High School on Wednesday without 20 of their classmates who were massacred nearly 12 years ago in one of the worst school shootings in US history.
The absence of the 20 students — who were killed when a gunman shot up their first-grade class — left a solemn shadow over what is typically a joyous day for most teenagers.
Those graduating shared mixed emotions over the milestone as they remembered their slain peers whose names were read aloud in a touching tribute, noting they too should be receiving their diplomas on stage.
“We remember your 20 classmates who were tragically lost on Dec. 14, 2012, who will not walk across the stage tonight,” Principal Kimberly Longobucco said, according to the News Times. “We remember them for their bravery, their kindness and their spirit. Let us strive to honor them today and every day.”
Longobucco read out all 20 names of the students who are forever first-graders followed by a moment of silence as attendees bowed their heads.
About 60 of the class of 335 graduates — who pinned green ribbons emblazoned with “Forever in Our Hearts” on their gowns — were former classmates of the victims at Sandy Hook Elementary School and survived the Dec. 14, 2012 shooting that also killed six educators.
“To graduate and miss 20 kids out of your class, there’s no way to go about it without remembering them,” 17-year-old Sandy Hook survivor and graduate Lilly Wasilnak told People Magazine.
Another graduating survivor, Matt Holden, said he thinks of grief in the moments unseen — the ones missed by the 20 students who should still be here, turning their tassels from one side to another, and in the smaller moments that are part of growing up.
“You can always see the moments when someone’s crying at the memorial or something like that, but every single day there are a thousand moments that you don’t even think about, where they should be here,” Holden told the Hartford Courant. “The empty seat at the lunch table, or the kid you don’t see in the halls, that’s what really defines it.
“Some people who didn’t even meet these kids, who went to another school in town, are affected by this. Not because they knew them, but because they should have,” he added. “Because we all should have gotten to know them better than we did.”
“They should still be here and that’s the greatest tragedy of all,” Holden said.
Parents of those killed painfully marked what should have been the day they celebrated their teenagers at events advocating for resources to prevent shootings in the days before graduation, the Courant reported.
“This is a hard month because there should be twenty more kids graduating,” said Nicole Hockley, whose son Dylan was killed. “Dylan should be graduating. And [Principal] Dawn [Hochsprung] and the others should all be here watching them graduate.”
For many of the young survivors — who at just 6 years old witnessed or heard their peers and teachers being slaughtered — the shooting has impacted their whole life and future career paths.
“This is the generation that has grown up knowing nothing but school shootings,” Hockley said, according to the Courant. “This is the generation that will not let that be the future for their children.”
