The Annunciation tragedy was unprecedented. Micah Wagoner ‘27 remembered, “everyone was scared, shocked, just confused.” Greg Perepelitsyn ‘27 recalled, “It was more just more shocking than anything.” Letters of Love leader, Lara Ibrani ‘27, said, “It opened a lot of people’s eyes.”
In terms of reaction, Ibrani believed “it’s the most active I’ve ever seen anyone our age be on a certain topic in our area.” She observed, “People were posting about it [on social media] and going out and visiting the school to pay remembrance to the victims.”
A day after the shooting, Maren Anderson hoped to, in coordination with the Director of Service Learning & Community Engagement, Lisa Sackreiter, “to provide some sort of support in any way that they feel is most necessary for them.” The Blake School Instagram posted, “The Blake community offers our support now and in the days and weeks to come.”
However, the students did not organize or join a walkout or protest. On Sept. 5, over 30 schools from across Minneapolis walked out of class, with some going to the State Capitol. Upper School students took the afternoon off, as was scheduled, following Convocation.
Letters of Love initiated a school-wide card-writing initiative. As Ibrani narrated, “We had access to making letters available for [all levels of the school]… so that they could do that form of community engagement.” Of the Letters of Love program, Anderson said, “That is exactly what they were asking for and hoping for in this time of need, which is the emotional and physical support of showing that we care and that we’re with them.”
Some students believed that the school’s action was inadequate. Ibrani said, “I think the [school] response wasn’t to the degree it could have been. We had one meeting on it in the JNA,…, but there weren’t any proactive actions taken.” Hal Gage ‘28 largely believed that the school reacted appropriately, but also said, “They probably could have done more.” Drew Cheng ‘27 stated, “Due to the severity of the situation, I think more could have been done.” Cheng continued, “Real action needed to be made over just words.” However, nearly all interviewed were unsure what more could have been done.
Other students believed that the school’s reaction was appropriate. A majority of students responding to the October poll indicated that they believed the administration’s reaction was adequate. However, the majority of students also indicated that they believed student reaction to be less than that of the administration.
The school has previously had a massively popular club called Justice League, which pushed for justice and equity. The school has a long history of student activism, from the Justice League to school-wide walkouts in reaction to school shootings and other problems. Following the Parkland High School shooting, nearly 70 students walked out of class and gathered on the front steps of Northrop in 2018.
