As teens from across the country descend on Washington, D.C., for a massive march to end gun violence, an underground network of high school students is helping to secure hundreds of homes for their out-of-town peers.
The organizers — five friends from Walter Johnson High School in Bethesda, Md. — have set up temporary housing for at least 200 students from as far as California as they travel to participate in Saturday’s March For Our Lives. Hundreds of thousands of protesters are expected to demand school safety measures and push for stronger gun restrictions in response to the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla, which left 17 students and staff members dead.
In just two weeks, Mai and her friends have convinced about 300 hosts to open their homes, churches, synagogues, college dorm rooms and rental properties along D.C.’s Metro transit system for free over the weekend.
The housing network heavily relies on social media and the use of shared Google documents, but it’s a concept with longstanding roots in activism circles. Like many young activists, the students from Maryland say they were moved to action out of frustration following the Parkland shooting.
The friends said they knew many of their peers wouldn’t be able to attend the March For Our Lives in Washington without help.
They began spreading the word about their home-sharing network for March For Our Lives at the end of February, and soon several dozen students and hosts signed up. The young organizers then compared the online forms each participant had to fill out to match like-minded individuals.
While organizers can’t guarantee anyone’s safety, they have been trying to screen for potentially dangerous situations. For example, they contact parents for permission when students under 18 sign up, and they ask for letters of recommendations from hosts’ employers as part of a background check. They also do their best to pair students with families.
Philip Freeman, a 17-year-old high school student from St. Louis, has been texting and communicating on Snapchat with his Maryland host family for the last two weeks. He said he wouldn’t have been able to take part in March For Our Lives without the home-sharing network.
Now, the teen from Missouri — who wants to pursue a career in politics — is counting down the days until he’s in Washington, pressuring leaders to enact tighter restrictions on gun or get voted out of office, and marching alongside thousands of his peers, including the survivors of the Parkland shooting.
“There’s no more reason not to go,” he said.