Lafayette High group encourages younger students to prevent gun violence

A group of Lafayette High School students spoke to their younger peers Wednesday night about gun violence and how it can be prevented in their community.

The students were part of WAVES, or We Against Violence Encourage Strength, which was formed in October after the shooting death of track athlete and Lafayette student Trinity Gay, 15. Last week, Lafayette freshman Robert “Bobby” Durrum, 15, was shot and killed.

The WAVES presentation at the William Wells Brown Center opened with a slide show of Lexington’s murder victims in 2016. The students then acted out a scenario in which a girl brought a gun to the mall. The WAVES students then asked the audience, mostly fifth- and sixth-graders, about being a snitch and what to do if they see someone with a gun.

One of the WAVES students on stage was Maya Homer, 17, a close friend of Gay.

“It affected our team every day. It’s just a reminder that someone on our team made such an impact on everyone that she knew,” Homer said. “She brought a smile to everyone’s face.”

The adviser for WAVES is Lafayette counselor Julie Bennington. She already has received requests for WAVES presentations at three other schools: Southern Elementary, Crawford Middle and Martin Luther King Jr. Academy for Excellence. Bennington said she hopes to expand WAVES into an after-school club at Lafayette.

Of Durrum’s death, she said, “It hit (the students) hard, even the ones that didn’t know him. It’s just unbelievable that so many kids now are possessing guns and are being killed because of guns.”

This story was originally published January 25, 2017 at 9:19 PM with the headline "Lafayette High group encourages younger students to prevent gun violence."