Tag Archives: Teens

Florida teens travel to state capital demanding action on guns

Mourners attend a service for Carmen Marie Schentrup, one of the victims of the school shooting at St. Andrew Church Catholic Church in Coral Springs, Florida, U.S. February 20, 2018. REUTERS/Joe Skipper

By Katanga Johnson

PARKLAND, Fla. (Reuters) – Busloads of Florida students headed on Tuesday to the state capital Tallahassee to call for a ban on assault rifles, pressing on with protests after a shooting rampage at a high school that killed 17 teens and educators.

Last week’s killing, the second-deadliest shooting at a public school in U.S. history, has inflamed a national debate about gun rights and prompted teens from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and across the United States to demand legislative action. The incident has galvanized advocates for stricter gun controls, including many survivors of the shooting.

A Washington Post/ABC News opinion poll released on Tuesday showed that 77 percent of Americans believe the Republican-controlled Congress is not doing enough to prevent mass shootings, with 62 percent saying President Donald Trump, also a Republican, has not done enough on that front.

Students who survived the shooting have promised they will push for action. Jaclyn Corin, a 17-year-old junior at the school in Parkland near Fort Lauderdale, said on Twitter that she had secured a meeting with Florida’s Republican Governor, Rick Scott, on the issue.

Scott spokeswoman Lauren Schenone confirmed the governor would be “meeting survivors later this week.”

Mourners attend a service for Carmen Marie Schentrup, one of the victims of the school shooting at St. Andrew Church Catholic Church in Coral Springs, Florida, U.S. February 20, 2018. REUTERS/Joe Skipp

Mourners attend a service for Carmen Marie Schentrup, one of the victims of the school shooting at St. Andrew Church Catholic Church in Coral Springs, Florida, U.S. February 20, 2018. REUTERS/Joe Skipper

Nikolas Cruz, 19, is accused of returning to the high school from which he had been expelled and opening fire with a semiautomatic AR-15 assault rifle on Feb. 14. He faces 17 counts of premeditated murder.

Students, many of whom have grown up in a world where they regularly train for the possibility of being targeted by a shooter on the loose, teachers and gun safety advocates were due to gather in Tallahassee on Wednesday to demand that state lawmakers enact a ban on the sale of assault weapons in Florida.

Gun ownership is protected by the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and remains one of the nation’s more divisive issues. The Washington Post/ABC News poll found that fewer than seven in 10 Republicans support the idea of a ban on assault weapons, the reverse of Democrats, 71 percent of whom support it. A federal ban on assault weapons, in force for 10 years, expired in 2004.

The suspect, whose mother died in November, was investigated by authorities after videos surfaced on the social media platform Snapchat, showing him cutting himself, an assessment by Florida’s Department of Children and Families said.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has acknowledged it failed to act on a tip that was called in last month and that warned that Cruz possessed a gun and the desire to kill.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; Editing by Bernadette Baum and Frances Kerry)

Drinking, drug use largely down among U.S. teens in 2016

By Dan Whitcomb

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The use of alcohol, marijuana, prescription medications and illicit substances declined among U.S. teens again in 2016, continuing a long-term trend, according to a study released on Tuesday by the National Institutes of Health.

But the research found that high school seniors were still using cannabis at nearly the same levels as in 2015, with 22.5 percent saying that had smoked or ingested the drug at least once within the past month and 6 percent reporting daily use.

“Clearly our public health prevention efforts, as well as policy changes to reduce availability, are working to reduce teen drug use, especially among eighth graders,” Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, said in a statement accompanying the study results.

“However, when 6 percent of high school seniors are using marijuana daily, and new synthetics are continually flooding the illegal marketplace, we cannot be complacent,” Volkow said.

The annual survey, part of a series called Monitoring the Future which has tracked drug, alcohol and tobacco use among teens since 1975, also found that during 2016 there was a higher use of pot among 12th graders in states with medical marijuana laws.

According to the study, marijuana and e-cigarettes are more popular among teens than regular tobacco, with a large drop in the use of tobacco cigarettes among 8th, 10th and 12th graders.

In 2016, 1.8 percent of high school seniors smoked half a pack or more of tobacco cigarettes per day, compared with 10.7 percent in 1991.

The use of alcohol has seen similar declines, according to the research, with 37.3 percent of 12th graders reporting this year that they had been drunk at least once, down from a peak of 53.2 percent in 2001.

The analysis found that the use of illicit drugs other than marijuana by teens was at its lowest levels since tracking began.

The study, which is sponsored by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration and conducted by researchers at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, surveyed 45,473 students from 372 public and private schools.

(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

New England Teens Invite Friends With Special Needs To Prom

What was once a night of dresses, tuxes, partying, and popularity has now been redefined as a night to reach out and include everyone in the festivities.

Matty Marcone, a student in Canton, Massachusetts, has special needs and several medical issues. He never dreamed that he was going to be asked to prom, but his friend and classmate, Kaitlin McCarthy, changed that.

Kaitlin invited Matty to Prom after he claimed he was going to buy Disney World for her.

“I said, if he’s going to buy Disney World for me, I should bring him to the prom,” said Kaitlin.

With the help of the hockey team, special education teachers, and school nurses, Matty was able to attend prom with Kaitlin and other friends. Matty and Kaitlin were voted Prom King and Prom Queen.

While Matty was invited to prom by Kaitlin, another special needs teen in New York was about to get asked to prom as well.

Michael Pagano has autism and had been rejected by several girls he had asked to prom. However, senior and friend, Sarah Kardonsky, had a plan to invite Michael to the prom.

Michael is a New York Jets fan, which led Sarah to asking the Jets players via Instagram to help her make a video prom invitation. Nine Jets players total sent videos to Sarah asking Michael if he would go to the dance with her.

And while this invitation to prom led to national publicity, including a spot on a popular daytime television show, Sarah was more concerned that her friend was happy.

“People who worry so much about what dress to wear or who to go with, that’s not what prom is about. Prom is about having a good time. You should just be surrounded by people who make you happy.”