This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Furman chapter.

You never really think it’s going to happen to you…until it does. The students of Michigan’s Oxford High School walked into school on September 30, 2021 thinking it was going to be like any other day. They were supposed to just go to their classes, have lunch, do their extracurriculars, and hang out with their friends. Instead, they endured a traumatic, cynical attack that no individual should ever have to endure.

At 12:51 pm that morning, 15-year-old Ethan Crumbley walked into the boy’s bathroom with a backpack and walked out with a 9mm semiautomatic pistol. At a methodical pace, he walked down the hallway aiming inside classrooms and at students trying to escape. After the first gunshots, some students attempted to escape through windows while many seeked refuge inside of classrooms–barricading themselves with chairs and tables. Within 5 minutes, 11 people had been shot. After more than a hundred 911 calls, police quickly apprehended Crumbley. He is now facing a multitude of charges such as: 4 counts of first-degree murder, 7 counts of assault with intent to murder, 12 counts of possession of a firearm in the commission of a felony, and 1 count of terrorism causing death.

In the end, 30 shots were fired, 7 were injured, and 4 are dead.

Can you imagine that feeling of sheer fear and panic that you won’t make it back home today? Can you imagine seeing your peers and close friends getting shot and dying in front of your eyes?

To make matters more horrific, the investigation team has not been able to find a motive for the attack. Evidence was acquired at Crumbley’s house not long after the shooting in which they found two video recordings from his cellphone where he talked about killing students and ‘shooting up’ his high school the next day. There was also further evidence such as Crumbley’s journal where he talked about his desire to shoot and kill other students. Teachers and administration did have prior worries about Ethan’s behavior prior to the shooting. In fact, officials at Oxford had reached out to his parents the day before the shooting expressing concern for his behavior after finding him searching online on his phone for ammunition. Text messages between Ethan and his mom were found timestamped after this meeting in which she simply replied with, “Lol. I’m not mad at you. You have to learn not to get caught.”

The day of the shooting, a teacher finds a drawing on Ethan’s desk of a handgun with phrases such as “blood everywhere” and “my life is useless” as well as an image of a person shot and bleeding with a laughing emoji right under it. By 10 a.m. his parents were summoned to the school in which they were advised to get Ethan therapy within the next 48 hours. While this evidence emphasizes Crumbley’s methodical intent to kill, there does not seem to be specific targets or a specific motive other than to perform cold-blooded, heartless murder. Ethan’s parents are also being charged with four counts each of involuntary manslaughter, and 2 hours after receiving these charges the Crumbley’s attempted to flee and were caught by police hiding in a friend’s art studio located just half a mile from the Canadian border. Detained at the same county jail as their son, their bail is set to $500,000.

Hana St. Juliana, Madisyn Baldwin, Tate Myre, and Justin Shilling all deserved to see another day. They deserved to graduate high school, go to college, have a family, and find their passions. Their life hadn’t even begun yet. My heart aches when I think of these victims’ families and the pain they must be enduring–as well as the families of over 1,500 students who desperately waited by their phone for news that their child is still alive. The survivors of this shooting will have to undergo an extensive period of healing from this trauma for the rest of their life.

It is terrifying how easily one of these victims could have been your best friend, your sister, your brother, or simply anyone you care about. This is the 28th school shooting in the U.S. this year. Only 9 months out of the year are students in school–meaning that if there was a school shooting 3 times a month, that still would be less than the actual number that took place. It has become so frequent and normalized that many people are no longer even surprised when crimes like this occur. This shouldn’t happen. Parents should not have to be afraid to send their children off to school. Students should not have to fear an environment where they are supposed to feel safe and learn. The U.S. needs stricter regulations and better gun control. It needs to politically and socially develop with current times and take action to make their citizens feel safer. It needs to realize that we don’t necessarily need to follow the same ideology as the original lawmakers–who of which were all white males and typically slave owners. We need a future with laws in place that are for the betterment of the people and all people. We need a future where guns can’t be easily purchased in a nearby gun show. We need a future where children feel safe. We need a future with change.

Please donate to families of the victims:

The Forever Echoing Gunshots of the Oxford High School Shooting

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