NBC Nightly News with Tom Llamas - Kate Snow interviews Parkland survivors one year since deadly mass shooting

Episode Date: February 14, 2019

Kate Snow sits down with three student survivors of the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, as well as Fred Guttenberg, the father of one of the slain students.

It's been one year since a gunman opened fire at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, killing 17. We sat down with three students to discuss how drastically their lives have changed. Senior Jacqueline Koren says it's tough to think back to February 14, 2018. JACQUELINE KOREN, It's obviously hard to look back, not only now, it being a year, but every single day. It's kind of a hard thing to articulate. It's a feeling that you can't describe and only people that know what you're going through can fully understand, but it's definitely a difficult thing to put yourself in the place you were a year

ago and think how different life was. All of our lives changed entirely, not only just the students in the school and the victims' families, but also just every person that was affected in just the tiniest way. Something changed in their life and and that's kind of a timestamp on our lives now before and after the shooting. Ryan Servaitis was a freshman. He says his life indelibly changed after the shooting. And I remember you know hearing about what happened and feeling absolutely crushed, because my life sort of ended and began at the same time. I kind of the person I used to be sort of faded away. LISA DESJARDINS- Ryan and Jacklin were just two of the Stoneman Douglas students

who quickly turned to activism in the days after the shooting. Within weeks, they'd organized March for Our Lives. Millions turned out to protest. Then junior Sarah Chadwick spoke at the rally in Washington, DC. SARAH CHADWICK, I don't think it really hit me how much of an impact that march had until afterwards. And I was looking at the drone shots that were taken. And the amount of people there was unbelievable. And to look back and think, like, I stood in front of that many people and spoke, it's like I still get almost nauseous thinking about it, because I'm honestly not a good public speaker, and I never really liked public speaking. Many of the students spent the last year touring the country,

speaking about gun violence and registering young people to vote. I would describe it as hopeful, simply because of the amount of young people that I've seen who really do care about this issue, who are willing to put in their time and their energy into this cause. And really just, you know, I would say that for a lot of us, this activism was a coping mechanism. And, you know, it's what drove us to get out of bed every day,

the fact that we were going to be doing good on the behalf of others, because we simply couldn't bear to live in a country where this is commonplace and where this happens. And I think that the thought that we are helping people is really just a big driving factor when it comes to us going on and us keeping up this effort and this fight to change the country. JANE FERGUSON, Fred Guttenberg has also been fighting to change the country. He lost his 14-year-old daughter, Jamie. FRED GUTTENBERG, You have these dreams as a parent. You always imagine what life's going to be going forward.

I dreamt daily, I thought about that day I would walk my daughter down the aisle I was a father of a daughter and I don't get to do that anymore this year all of my daughter's friends who I love like my kids that I they're they are just the most amazing young ladies, they're all having sweet 16s. I don't have a sweet 16 for my daughter. They're all learning to drive. I won't be teaching my daughter to drive. I'm supposed to be teaching her this year. This was the year where my daughter was gonna take that step in her life

towards independence. And all that that brings good and bad, like I'm guessing there would have been boyfriends. I was actually, I spent years joking with my daughter about that first boyfriend and the speech I was going to give him. I don't get to give it. States have passed nearly 70 new gun laws since Parkland, but there's been no sweeping federal legislation.

I put my initial focus not on a political solution, but on destroying the gun lobby. Because you have to get them removed from legislators and legislation to be successful. And I'm proud of the work, and I, you know, not not just me but myself and others have done because they are not what they used to be they have not figured out how to react to us these things make a difference and I'm actually surprised that only one year later, we've already made the progress that we have. State by state, laws are being passed, and not just with Democratic governors,

it's happening in Republican states as well. They mess with the wrong community and the wrong dad. And, you know, none of us are going away.