Slowly, purposefully, they came to see the white crosses.A substitute teacher on a camping trip. A grandfather taking his afternoon walk. A couple in a pickup truck with their caramel-colored Labrador Retriever in the back. A group of female bikers that rode into town with flowers in hand.With few words, they stood at the corner of Old Carrizo and Geraldine, gazing somberly at the memorial to the murdered: 19 crosses for the children, two for the teachers at Robb Elementary School. Twenty-one killed in America’s worst school shooting of 2022.Nearly one year to the day later, the mourners continue to visit a campus where students will never learn again.“I knew it would be moving,” said Kelly Mitchell, a substitute teacher from San Antonio, who stopped by the school recently while returning home from a camping trip. “It makes it very real. It’s not some faraway thing. It makes it very personal,” Mitchell said.Bob Estrada, who said a relative died in the shooting, paused at the memorial while walking his grandson. He said he visits the site several times a week. “I just come down here and imagine what happened,” Estrada said. “I always wondered what those kids went through.”VIDEO ABOVE: WATCH MARK ALBERT AT ROBB ELEMENTARY SCHOOL NEARLY ONE YEAR AFTER UVALDE, TEXAS, MASSACRE School shootings after UvaldeSince the shooting at Uvalde, more kids have gone through it, too, because the bullets have not stopped, killing more kids and more teachers at more schools, in Texas and around the nation. From May 25, 2022 — the day after the Robb Elementary massacre — until April 30, 2023, 25 more schools reported gun violence on campus, according to The Washington Post’s school shooting database, killing 13 people and injuring 41. In all, there have been 105 incidents of gunfire at K-12 schools since the Uvalde school shooting, according to the advocacy group Everytown for Gun Safety.More than a dozen states have taken action in response in that same time frame.New gun laws passed after massacreOne month after the Uvalde shooting, in June 2022, President Joe Biden signed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. It expanded background checks for gun buyers ages 18 to 21, provided $2 billion for school safety, and will help pass ‘red flag’ laws to temporarily take guns away from people in crisis. At least 74 gun control laws have passed in 13 states since the Robb Elementary killings, according to Everytown for Gun Safety, including new bans on assault weapons in California and Washington.One of the states not on the list: Texas, where a former student used an AR-style rifle to shatter the community of Uvalde. In the 365 days since the killings, the Republican-controlled state legislature has sent no new laws to the Texas governor restricting the type of firearm that was used to take 21 lives at the school, where Kelly Mitchell, the substitute teacher, recently came to mourn her fellow teachers.”Every person had to know somebody that was affected by it,” she said.READ THE FULL RESULTS FROM THE EXCLUSIVE SCHOOL SAFETY QUESTIONNAIRE SENT TO EVERY PUBLIC SCHOOL DISTRICT IN ALL 50 STATES.Mark Albert is the chief national investigative correspondent for the Hearst Television National Investigative Unit, based in Washington, D.C. Tamika Cody, Reid Bolton and Pingping Yin contributed to this report.If you know of school security concerns you want us to investigate or unique district safety initiatives you’d like to share for our ongoing ‘Securing Our Schools’ investigation, please send confidential information and documents to the National Investigative Unit at investigate@hearst.com.WATCH THE HEARST TELEVISION NATIONAL INVESTIGATIVE UNIT’S ONGOING SECURING OUR SCHOOLS SERIES: Part 1: Falling Short – November 2022 Part 2: Cost of Safety – March 2023
Slowly, purposefully, they came to see the white crosses.
A substitute teacher on a camping trip. A grandfather taking his afternoon walk. A couple in a pickup truck with their caramel-colored Labrador Retriever in the back. A group of female bikers that rode into town with flowers in hand.
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With few words, they stood at the corner of Old Carrizo and Geraldine, gazing somberly at the memorial to the murdered: 19 crosses for the children, two for the teachers at Robb Elementary School. Twenty-one killed in America’s worst school shooting of 2022.
Nearly one year to the day later, the mourners continue to visit a campus where students will never learn again.
“I knew it would be moving,” said Kelly Mitchell, a substitute teacher from San Antonio, who stopped by the school recently while returning home from a camping trip.
“It makes it very real. It’s not some faraway thing. It makes it very personal,” Mitchell said.
Bob Estrada, who said a relative died in the shooting, paused at the memorial while walking his grandson. He said he visits the site several times a week. “I just come down here and imagine what happened,” Estrada said. “I always wondered what those kids went through.”
VIDEO ABOVE: WATCH MARK ALBERT AT ROBB ELEMENTARY SCHOOL NEARLY ONE YEAR AFTER UVALDE, TEXAS, MASSACRE
School shootings after Uvalde
Since the shooting at Uvalde, more kids have gone through it, too, because the bullets have not stopped, killing more kids and more teachers at more schools, in Texas and around the nation.
From May 25, 2022 — the day after the Robb Elementary massacre — until April 30, 2023, 25 more schools reported gun violence on campus, according to The Washington Post’s school shooting database, killing 13 people and injuring 41.
In all, there have been 105 incidents of gunfire at K-12 schools since the Uvalde school shooting, according to the advocacy group Everytown for Gun Safety.
More than a dozen states have taken action in response in that same time frame.
New gun laws passed after massacre
One month after the Uvalde shooting, in June 2022, President Joe Biden signed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. It expanded background checks for gun buyers ages 18 to 21, provided $2 billion for school safety, and will help pass ‘red flag’ laws to temporarily take guns away from people in crisis.
At least 74 gun control laws have passed in 13 states since the Robb Elementary killings, according to Everytown for Gun Safety, including new bans on assault weapons in California and Washington.
One of the states not on the list: Texas, where a former student used an AR-style rifle to shatter the community of Uvalde.
In the 365 days since the killings, the Republican-controlled state legislature has sent no new laws to the Texas governor restricting the type of firearm that was used to take 21 lives at the school, where Kelly Mitchell, the substitute teacher, recently came to mourn her fellow teachers.
“Every person had to know somebody that was affected by it,” she said.
Mark Albert is the chief national investigative correspondent for the Hearst Television National Investigative Unit, based in Washington, D.C. Tamika Cody, Reid Bolton and Pingping Yin contributed to this report.
If you know of school security concerns you want us to investigate or unique district safety initiatives you’d like to share for our ongoing ‘Securing Our Schools’ investigation, please send confidential information and documents to the National Investigative Unit at investigate@hearst.com.
WATCH THE HEARST TELEVISION NATIONAL INVESTIGATIVE UNIT’S ONGOING SECURING OUR SCHOOLS SERIES:
