Thousands of children from Vero Beach to Martin County, as well as students in schools scattered throughout Palm Beach County paused Thursday to remember and reflect on the tragedy that happened in Parkland one year ago today.
“We thought it would be a very difficult day for them on that campus so we sent them a valentine and we asked all the students in the school to sign it,” said campus minister Ann Frearson.
Frearson and dozens of other facility and students from Cardinal Newman High School in West Palm Beach donated blood as a way to honor the victims from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.
“You know they are always in our thoughts and prayers because that was such an awful disaster,” said student Riley Ziegler.
RELATED: PARKLAND: One year later
At every Palm Beach State College campus on Thursday a moment of silence was held at 2:21 p.m. The same time gunshots first rang out through the hallway at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on Valentine’s Day 2018.
“Those young people, those colleagues, those staff members that were down there, they may be gone but they are not forgotten,” said Dean Dr. Tunjarnika Coleman-Ferrell.
Students at Vero Beach High School displayed 17 desks near its cafeteria for all to see, along with 17 students who wore a white shirt each with a handwritten name of one of the victims from Parkland.
Over at Sandpiper Shores Elementary, kids in the Kindness Club gave high fives to start the day. It’s all part of a #17actsofkindness hashtag trending on twitter. While middle school students from Boca Raton planted trees in remembrance of the lives lost.
A spokesperson for the Martin County School District said students in their district took part in a moment of silence earlier in the day to remember the tragedy that happened on year ago.